Is VTune driver required on machine for analysis only?

[cmichael_martell]

I tried to install VTL on em64t machine with 64 bit Linux but wouldn't install. So now I'm trying to use remote data collection on another machine to drive the sampling process on the em64t machine. Once I have collected the data I will use Pack and Go to analyze on Windows machine. However, we're getting the error "unable to access /dev/vtune_d" presumably since we didn't install the driver on the analysis machine. Is this required if you're not sampling on that machine, just collecting data for Pack and Go. The problem is that I can only use the default project. I get the above error when I try to add additional events.

FYI, we were hoping to avoid installing the driver on this machine since is purely a portal to the target machines.

Thanks, Mike.

[TimP]

I've been using remote collector on RHEL3_U3 x86_64, with the analyzer running on Windows 2000. I've heard the only recommended ways were to run the GUI analyzer on 32-bit Windows or linux. I can't make out from your question whether you are doing that. I think SuSE 9 support was just announced, but SuSE 8 would not be supported. VTune GUI analyzers generally take a lot of resources; I don't see how you will avoid that, or that having the VTune driver installed but not in use would make much difference. Some information on OS, kernels, VTune versions etc. is likely to be needed to get anywhere with your question.

[cmichael_martell]

Unfortunately, I don't have direct access to the em64t machine where I'm doing the sampling. So I can't use Windows VTune to drive rdc. The problem seems to be that the sampling driver is required on the analysis machine even if you're not sampling on that machine. That seems like a strange requirement, as the events may be different on the rdc machine.

[C_Michael_Martell]

Hmm. Maybe I wasn't clear. I'm running vtl 3.0 on IA32 for remote data collection only. It's talking to vtserver on the sampling machine which is em64t running RHEL3, 64 bit. To restate the problem, Is Vtune driver required on analysis machine, and if so, why, since it's just doing analysis not collecting samples.

[jeffrey-gallagher]

VTune really has three basic jobs: 1, to collect performance data, 2, to analyze that data, and 3, to display that analysis to you. VTune can do this in what are essentially two modes of operation, local and remote.

If you are running vtune locally, the data collection, analysis, and displaying all occur on the same system, the one you're sitting at.

If you are running vtune remotely, you launch the profiling activity from where you are sitting ,across the network to a daemon which is listening for such requests, called vtserver. In this model, the data collection occurs on the remote system, but it's sent across the network back to you, where analysis and displaying of the data occur.

EM64T is currently only supported by means of a remote collector, which means you have to install VTune on an IA32 or Itanium server, then install vtserver on the EM64T system.

You may already know that VTune uses processor event registers to obtain information about the events that occur while you are profiling your code. On the Linux side, we require an interaction with the kernel to do this, and, that means a need for kernel drivers and special /dev files that vtserver also uses to get this info.

In the two-server approach, two installations are required: vtl/vtlec on one system, and vtserver on the EM64T model (there are vtservers for windows applications as well as IA32 and Itanium linux servers, not just EM64T.)

I hope this helps!

cheers

jdg