About Kernel Documentation Linux Kernel Contact Linux Resources Linux Blog

Documentation / ramoops.txt




Custom Search

Based on kernel version 3.9. Page generated on 2013-05-02 23:12 EST.

1	Ramoops oops/panic logger
2	=========================
3	
4	Sergiu Iordache <sergiu@chromium.org>
5	
6	Updated: 17 November 2011
7	
8	0. Introduction
9	
10	Ramoops is an oops/panic logger that writes its logs to RAM before the system
11	crashes. It works by logging oopses and panics in a circular buffer. Ramoops
12	needs a system with persistent RAM so that the content of that area can
13	survive after a restart.
14	
15	1. Ramoops concepts
16	
17	Ramoops uses a predefined memory area to store the dump. The start and size of
18	the memory area are set using two variables:
19	  * "mem_address" for the start
20	  * "mem_size" for the size. The memory size will be rounded down to a
21	  power of two.
22	
23	The memory area is divided into "record_size" chunks (also rounded down to
24	power of two) and each oops/panic writes a "record_size" chunk of
25	information.
26	
27	Dumping both oopses and panics can be done by setting 1 in the "dump_oops"
28	variable while setting 0 in that variable dumps only the panics.
29	
30	The module uses a counter to record multiple dumps but the counter gets reset
31	on restart (i.e. new dumps after the restart will overwrite old ones).
32	
33	Ramoops also supports software ECC protection of persistent memory regions.
34	This might be useful when a hardware reset was used to bring the machine back
35	to life (i.e. a watchdog triggered). In such cases, RAM may be somewhat
36	corrupt, but usually it is restorable.
37	
38	2. Setting the parameters
39	
40	Setting the ramoops parameters can be done in 2 different manners:
41	 1. Use the module parameters (which have the names of the variables described
42	 as before).
43	 For quick debugging, you can also reserve parts of memory during boot
44	 and then use the reserved memory for ramoops. For example, assuming a machine
45	 with > 128 MB of memory, the following kernel command line will tell the
46	 kernel to use only the first 128 MB of memory, and place ECC-protected ramoops
47	 region at 128 MB boundary:
48	 "mem=128M ramoops.mem_address=0x8000000 ramoops.ecc=1"
49	 2. Use a platform device and set the platform data. The parameters can then
50	 be set through that platform data. An example of doing that is:
51	
52	#include <linux/pstore_ram.h>
53	[...]
54	
55	static struct ramoops_platform_data ramoops_data = {
56	        .mem_size               = <...>,
57	        .mem_address            = <...>,
58	        .record_size            = <...>,
59	        .dump_oops              = <...>,
60	        .ecc                    = <...>,
61	};
62	
63	static struct platform_device ramoops_dev = {
64	        .name = "ramoops",
65	        .dev = {
66	                .platform_data = &ramoops_data,
67	        },
68	};
69	
70	[... inside a function ...]
71	int ret;
72	
73	ret = platform_device_register(&ramoops_dev);
74	if (ret) {
75		printk(KERN_ERR "unable to register platform device\n");
76		return ret;
77	}
78	
79	You can specify either RAM memory or peripheral devices' memory. However, when
80	specifying RAM, be sure to reserve the memory by issuing memblock_reserve()
81	very early in the architecture code, e.g.:
82	
83	#include <linux/memblock.h>
84	
85	memblock_reserve(ramoops_data.mem_address, ramoops_data.mem_size);
86	
87	3. Dump format
88	
89	The data dump begins with a header, currently defined as "====" followed by a
90	timestamp and a new line. The dump then continues with the actual data.
91	
92	4. Reading the data
93	
94	The dump data can be read from the pstore filesystem. The format for these
95	files is "dmesg-ramoops-N", where N is the record number in memory. To delete
96	a stored record from RAM, simply unlink the respective pstore file.
97	
98	5. Persistent function tracing
99	
100	Persistent function tracing might be useful for debugging software or hardware
101	related hangs. The functions call chain log is stored in a "ftrace-ramoops"
102	file. Here is an example of usage:
103	
104	 # mount -t debugfs debugfs /sys/kernel/debug/
105	 # echo 1 > /sys/kernel/debug/pstore/record_ftrace
106	 # reboot -f
107	 [...]
108	 # mount -t pstore pstore /mnt/
109	 # tail /mnt/ftrace-ramoops
110	 0 ffffffff8101ea64  ffffffff8101bcda  native_apic_mem_read <- disconnect_bsp_APIC+0x6a/0xc0
111	 0 ffffffff8101ea44  ffffffff8101bcf6  native_apic_mem_write <- disconnect_bsp_APIC+0x86/0xc0
112	 0 ffffffff81020084  ffffffff8101a4b5  hpet_disable <- native_machine_shutdown+0x75/0x90
113	 0 ffffffff81005f94  ffffffff8101a4bb  iommu_shutdown_noop <- native_machine_shutdown+0x7b/0x90
114	 0 ffffffff8101a6a1  ffffffff8101a437  native_machine_emergency_restart <- native_machine_restart+0x37/0x40
115	 0 ffffffff811f9876  ffffffff8101a73a  acpi_reboot <- native_machine_emergency_restart+0xaa/0x1e0
116	 0 ffffffff8101a514  ffffffff8101a772  mach_reboot_fixups <- native_machine_emergency_restart+0xe2/0x1e0
117	 0 ffffffff811d9c54  ffffffff8101a7a0  __const_udelay <- native_machine_emergency_restart+0x110/0x1e0
118	 0 ffffffff811d9c34  ffffffff811d9c80  __delay <- __const_udelay+0x30/0x40
119	 0 ffffffff811d9d14  ffffffff811d9c3f  delay_tsc <- __delay+0xf/0x20
Hide Line Numbers
About Kernel Documentation Linux Kernel Contact Linux Resources Linux Blog
Information is copyright its respective author. All material is available from the Linux Kernel Source distributed under a GPL License. This page is provided as a free service by mjmwired.net.