How to install perf on a custom build kernel?

Question

I want to use profiling tools in linux. I see some information say Oprofile is not support in Ubuntu 12.04 and the alternate is perf. So I try to install perf.

I installed linux-tools-common, linux-base and linux-tools.

Then I type perf in the terminal and it returns:

perf not found for kernel 3.12.6
You may need to install linux-tools-3.12.6-3.12.6

But I could not install either linux-tools-3.12.6-3.12.6 (I think it's a wrong name) or linux-tools-3.12.6.

Is it a wrong way to install and use perf in that way, or is it the kernel problem(the kernel is compiled by myself)?

Solution 1

You may need to build the tools since you are using a custom kernel. If you want to use linux tools from the repositories, you need to use the kernel provided by Ubuntu. Linux tools checks your kernel version and if it don't match it's own it will not run.

Solution 2

On ubuntu "perf" is a shell script that calls a kernel specific perf binary.

But that's not actually needed, perf is compatible. Just remove the wrapper from /usr/bin and copy any of the perf binaries from ./lib/linux-tools* to it.

Comments

[Rakesh Godhala]

askubuntu.com/questions/50145/…

[user2002993]

Thank you for the reply! I updated the building steps. I think I just upgraded the kernel without changing the basic ubuntu settings.

[user2002993]

I am sorry, Braiam. I don't understand your meaning. I don't have any answer of installing perf on custom kernel. I edit my question to add the information of how I building my custom kernel due to gertvdijk asking. You mean I should add the information below the answer section? But what do you mean by editing my question?

[user2002993]

I see! I try to use perf in my original ubuntu kernel and it works. So isn't there any way to use perf in custom kernel?

[Braiam]

@user2002993 compile it yourself.

[Caychu]

@Braiam This is a very late comment, but would you mind adding some detail about where to find the source for linux-tools (eg. in the kernel source) and how to compile it? (eg. run make in linux/tools/perf) etc? I'd make for a more complete answer.

[Braiam]

@ffledgling unix.stackexchange.com/q/92957/41104