phpspy

Low-overhead sampling profiler for PHP 7 inspired by rbspy.

For now, works with Linux x86_64 non-ZTS PHP 7 with CLI and Apache SAPIs.

You can use it to make flamegraphs like this:

Synopsis

$ git clone https://github.com/adsr/phpspy.git
Cloning into 'phpspy'...
...
$ cd phpspy
$ make
cc  -Wall -Wextra -g -Ofast -I.  phpspy.c -o phpspy
$ sudo ./phpspy -l 1000 -p $(pgrep -n httpd) | ./stackcollapse-phpspy.pl | ./flamegraph.pl > flame.svg
...
$ google-chrome flame.svg # view flame.svg in browser

Build

$ make
cc  -Wall -Wextra -g -Ofast -I.  phpspy.c -o phpspy
$ ./phpspy -h

Usage: phpspy [options] [--] <php_command>

-h         Show help
-p <pid>   Trace PHP process at pid
-s <ns>    Sleep this many nanoseconds between traces (default: 10000000, 10ms)
-n <max>   Set max stack trace depth to `max` (default: -1, unlimited)
-x <hex>   Address of executor_globals in hex (default: 0, find dynamically)
-a <hex>   Address of sapi_globals in hex (default: 0, find dynamically)
-r         Capture request info as well
-l <num>   Limit number of stack traces to capture (default: 0, unlimited)
-o <path>  Write phpspy output to path instead of stdout (default: -)
-O <path>  Write child stdout to path instead of stdout (default: phpspy.%d.out)
-E <path>  Write child stderr to path instead of stderr (default: phpspy.%d.err)

Build options

$ make phpspy_readelf  # Use readelf (default) binary (requires elfutils)
$ # or
$ make phpspy_libdw    # Use libdw (requires libdw-dev or elfutils-devel)
$ # also
$ USE_ZEND=1 make ...  # Use Zend structs instead of built-in structs (requires php-dev or php-devel)

Example (httpd)

$ sudo ./phpspy -p $(pgrep -n httpd)
0 Memcached::get <internal>:-1
1 Cache_MemcachedToggleable::get /foo/bar/lib/Cache/MemcachedToggleable.php:26
2 Cache_Memcached::get /foo/bar/lib/Cache/Memcached.php:251
3 IpDb_CacheBase::getFromCache /foo/bar/lib/IpDb/CacheBase.php:165
4 IpDb_CacheBase::get /foo/bar/lib/IpDb/CacheBase.php:107
5 IpDb_CacheBase::contains /foo/bar/lib/IpDb/CacheBase.php:70
6 IpDb_Botnet::has /foo/bar/lib/IpDb/Botnet.php:32
7 Security_Rule_IpAddr::__construct /foo/bar/lib/Security/Rule/IpAddr.php:53
8 Security_Rule_HttpRequestContext::initVariables /foo/bar/lib/Security/Rule/HttpRequestContext.php:22
9 Security_Rule_Context::__construct /foo/bar/lib/Security/Rule/Context.php:44
10 Security_Rule_Engine::getContextByName /foo/bar/lib/Security/Rule/Engine.php:225
11 Security_Rule_Engine::getContextByLocation /foo/bar/lib/Security/Rule/Engine.php:210
12 Security_Rule_Engine::evaluateActionRules /foo/bar/lib/Security/Rule/Engine.php:116
13 <main> /foo/bar/lib/bootstrap/api.php:49
14 <main> /foo/bar/htdocs/v3/public.php:5
# - - -
...

Example (cli child)

$ sudo ./phpspy -r -- php -r 'usleep(100000);'
0 usleep <internal>:-1
1 <main> <internal>:-1
# 1535179291.009094 - Standard input code

0 usleep <internal>:-1
1 <main> <internal>:-1
# 1535179291.009094 - Standard input code

0 usleep <internal>:-1
1 <main> <internal>:-1
# 1535179291.009094 - Standard input code

0 usleep <internal>:-1
1 <main> <internal>:-1
# 1535179291.009094 - Standard input code

0 usleep <internal>:-1
1 <main> <internal>:-1
# 1535179291.009094 - Standard input code

0 usleep <internal>:-1
1 <main> <internal>:-1
# 1535179291.009094 - Standard input code

process_vm_readv: No such process

Example (cli attach)

$ php -r 'sleep(10);' &
[1] 28586
$ sudo ./phpspy -p 28586
0 sleep <internal>:-1
1 <main> <internal>:-1
# - - -
...

TODO

• See https://github.com/adsr/phpspy/issues