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Deep Memory Profiler

Introduction

Deep Memory Profiler (DMP) is a 1) whole-process, 2) timeline-based and 3) post-mortem memory profiler for Chromium. See the Design Doc if interested.

Memory bloat has been a serious issue in Chromium for years. Bloat is harder to fix than leak and errors. We have memory checkers like Valgrind and Address Sanitizer for leak and errors, but no handy tools for bloat. DMP is an easy-to-use tool for bloat to know “who is the memory eater”. (It would be helpful also for leak.)

Announcement

Future announcements (e.g. command line changes) will be done in dmprof@chromium.org. Subscribe it if you're interested.

Sub-profilers

How to Use

DMP profiles memory usage post-mortem. You need to 1) get memory dumps while Chrome is running, and then 2) analyze the dumps.  The analyzing script dmprof is available in src/tools/deep_memory_profiler of the Chromium source tree, or can be retrieved by downloading and running download.sh.

Phase 1: Get dumps

You have three options to get dumps.

Get dumps (A): Standalone Chromium

    1. Build or download the latest Chromium Debug static build.  (Shared build doesn't work for now.)
      1. A GYP flag 'disable_debugallocation=1' is recommended.  (See http://codereview.chromium.org/11794029 and http://codereview.chromium.org/11266019.)
    2. Run the Chromium Debug build with a command-line option --no-sandbox and the following environment variables :
      1. HEAPPROFILE=/path/to/prefix
      2. HEAP_PROFILE_MMAP=1
      3. HEAP_PROFILE_TIME_INTERVAL=<interval seconds between dumping>
      4. DEEP_HEAP_PROFILE=1
    3. Remember the Process ID of your target renderer! (c.f. about:memory.)
    4. Find the dumps /path/to/prefix.*.heap which are dumped every HEAP_PROFILE_TIME_INTERVAL seconds.
      • Names of the dumps include Process IDs.  For example, prefix.12345.0002.heap for pid = 12345.  '0002' is a sequence number of the dump.
$ HEAPPROFILE=$HOME/prof/prefix HEAP_PROFILE_TIME_INTERVAL=20 HEAP_PROFILE_MMAP=1 DEEP_HEAP_PROFILE=1 out/Debug/chrome --no-sandbox

Get dumps (B): WebDriver (ChromeDriver)

A WebDriver (ChromeDriver) API function is available to dump. Try dump_heap_profile with environment variables HEAPPROFILE, HEAP_PROFILE_MMAP, DEEP_HEAP_PROFILE specified.  The usage is :

dump_heap_profile(reason='Why you want a dump.')

Note that:

    • You need to set environment variables HEAPPROFILE, HEAP_PROFILE_MMAP and DEEP_HEAP_PROFILE before starting Chrome in your WebDriver tests.
    • You may want to copy the dumps from your remote machine if you run ChromeDriver remotely.

Get dumps (C): PyAuto

A PyAuto API function is available.  Try PyUITest.HeapProfilerDump with environment variables HEAPPROFILE, HEAP_PROFILE_MMAP, DEEP_HEAP_PROFILE specified.  The usage is :

HeapProfilerDump(process_type='renderer' or 'browser',
                 reason='Why you want a dump.',
                 tab_index,
                 windex)

Note that you need to set environment variables HEAPPROFILE, HEAP_PROFILE_MMAP and DEEP_HEAP_PROFILE before starting Chrome in your PyAuto tests. See perf_endure.py as an example.

Phase 2: Analyze the dumps

  1. Run the analyzing script dmprof, and redirect its stdout to a CSV file. You can choose a policy with -p option. Details of policies are described below.
    dmprof [-p POLICY] csv /path/to/first-one-of-the-dumps.heap > result.csv
  2. Copy the CSV into a spreadsheet application, for example, OpenOffice Calc and Google Spreadsheet.
  3. Draw a (stacked) line chart on the spreadseet for columns from FROM_HERE_FOR_TOTAL to UNTIL_HERE_FOR_TOTAL.  (See the example.)
$ tools/deep_memory_profiler/dmprof csv ~/profile/00-test.12345.0002.heap > ~/profile/00-test.12345.result.csv

How to read the graph

Graphs are typical stacked ones which classifies all memory usage into some components.  We have four kinds of graphs from each execution dump based on four built-in "policies": l0, l1, l2, t0.

We're preparing more breakdown policies.  If you'd like to add a criteria for your component, 1) modify policy.*.json files, 2) modify polices.json and add a policy file or 3) tell dmikurube@.

Common components

 mustbezero & unhooked-absent  Should be zero.
 unhooked-anonymous  VMA is mapped, but no information is recorded. No label is given in /proc/.../maps.
 unhooked-file-exec  VMA is mapped, but no information is recorded. An executable file is mapped.
 unhooked-file-nonexec  VMA is mapped, but no information is recorded. A non-executable file is mapped.
 unhooked-file-stack  VMA is mapped, but no information is recorded. Used as a stack.
 unhooked-other  VMA is mapped, but no information is recorded. Used for other purposes.
 no-bucket  Should be small. Out of record because it is an ignorable small blocks.
 tc-unused  Reserved by TCMalloc, but not used by malloc(). Headers, fragmentation and free-list.

Policy "l0"

This policy applies the most rough classification.  

 mmap-v8  mmap'ed for V8. It includes JavaScript heaps and JIT compiled code.
 mmap-catch-all  mmap'ed for other purposes.
 tc-used-all  All memory blocks allocated by malloc().

Policy "l1"

It breaks down memory usage into relatively specific components.

 mmap-v8-heap-newspace  JavaScript new (nursery) heap for younger objects.
 mmap-v8-heap-coderange  Code produced at runtime including JIT-compiled JavaScript code.
 mmap-v8-heap-pagedspace  JavaScript old heap and many other object spaces.
 mmap-v8-other  Other regions mmap'ed by V8.
 mmap-catch-all  Any other mmap'ed regions.
 tc-v8  Blocks allocated from V8.
 tc-skia  Blocks allocated from Skia.
 tc-webkit-catch-all  Blocks allocated from WebKit.
 tc-unknown-string  Blocks which are related to std::string.
 tc-catch-all  Any other blocks allocated by malloc().

Policy "l2"

It tries to breakdown memory usage into specific components.  See policy.l2.json for details, and tell dmikurube@ to add more components.

 mmap-v8-heap-newspace  JavaScript new (nursery) heap for younger objects.
 mmap-v8-heap-coderange  Code produced at runtime including JIT-compiled JavaScript code.
 mmap-v8-heap-pagedspace  JavaScript old heap and many other spaces.
 mmap-v8-other  Other regions mmap'ed by V8.
 mmap-catch-all  Any other mmap'ed regions.
 tc-webcore-fontcache  Blocks used for FontCache.
 tc-skia  Blocks used for Skia.
 tc-renderobject  Blocks used for RenderObject.
 tc-renderstyle  Blocks used for RenderStyle.
 tc-webcore-sharedbuf  Blocks used for WebCore's SharedBuffer.
 tc-webcore-XHRcreate  Blocks used for WebCore's XMLHttpRequest (create).
 tc-webcore-XHRreceived  Blocks used for WebCore's XMLHttpRequest (received). 
 tc-webcore-docwriter-add  Blocks used for WebCore's DocumentWriter.
 tc-webcore-node-and-doc  Blocks used for WebCore's HTMLElement, Text, and other Node objects.
 tc-webcore-node-factory  Blocks created by WebCore's HTML*Factory.
 tc-webcore-element-wrapper  Blocks created by WebCore's createHTML*ElementWrapper.
 tc-webcore-stylepropertyset  Blocks used for WebCore's StylePropertySet (CSS).
 tc-webcore-style-createsheet  Blocks created by WebCore's StyleElement::createSheet.
 tc-webcore-cachedresource  Blocks used for WebCore's CachedResource.
 tc-webcore-script-execute  Blocks created by WebCore's ScriptElement::execute.
 tc-webcore-events-related  Blocks related to WebCore's events (EventListener and so on)
 tc-webcore-document-write  Blocks created by WebCore's Document::write.
 tc-webcore-node-create-renderer  Blocks created by WebCore's Node::createRendererIfNeeded.
 tc-webcore-render-catch-all  Any other blocks related to WebCore's Render.
 tc-webcore-setInnerHTML-except-node  Blocks created by setInnerHTML.
 tc-wtf-StringImpl-user-catch-all  Blocks used for WTF::StringImpl.
 tc-wtf-HashTable-user-catch-all  Blocks used for WTF::HashTable.
 tc-webcore-everything-create  Blocks created by WebCore's any create() method.
 tc-webkit-from-v8-catch-all  Blocks created by V8 via WebKit functions.
 tc-webkit-catch-all  Any other blocks created by WebKit.
 tc-v8-catch-all  Any other blocks created in V8.
 tc-toplevel-string  All std::string objects created at the top-level.
 tc-catch-all  Any other blocks by malloc().

Policy "t0"

It classifies memory blocks based on their type_info.

 mmap-v8  mmap'ed for V8. It includes JavaScript heaps and JIT compiled code.
 mmap-catch-all  mmap'ed for other purposes.
 tc-std-string  std::string objects.
 tc-WTF-String  WTF::String objects.
 tc-no-typeinfo-StringImpl  No type_info (not allocated by 'new'), but allocated for StringImpl.
 tc-Skia  Skia objects.
 tc-WebCore-Style  WebCore's style objects.
 tc-no-typeinfo-other  Any other blocks without type_info.
 tc-other  All objects with other type_info.