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Re: SystemTapGui usage scenarios.


Dave Brolley wrote:
Hi Anithra,

Just to repeat and record what I was getting at during today's call...

It looks to me that one could accomplish just about any usage scenario by thinking of this in a modular way. We have:

o stapgui - a tool for creating stap scripts and visualizing the results of running them
o stap - a tool for compiling scripts on the local host
o stap-client/stap-server - a tool for compiling scripts on local or remote hosts
o staprun - a tool for loading/executing stap modules on the local host
o stapgui-server - the "lean" server you refer to is a tool for loading/executing stap modules on local or remote hosts


Given this set of tools, I think you can accomplish all of the usage scenarios below and likely additional ones as well. One essentially has the ability from a given host to use stapgui to create a stap script, compile it for the local host or any target running an available stap-server (via stap-client), load/execute it on any compatible host (via staprun or the "lean" server) and view the results in stapgui.

i.e., if we think of the "lean" stapgui server as a staprun-server, then there is no need to extend the existing stap-server to provide remote loading/execution of stap modules and, provided that suitable stap-servers are available, you may not need more than the "lean" stapgui server.

As for hard dependencies on the stap compile-server, stap-client has the same user interface as stap (with some client/server specific additions), so stapgui would only need to know to use stap-client when compiling for a target other than the stapgui host.

Does this make sense?

Dave
Hi Dave,

I'm not very clear with the usage of stap-server/stap-server that you have described.
This is what i understood:
The staprun-server(stapgui-server/"lean" server) is to staprun what the stap-client/stap-server is to stap.
1. In a scenario where i create a script using stapgui, and i need to execute it on a remote machine - i use stap-client to create the module and use the staprun-server("lean" server) to execute the module.
2. In a scenario where i create a script using stapgui, and i need to execute on the same machine - i use stap and staprun instead of the stap-client and staprun-server


The problem i have with this is that it creates a "hard-dependency", in the sense , in scenario 1 if there is no stap-server the stapgui cannot be used. I would like to use stapgui even if there is no registered compile-server.

The alternative would be to check if there is a registered compile-server, if not use stap to compile on the remote machine and use the staprun-server for execution. This is how others had interpreted you mail :). Ananth, correct me if im wrong.

Regards,
Anithra.


-------- Original Message --------
Subject: SystemTapGui usage scenarios.
Date: Tue, 07 Apr 2009 21:10:56 +0530
From: Anithra P Janakiraman <anithra@linux.vnet.ibm.com>
To: systemtap <systemtap@sources.redhat.com>

Listing the usage scenarios i can think of for stapgui. Please add to
the list if i have missed something.

1. Client and Server running on the same local machine(a laptop?). In
this scenario a hard-dependency on the compile-server might not be a
good idea. The systemtap installation on the m/c would have the
compile-server scripts, but ideally the compile-server will not be
registered as a service in this case.
2. Client and server on different machines in a cluster environment. A
lean server that only does execution with the compile-server taking care
of compilation would be a good option, esp if the server does not have
the required dependencies like debuginfo setup.
3.  A lean server, with the client doing the compilation and sending
over the module to the server. The client and server would need to have
an identical setup.
4.  The client , server and compile-server all on the same machine
(possibly in a clustered environment) with the m/c running the server
also running the compile-server service.
5.  The client running on a windows box. In this scenario access to the
server's systemtap installation would be needed to list probes/functions
and for syntax-checking.
6.  Multiple servers with a single client.

Regards,
Anithra.






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