03 - Adding a Profiler

In this tutorial, we will extend the previous workflow to obtain performance metrics.

Step 1: Profiling with Perf

Running a profiler is as simple as adding a new parameter in .daisy/benchmark.yml. The workflows support various profilers. For the scope of the tutorial, we choose perf.

on:
  push:
    branches:
      - main

parameters:
  timeout: 15
  partitions:
    - bellis4

steps:
  build: |
    # Update and install dependencies
    sudo apt-get update
    sudo apt-get install -y build-essential

    # Compile the benchmark
    gcc -O2 matmul.c -o matmul.out

  run:
    matmul:
      command: ./matmul.out
      measurements: 1
      profiler: perf

After pushing your changes, Daisytuner will automatically execute the updated workflow. Our dashboard previews the resulting Flame Graph for multiple threads. For a more detailed view, you can also export the speedscope data and use a visualizer of your choice!

Step 2: Hardware Utilization

The metrics parameter allows you to easily obtain performance metrics that reflect the hardware utilization of your benchmark.

  run:
    matmul:
      command: ./matmul.out
      measurements: 1
      profiler: perf
      metrics:
        - flops_dp
        - memory_bandwidth

The Dashboard now shows measurements for the requested metrics on top of the page:

Happy benchmarking! 🎉