KCOV(4) | Device Drivers Manual | KCOV(4)

# NAME

`kcov` — kernel code coverage tracing

# SYNOPSIS

`pseudo-device kcov`

`#include <sys/kcov.h>`

# DESCRIPTION

The `kcov` driver implements collection of code coverage inside the kernel. It can be enabled on a per thread basis from user space, allowing the kernel program counter to be collected during syscalls triggered by the same thread. The collected coverage can be accessed by mapping the device using mmap(2).

By default, `kcov` is not enabled but instead requires the following line to be present in the kernel configuration:

    pseudo-device kcov 1

The following ioctl(2) calls are provided:

`KIOSETBUFSIZE` unsigned long *nentries
  Allocate a coverage buffer with a capacity of nentries. The buffer can be accessed using mmap(2), whereas the returned pointer must be interpreted as an array of unsigned long entries. The first entry contains the number of entries in the array, excluding the first entry.
`KIOENABLE` int *mode
  Enable code coverage tracing for the current thread or any remote subsystem attached using `KIOREMOTEATTACH`. The mode must be one of the following:
  `KCOV_MODE_TRACE_PC`
    Trace the kernel program counter.
  `KCOV_MODE_TRACE_CMP`
    Trace comparison instructions and switch statements. For switch statements, the number of traced comparison instructions is equal to the number of switch cases. Each traced comparison instruction is represented by 4 entries in the coverage buffer:
    1. A mask where the least significant bit is set if one of the comparison operands is a compile-time constant, which is always true for switch statements. The remaining bits represents the log2 size of the operands, ranging from 0 to 3.
    2. First comparison operand. For switch statements, this operand corresponds to the case value.
    3. Second comparison operand. For switch statements, this operand corresponds to the value passed to switch.
    4. Kernel program counter where the comparison instruction took place.

    In this mode, the first entry in the coverage buffer reflects the number of traced comparison instructions. Thus, the effective number of entries in the coverage buffer is given by multiplying the first entry by 4.

`KIODISABLE` void
  Disable code coverage tracing for the current thread.
`KIOREMOTEATTACH` struct kio_remote_attach *remote
  Attach collection of remote coverage from other kernel threads, identified by a subsystem. Collection of remote coverage is mutually exclusive with coverage collection of the current thread. The remote argument is a pointer to the following structure:

      struct kio_remote_attach {
      	int	subsystem;
      	int	id;
      };

  The subsystem field must be one of the following:

  `KCOV_REMOTE_COMMON`
    Collect coverage from tasks and timeouts scheduled by the current process, see task_add(9) and timeout(9). The id field is ignored.

# FILES

/dev/kcov
  Default device node.

# EXAMPLES

In the following example, the read(2) syscall is traced and the coverage displayed, which in turn can be passed to addr2line(1) in order to translate the kernel program counter into the file name and line number it corresponds to.

    #include <sys/ioctl.h>
    #include <sys/kcov.h>
    #include <sys/mman.h>

    #include <err.h>
    #include <fcntl.h>
    #include <stdio.h>
    #include <stdlib.h>
    #include <unistd.h>

    int
    main(void)
    {
    	unsigned long *cover, i;
    	unsigned long size = 1024;
    	int fd, mode;

    	fd = open("/dev/kcov", O_RDWR);
    	if (fd == -1)
    		err(1, "open");

    	if (ioctl(fd, KIOSETBUFSIZE, &size) == -1)
    		err(1, "ioctl: KIOSETBUFSIZE");
    	cover = mmap(NULL, size * sizeof(unsigned long),
    	    PROT_READ | PROT_WRITE, MAP_SHARED, fd, 0);
    	if (cover == MAP_FAILED)
    		err(1, "mmap");

    	mode = KCOV_MODE_TRACE_PC;
    	if (ioctl(fd, KIOENABLE, &mode) == -1)
    		err(1, "ioctl: KIOENABLE");
    	read(-1, NULL, 0);
    	if (ioctl(fd, KIODISABLE) == -1)
    		err(1, "ioctl: KIODISABLE");

    	for (i = 0; i < cover[0]; i++)
    		printf("%p\n", (void *)cover[i + 1]);

    	if (munmap(cover, size * sizeof(unsigned long)) == -1)
    		err(1, "munmap");
    	close(fd);

    	return 0;
    }

# SEE ALSO

files.conf(5), kcov_remote_register(9)

# HISTORY

The `kcov` driver first appeared in OpenBSD 6.4.

# AUTHORS

The `kcov` driver was written by Anton Lindqvist <anton@openbsd.org>.

# CAVEATS

The `kcov` driver is limited to architectures using clang(1) as their default compiler.

December 30, 2021 | Debian