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| <div class="chapter"> |
| <div class="titlepage"><div><div><h1 class="title"> |
| <a name="manual-intro"></a>1. Introduction</h1></div></div></div> |
| <div class="toc"> |
| <p><b>Table of Contents</b></p> |
| <dl class="toc"> |
| <dt><span class="sect1"><a href="manual-intro.html#manual-intro.overview">1.1. An Overview of Valgrind</a></span></dt> |
| <dt><span class="sect1"><a href="manual-intro.html#manual-intro.navigation">1.2. How to navigate this manual</a></span></dt> |
| </dl> |
| </div> |
| <div class="sect1"> |
| <div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"> |
| <a name="manual-intro.overview"></a>1.1. An Overview of Valgrind</h2></div></div></div> |
| <p>Valgrind is an instrumentation framework for building dynamic analysis |
| tools. It comes with a set of tools each of which performs some kind of |
| debugging, profiling, or similar task that helps you improve your programs. |
| Valgrind's architecture is modular, so new tools can be created easily |
| and without disturbing the existing structure.</p> |
| <p>A number of useful tools are supplied as standard.</p> |
| <div class="orderedlist"><ol class="orderedlist" type="1"> |
| <li class="listitem"><p><span class="command"><strong>Memcheck</strong></span> is a memory error detector. It helps |
| you make your programs, particularly those written in C and C++, more |
| correct.</p></li> |
| <li class="listitem"><p><span class="command"><strong>Cachegrind</strong></span> is a cache and branch-prediction |
| profiler. It helps you make your programs run faster.</p></li> |
| <li class="listitem"><p><span class="command"><strong>Callgrind</strong></span> is a call-graph generating cache |
| profiler. It has some overlap with Cachegrind, but also gathers some |
| information that Cachegrind does not.</p></li> |
| <li class="listitem"><p><span class="command"><strong>Helgrind</strong></span> is a thread error detector. |
| It helps you make your multi-threaded programs more correct. |
| </p></li> |
| <li class="listitem"><p><span class="command"><strong>DRD</strong></span> is also a thread error detector. It is |
| similar to Helgrind but uses different analysis techniques and so may |
| find different problems.</p></li> |
| <li class="listitem"><p><span class="command"><strong>Massif</strong></span> is a heap profiler. It helps you |
| make your programs use less memory.</p></li> |
| <li class="listitem"><p><span class="command"><strong>DHAT</strong></span> is a different kind of heap |
| profiler. It helps you understand issues of block lifetimes, |
| block utilisation, and layout inefficiencies.</p></li> |
| <li class="listitem"><p><span class="command"><strong>SGcheck</strong></span> is an experimental tool that can |
| detect overruns of stack and global arrays. Its functionality is |
| complementary to that of Memcheck: SGcheck finds problems that |
| Memcheck can't, and vice versa..</p></li> |
| <li class="listitem"><p><span class="command"><strong>BBV</strong></span> is an experimental SimPoint basic block |
| vector generator. It is useful to people doing computer architecture |
| research and development.</p></li> |
| </ol></div> |
| <p>There are also a couple of minor tools that aren't useful to |
| most users: <span class="command"><strong>Lackey</strong></span> is an example tool that illustrates |
| some instrumentation basics; and <span class="command"><strong>Nulgrind</strong></span> is the minimal |
| Valgrind tool that does no analysis or instrumentation, and is only useful |
| for testing purposes.</p> |
| <p>Valgrind is closely tied to details of the CPU and operating |
| system, and to a lesser extent, the compiler and basic C libraries. |
| Nonetheless, it supports a number of widely-used platforms, listed in full |
| at <a class="ulink" href="http://www.valgrind.org/" target="_top">http://www.valgrind.org/</a>.</p> |
| <p>Valgrind is built via the standard Unix |
| <code class="computeroutput">./configure</code>, |
| <code class="computeroutput">make</code>, <code class="computeroutput">make |
| install</code> process; full details are given in the |
| README file in the distribution.</p> |
| <p>Valgrind is licensed under the <a class="xref" href="license.gpl.html" title="1. The GNU General Public License"> The GNU General Public License</a>, |
| version 2. The <code class="computeroutput">valgrind/*.h</code> headers |
| that you may wish to include in your code (eg. |
| <code class="filename">valgrind.h</code>, <code class="filename">memcheck.h</code>, |
| <code class="filename">helgrind.h</code>, etc.) are |
| distributed under a BSD-style license, so you may include them in your |
| code without worrying about license conflicts. Some of the PThreads |
| test cases, <code class="filename">pth_*.c</code>, are taken from "Pthreads |
| Programming" by Bradford Nichols, Dick Buttlar & Jacqueline Proulx |
| Farrell, ISBN 1-56592-115-1, published by O'Reilly & Associates, |
| Inc.</p> |
| <p>If you contribute code to Valgrind, please ensure your |
| contributions are licensed as "GPLv2, or (at your option) any later |
| version." This is so as to allow the possibility of easily upgrading |
| the license to GPLv3 in future. If you want to modify code in the VEX |
| subdirectory, please also see the file VEX/HACKING.README in the |
| distribution.</p> |
| </div> |
| <div class="sect1"> |
| <div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"> |
| <a name="manual-intro.navigation"></a>1.2. How to navigate this manual</h2></div></div></div> |
| <p>This manual's structure reflects the structure of Valgrind itself. |
| First, we describe the Valgrind core, how to use it, and the options |
| it supports. Then, each tool has its own chapter in this manual. You |
| only need to read the documentation for the core and for the tool(s) you |
| actually use, although you may find it helpful to be at least a little |
| bit familiar with what all tools do. If you're new to all this, you probably |
| want to run the Memcheck tool and you might find the <a class="xref" href="quick-start.html" title="The Valgrind Quick Start Guide">The Valgrind Quick Start Guide</a> useful.</p> |
| <p>Be aware that the core understands some command line options, and |
| the tools have their own options which they know about. This means |
| there is no central place describing all the options that are |
| accepted -- you have to read the options documentation both for |
| <a class="xref" href="manual-core.html" title="2. Using and understanding the Valgrind core">Valgrind's core</a> and for the tool you want to use.</p> |
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