Re: Post-mortem debugging tools

[Joerg Sonnenberger <joerg%britannica.bec.de@localhost>]

On Wed, Feb 06, 2013 at 08:14:28AM +0000, David Laight wrote:
> On Mon, Feb 04, 2013 at 09:39:04PM +0100, Joerg Sonnenberger wrote:
> > Hi all,
> > we have quite a few tools in base that still require KVM or optionally
> > support it. Removing all tools that require KVM for operation (and
> > therefore setgid) is one of the open goals. It would be nice if that
> > doesn't require adding lots of duplicate code. For that, a decision is
> > required what programs are required for post-mortem analysis (i.e.
> > debugging kernel dumps) and limit dual-KVM/sysctl code paths to that.
> 
> For post-mortem work you often want the raw information from the kernel
> structures (ie including the KVA of things), which the normal user-tools
> don't need.

Agreed.

> Putting the work into a single program that grovells KVM for diagnostics
> (aka SYV crash) means that only one program has to exactly match the
> kernel (and, maybe, could be compiled with the kernel?).

Also agreed. So the question remains, what data does need to be
extractable that way?

Joerg