8. System Debugging and Profiling
Debugging and profiling are critical for maintaining efficient and functional embedded systems, particularly in Linux environments. This chapter discusses various techniques and tools for debugging and profiling, which help identify system issues and optimize performance. Key tools such as GDB, Valgrind, and perf are emphasized to guide developers in troubleshooting and enhancing system resources.
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What we have learnt
- Debugging is crucial for identifying and resolving issues in both user-space and kernel-space components of systems.
- Profiling helps analyze system performance through metrics like CPU usage and memory consumption.
- A variety of tools are available for both debugging and profiling, each tailored to specific components or requirements in Linux systems.
Key Concepts
- -- Debugging
- The process of identifying and resolving errors or issues within software applications.
- -- Profiling
- The act of measuring various aspects of a system's performance to identify bottlenecks and optimize resource usage.
- -- GDB
- The GNU Debugger, a powerful tool that allows the analysis and control of program execution to diagnose issues.
- -- Valgrind
- A tool used for memory debugging, memory leak detection, and profiling in C/C++ applications.
- -- perf
- A performance analysis tool for Linux that provides insights into CPU performance and various system metrics.
- -- ftrace
- A tracing utility in the Linux kernel used to trace function calls and analyse performance.
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