Hi, I'd love to package Linux perf as per Arnaldo's prepared tarball for Debian. If I could get help on the Debian side it would be great! The actions that are needed are:
1) package Arnaldo's tarball for Debian, presumably the build in the sources for linux-perf-5.10 will be a good starting point. The package will be linux-perf and replace the current metapackage of the same name. 2) create an updated linux-base that removes /usr/bin/perf 3) upload the updated linux-base and linux-perf packages for maintainer approval to https://mentors.debian.net/ 4) some how get the previous Debian linux-perf-[45].* packages removed After this, when Arnaldo sends out a new tarball we can update the linux-perf package. libbpf and libtraceevent are currently part of linux/tools, but it would be better to depend on the distribution versions, which can be a future update to the packaging. I'd love some feedback on this plan, whether linux-base/linux-perf have a special process, etc. Documentation wise I've seen there is a lot, but: https://mentors.debian.net/intro-maintainers/ looks fairly to the point. Thanks, Ian On Fri, Nov 12, 2021 at 6:39 AM Arnaldo Carvalho de Melo <[email protected]> wrote: > > Em Thu, Nov 11, 2021 at 10:34:33PM -0800, Ian Rogers escreveu: > > Hi, > > > Debian currently tries to match the Linux perf tool to the version of > > the kernel that it is being run upon. Reaching out to Ben Hutchings, > > he explained to me that this was done back in 2010 due to kernel and > > Linux perf incompatibilities. This was likely the case, but it was a > > bug in the Linux perf tool that should have been fixed. It is the goal > > of the tool to be backward compatible. A problem with matching the > > tool to the kernel version is that users miss out on new features and > > fixes (this topic came up in a recent interview of the maintainer > > Arnaldo Carvalho de Melo [1]). > > > Ben Hutchings informs me that making it so that Debian ships the > > latest Linux perf tool requires updates both to the linux-base and > > linux source packages. The Linux perf tool also has many other often > > optional dependencies, like libunwind, libbpf, libpfm4, libtraceevent, > > etc. In general, having the dependency will unlock more features. > > Linux tools has its own copies of libbpf and libtraceevent, and so > > these may pose some versioning issues. > > We can use LIBBPF_DYNAMIC=1 to use the distro libbpf-dev package, which > currently is going thru some growing pains as libbpf is 0.x, with > several APIs being deprecated, others renamed, and that has been a > source of friction, but should be past us with v1.0. Till then the perf > codebase is being adjusted to allow it to be seamlessly built with the > in-kernel version and with whatever libbpf-devel the distro has. > > > I think it'd be great to get Debian shipping the latest version of > > Linux perf for its users. Hopefully we can agree to change how Debian > > packages perf currently and then work out the best way to package and > > keep it up-to-date. I look forward to everyone's help and input. > > I also keep the tarballs available at: > > https://mirrors.edge.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/tools/perf/ > > Where there are instructions on how to build this detached tarball. > > I regularly build perf on lots of distros, including: > > debian:9 : Ok gcc (Debian 6.3.0-18+deb9u1) 6.3.0 > 20170516 , clang version 3.8.1-24 (tags/RELEASE_381/final) > debian:10 : Ok gcc (Debian 8.3.0-6) 8.3.0 , clang > version 7.0.1-8+deb10u2 (tags/RELEASE_701/final) > debian:11 : Ok gcc (Debian 10.2.1-6) 10.2.1 20210110 > , Debian clang version 11.0.1-2 > debian:experimental : Ok gcc (Debian 11.2.0-10) 11.2.0 , Debian > clang version 11.1.0-4 > debian:experimental-x-arm64 : Ok aarch64-linux-gnu-gcc (Debian > 11.2.0-9) 11.2.0 > debian:experimental-x-mips : Ok mips-linux-gnu-gcc (Debian 10.2.1-6) > 10.2.1 20210110 > debian:experimental-x-mips64 : Ok mips64-linux-gnuabi64-gcc (Debian > 10.2.1-6) 10.2.1 20210110 > debian:experimental-x-mipsel : Ok mipsel-linux-gnu-gcc (Debian 11.2.0-9) > 11.2.0 > > Ditto for ubuntu. > > A complete list can be found in each pull request I send to Linus, see > in the last one: > > https://lore.kernel.org/all/[email protected]/ > > Search for BUILD_TARBALL. > > There is also the output for 'make -C tools/perf build-test' that tests > building with lots of combinations of optional libraries, for instance, > with LIBBPF_DYNAMIC=1, etc. > > - Arnaldo
