The Java DTrace Toolkit

DTrace is a dynamic tracing framework, initially developed by Sun for the Solaris 10 OS. Since some early beta version of the Java 1.6 JDK, the JVM (at least on Solaris) has incorporated a number of DTrace probes that allow DTrace to extract data from a program running within the JVM at runtime.

I initially used DTrace for Java to study the interaction of the OS with the JVM on the I/O front. I then understood that my scripts might be useful to a number of people doing low level performance analysis so I spent some time to make them a bit more generic and easy to use.

You can download the Java DTrace Toolkit from here

The JDT has been presented in the following short paper:

G. Gousios and D. Spinellis, “Java Performance Evaluation Using External Instrumentation,” in Proceedings of the 12th Pan-Hellenic Conference on Informatics, 2008, pp. 173–177.

###The scripts

Script	Function
jprofiler	Reports the methods and classes that consume most execution time. Can aggregate results by package name.
jmemstats	Report object allocation statistics. Can aggregate results by package name and filter results by specific package names.
jlockstat	Reports methods initiating locking opera- tions in native code.
jiosnoop	File management statistics: which classes cause I/O traffic?
jcallgraph	Display a Java function call graph from Java to the OS kernel.
jgcsnoop	Reports garbage collection statistics: frequency, duration.

###Output examples

####jmemstats

Java Method                            objects alloc
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
java/lang/StringCoding$StringEncoder.encode      486
java/util/HashMap.newKeyIterator                 221
org/[...]/buf/CharChunk.toStringInternal         142 
java/io/UnixFileSystem.resolve                   131 
java/lang/String.substring                       122 
java/lang/StringCoding$StringDecoder.decode      108 
java/net/Socket.getInputStream                   100 
java/lang/AbstractStringBuilder.expandCapacity   99
java/lang/Object.clone                           91
java/io/UnixFileSystem.list                      74

####jlockstat

Java Method                                  Native      cnt
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
java/io/UnixFileSystem.getBooleanAttributes0 malloc      367
java/io/UnixFileSystem.getBooleanAttributes0 free        363   
java/lang/ClassLoader.defineClass1           free        288 
java/lang/ClassLoader.defineClass1           malloc      290
java/io/UnixFileSystem.getLastModifiedTime   free        136 
java/io/UnixFileSystem.getLastModifiedTime   malloc      136 
java/io/UnixFileSystem.list                  readdir64_r 134

####jiosnoop

Java Method                                     syscall  cnt  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
org/apache/coyote/Response.action               _so_send  7
org[...]Http11Processor.action                  _read     7
org/[...]OutputStreamOutputBuffer.doWrite       _so_send  2
org/[...]Http11ConnectionHandler.processConnect _read     1
org[...]/mapper/Mapper.internalMapWrapper       _read     1