Using the Pablo MPI I/O Analysis Tools with Windows: A Tutorial

Several programs exist to help analyze data recorded in SDDF performance trace files by the MPI I/O extension to the Pablo Performance Analysis toolkit. Both the runtime and the real-time MPI I/O tracing options, available through this extension, generate per-process performance files in the SDDF binary format.  All utilities described below operate by clicking on the appropriate icon and filling in the dialogue box (image below).  Additional information about dialogue box entries is available by clicking on the Help menu in the dialogue box itself.  All utilities are available on the Pablo website [http://www-pablo.cs.uiuc.edu/Software/Pablo/IO-Analysis/IOanalysis.htm].

Three programs have been created  for analyzing the MPI I/O trace files: CreateMPIORecords, MultiCreateMPIORecords , and MPIOstatsTable. These three programs and two others, MergePabloTraces and SyncIOfileIDs, are part of the SDDF component of the Pablo toolkit. They are used to generate the performance reports.

Runtime Tracing

If  runtime tracing was used, analysts would complete the following steps:

1. Run CreateMPIORecords on the SDDF trace file(s), alternatively, run MultiCreateMPIORecords  on multiple trace files..
2. If multiple SDDF trace files were produced, run MergePabloTraces to merge the data into one file. If multiple SDDF files were not produced, the file is already considered merged.
3. Run SyncIOfileIDs on the merged file to synchronize the MPI I/O identifiers.
4. Run MPIOstatsTable on the output from SyncIOFileIDs to produce a report

Real-time (Summary) Tracing

1. If multiple SDDF trace files were produced, run MergePabloTraces to merge the data into one file, and SyncIOFileIDs. If multiple SDDF files were not produced, the file is already considered merged.
2. Run MPIOstatsTable on the output from SyncIOFileIDs to produce a report

Download the Pablo MPI I/O Library User Guide