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Event Masking

Event levels can be enabled or disabled to trim excessive and overly verbose logging. First, a mask of events is specified at compile time via the KTR_COMPILE option to limit which events are actually compiled into the kernel. The default value for this option is for all events to be enabled.

Secondly, the actual events logged while the kernel runs can be further masked via the run time event mask. The KTR_MASK option sets the default value of the run time event mask. The runtime event mask can also be set by the loader(8) via the debug.ktr.mask environment variable. It can also be examined and set after booting via the debug.ktr.mask sysctl. By default the run time mask is set to block any tracing. The definitions of the event mask bits can be found in <sys/ktr.h>.

Furthermore, there is a CPU event mask whose default value can be changed via the KTR_CPUMASK option. When two or more parameters to KTR_CPUMASK, are used, it is important they are not separated by whitespace. A CPU must have the bit corresponding to its logical id set in this bitmask for events that occur on it to be logged. This mask can be set by the loader(8) via the debug.ktr.cpumask environment variable. It can also be examined and set after booting via the debug.ktr.cpumask sysctl. By default, only CPUs specified in KTR_CPUMASK will log events. See sys/conf/NOTES for more information.

Verbose Mode

By default, events are only logged to the internal buffer for examination later, but if the verbose flag is set then they are dumped to the kernel console as well. This flag can also be set from the loader via the debug.ktr.verbose environment variable, or it can be examined and set after booting via the debug.ktr.verbose sysctl. If the flag is set to zero, which is the default, then verbose output is disabled. If the flag is set to one, then the contents of the log message and the CPU number are printed to the kernel console. If the flag is greater than one, then the filename and line number of the event are output to the console in addition to the log message and the CPU number. The KTR_VERBOSE option sets the flag to one.

Examining the Events

The KTR buffer can be examined from within ddb(4) via the show ktr [/vV] command. This command displays the contents of the trace buffer one page at a time. At the “--more--” prompt, the Enter key displays one more entry and prompts again. The spacebar displays another page of entries. Any other key quits. By default the timestamp, filename, and line number are not displayed with each log entry. If the /v modifier is specified, then they are displayed in addition to the normal output. If the /V modifier is specified, then just the timestamp is displayed in addition to the normal output. Note that the events are displayed in reverse chronological order. That is, the most recent events are displayed first.

Logging ktr to Disk

The KTR_ALQ option can be used to log ktr entries to disk for post analysis using the ktrdump(8) utility. This option depends on the ALQ option. Due to the potentially high volume of trace messages the trace mask should be selected carefully. This feature is configured through a group of sysctls.

debug.ktr.alq_file

displays or sets the file that ktr will log to. By default its value is /tmp/ktr.out. If the file name is changed while ktr is enabled it will not take effect until the next invocation.

debug.ktr.alq_enable

enables logging of ktr entries to disk if it is set to one. Setting this to 0 will terminate logging to disk and revert to logging to the normal ktr ring buffer. Data is not sent to the ring buffer while logging to disk.

debug.ktr.alq_max

is the maximum number of entries that will be recorded to disk, or 0 for infinite. This is helpful for limiting the number of particularly high frequency entries that are recorded.

debug.ktr.alq_depth

determines the number of entries in the write buffer. This is the buffer that holds entries before they are written to disk and defaults to the value of the KTR_ENTRIES option.

debug.ktr.alq_failed

records the number of times we failed to write an entry due to overflowing the write buffer. This may happen if the frequency of the logged ktr messages outpaces the depth of the queue.

debug.ktr.alq_cnt

records the number of entries that have currently been written to disk.