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<title>ThreadSanitizer, a race detector</title>
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<h1>ThreadSanitizer</h1>
<ul>
<li> <a href="#intro">Introduction</a>
<li> <a href="#howtobuild">How to Build</a>
<li> <a href="#platforms">Supported Platforms</a>
<li> <a href="#usage">Usage</a>
<li> <a href="#limitations">Limitations</a>
<li> <a href="#status">Current Status</a>
<li> <a href="#moreinfo">More Information</a>
</ul>
<h2 id="intro">Introduction</h2>
ThreadSanitizer is a tool that detects data races. <BR>
It consists of a compiler instrumentation module and a run-time library. <BR>
Typical slowdown introduced by ThreadSanitizer is <b>5x-15x</b> (TODO: these numbers are
approximate so far).
<h2 id="howtobuild">How to build</h2>
Follow the <a href="../get_started.html">clang build instructions</a>. <BR>
Note: CMake build does not work yet.
See <a href="http://llvm.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=12272">bug 12272</a>.
<h2 id="platforms">Supported Platforms</h2>
ThreadSanitizer is supported on Linux x86_64 (tested on Ubuntu 10.04). <BR>
Support for MacOS 10.7 (64-bit only) is planned for late 2012. <BR>
Support for 32-bit platforms is problematic and not yet planned.
<h2 id="usage">Usage</h2>
Simply compile your program with <tt>-fthread-sanitizer -fPIE</tt> and link it
with <tt>-fthread-sanitizer -pie</tt>.<BR>
To get a reasonable performance add <tt>-O1</tt> or higher. <BR>
Use <tt>-g</tt> to get file names and line numbers in the warning messages. <BR>
Example:
<pre>
% cat projects/compiler-rt/lib/tsan/output_tests/tiny_race.c
#include <pthread.h>
int Global;
void *Thread1(void *x) {
Global = 42;
return x;
}
int main() {
pthread_t t;
pthread_create(&t, NULL, Thread1, NULL);
Global = 43;
pthread_join(t, NULL);
return Global;
}
</pre>
<pre>
% clang -fthread-sanitizer -g -O1 tiny_race.c -fPIE -pie
</pre>
If a bug is detected, the program will print an error message to stderr.
Currently, ThreadSanitizer symbolizes its output using an external
<tt>addr2line</tt>
process (this will be fixed in future).
<pre>
% TSAN_OPTIONS=strip_path_prefix=`pwd`/ # Don't print full paths.
% ./a.out 2> log
% cat log
WARNING: ThreadSanitizer: data race (pid=19219)
Write of size 4 at 0x7fcf47b21bc0 by thread 1:
#0 Thread1 tiny_race.c:4 (exe+0x00000000a360)
Previous write of size 4 at 0x7fcf47b21bc0 by main thread:
#0 main tiny_race.c:10 (exe+0x00000000a3b4)
Thread 1 (running) created at:
#0 pthread_create ??:0 (exe+0x00000000c790)
#1 main tiny_race.c:9 (exe+0x00000000a3a4)
</pre>
<h2 id="limitations">Limitations</h2>
<ul>
<li> ThreadSanitizer uses more real memory than a native run.
At the default settings the memory overhead is 9x plus 9Mb per each thread.
Settings with 5x and 3x overhead (but less accurate analysis) are also available.
<li> ThreadSanitizer maps (but does not reserve) a lot of virtual address space.
This means that tools like <tt>ulimit</tt> may not work as usually expected.
<li> Static linking is not supported.
<li> ThreadSanitizer requires <tt>-fPIE -pie</tt>
</ul>
<h2 id="status">Current Status</h2>
ThreadSanitizer is in alpha stage.
It is known to work on large C++ programs using pthreads, but we do not promise
anything (yet). <BR>
C++11 threading is not yet supported.
We are actively working on enhancing the tool -- stay tuned.
Any help, especially in the form of minimized standalone tests is more than welcome.
<h2 id="moreinfo">More Information</h2>
<a href="http://code.google.com/p/thread-sanitizer/">http://code.google.com/p/thread-sanitizer</a>.
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