[gst-devel] Naming threads ? Other performance debugging helpers ?

[Florent]

Hi

I was wondering if it would be feasible that elements that launch
threads (e.g. queues) could name threads (using prctl(PR_SET_NAME? ),
with the name being constructed after their name, or the neighbour
elements' name. After a quick search [1], i'm not sure the Linux
kernel offers this feature

This would help a lot performance debugging : so far if you want to
know what thread is consuming the most power, you make assumptions on
the nature of processing, and study partial pipelines to estimate the
proportion taken by what, but this approach is very limiting for
detecting/understanding side effects.

Also, any other idea about how to "map" the CPU cycles consumption of
a pipeline or other performance indicators would be welcome. I am
considering developing a tool which would display states/hints of a
pipeline's behaviour in a graphical fashion. So far i experimented
with polling queue filling states, but it does not always prove
helpful. I also don't know how i can access QoS data from python.

Regards,

FLorent

[1] http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/engine?list=linux&do=search_results&search_forum=forum_1&search_string=thread+name&search_type=AND