Provided by: makedumpfile_1.7.6-1_amd64 
NAME
makedumpfile - make a small dumpfile of kdump
SYNOPSIS
makedumpfile [OPTION] [-x VMLINUX|-i VMCOREINFO] VMCORE DUMPFILE
makedumpfile -F [OPTION] [-x VMLINUX|-i VMCOREINFO] VMCORE
makedumpfile [OPTION] -x VMLINUX [--config FILTERCONFIGFILE] [--eppic EPPICMACRO] VMCORE
DUMPFILE
makedumpfile -R DUMPFILE
makedumpfile --split [OPTION] [-x VMLINUX|-i VMCOREINFO] VMCORE DUMPFILE1 DUMPFILE2
[DUMPFILE3 ..]
makedumpfile [OPTION] [-x VMLINUX|-i VMCOREINFO] --num-threads THREADNUM VMCORE DUMPFILE
makedumpfile --reassemble DUMPFILE1 DUMPFILE2 [DUMPFILE3 ..] DUMPFILE
makedumpfile -g VMCOREINFO -x VMLINUX
makedumpfile [OPTION] [--xen-syms XEN-SYMS|--xen-vmcoreinfo VMCOREINFO] VMCORE DUMPFILE
makedumpfile --dump-dmesg [--partial-dmesg] [-x VMLINUX|-i VMCOREINFO] VMCORE LOGFILE
makedumpfile [OPTION] -x VMLINUX --diskset=VMCORE1 --diskset=VMCORE2 [--diskset=VMCORE3
..] DUMPFILE
makedumpfile -h
makedumpfile -v
DESCRIPTION
With kdump, the memory image of the first kernel (called "panicked kernel") can be taken
as /proc/vmcore while the second kernel (called "kdump kernel" or "capture kernel") is
running. This document represents /proc/vmcore as VMCORE. makedumpfile makes a small
DUMPFILE by compressing dump data or by excluding unnecessary pages for analysis, or both.
makedumpfile needs the first kernel's debug information, so that it can distinguish
unnecessary pages by analyzing how the first kernel uses the memory. The information can
be taken from VMLINUX or VMCOREINFO.
makedumpfile can exclude the following types of pages while copying VMCORE to DUMPFILE,
and a user can choose which type of pages will be excluded.
- Pages filled with zero
- Cache pages without private flag (non-private cache)
- Cache pages with private flag (private cache)
- User process data pages
- Free pages
makedumpfile provides two DUMPFILE formats (the ELF format and the kdump-compressed
format). By default, makedumpfile makes a DUMPFILE in the kdump-compressed format. The
kdump-compressed format is readable only with the crash utility, and it can be smaller
than the ELF format because of the compression support. The ELF format is readable with
GDB and the crash utility. If a user wants to use GDB, DUMPFILE format has to be
explicitly specified to be the ELF format.
Apart from the exclusion of unnecessary pages mentioned above, makedumpfile allows user to
filter out targeted kernel data. The filter config file can be used to specify
kernel/module symbols and its members that need to be filtered out through the erase
command syntax. makedumpfile reads the filter config and builds the list of memory
addresses and its sizes after processing filter commands. The memory locations that
require to be filtered out are then poisoned with character 'X' (58 in Hex). Refer to
makedumpfile.conf(5) for file format.
Eppic macros can also be used to specify kernel symbols and its members that need to be
filtered. Eppic provides C semantics including language constructs such as conditional
statements, logical and arithmetic operators, functions, nested loops to traverse and
erase kernel data. --eppic requires eppic_makedumpfile.so and eppic library.
eppic_makedumpfile.so can be built from makedumpfile source. Refer to
http://code.google.com/p/eppic/ to build eppic library libeppic.a and for more information
on writing eppic macros.
To analyze the first kernel's memory usage, makedumpfile can refer to VMCOREINFO instead
of VMLINUX. VMCOREINFO contains the first kernel's information (structure size, field
offset, etc.), and VMCOREINFO is small enough to be included into the second kernel's
initrd.
If the second kernel is running on its initrd without mounting a root file system,
makedumpfile cannot refer to VMLINUX because the second kernel's initrd cannot include a
large file like VMLINUX. To solve the problem, makedumpfile makes VMCOREINFO beforehand,
and it refers to VMCOREINFO instead of VMLINUX while the second kernel is running.
VMCORE has contained VMCOREINFO since linux-2.6.24, and a user does not need to specify
neither -x nor -i option.
If the second kernel is running on its initrd without mounting any file system, a user
needs to transport the dump data to a remote host. To transport the dump data by SSH,
makedumpfile outputs the dump data in the intermediate format (the flattened format) to
the standard output. By piping the output data to SSH, a user can transport the dump data
to a remote host. Note that analysis tools (crash utility before version 5.1.2 or GDB)
cannot read the flattened format directly, so on a remote host the received data in the
flattened format needs to be rearranged to a readable DUMPFILE format by makedumpfile (or
makedumpfile-R.pl).
makedumpfile can read a DUMPFILE in the kdump-compressed format instead of VMCORE and re-
filter it. This feature is useful in situation that users need to reduce the file size of
DUMPFILE for sending it somewhere by ftp/scp/etc. (If all of the page types, which are
specified by a new dump_level, are excluded from an original DUMPFILE already, a new
DUMPFILE is the same as an original DUMPFILE.)
For example, makedumpfile can create a DUMPFILE of dump_level 31 from the one of
dump_level 3 like the following:
Example:
# makedumpfile -c -d 3 /proc/vmcore dumpfile.1
# makedumpfile -c -d 31 dumpfile.1 dumpfile.2
makedumpfile can read VMCORE(s) in three kinds of sadump formats: single partition format,
diskset format and media backup format, and can convert each of them into kdump-compressed
format with filtering and compression processing. Note that for VMCORE(s) created by
sadump, you always need to pass VMLINUX with -x option. Also, to pass multiple VMCOREs
created on diskset configuration, you need to use --diskset option.
OPTIONS
-c,-l,-p,-z
Compress dump data by the page using the following compression library
respectively:
-c : zlib
-l : lzo
-p : snappy
-z : zstd
(-l, -p and -z option need USELZO=on, USESNAPPY=on and USEZSTD=on respectively when
building makedumpfile)
A user cannot specify this option with -E option, because the ELF format does not
support compressed data.
Example:
# makedumpfile -c -d 31 -x vmlinux /proc/vmcore dumpfile
-d dump_level
Specify the type of unnecessary page for analysis.
Pages of the specified type are not copied to DUMPFILE. The page type marked in the
following table is excluded. A user can specify multiple page types by setting the
sum of each page type for dump_level. The maximum of dump_level is 31. Note that a
dump_level for Xen dump filtering is 0 or 1 on a machine other than x86_64. On a
x86_64 machine, even 2 or bigger dump level will be effective if you specify
domain-0's vmlinux with -x option. Then the pages are excluded only from domain-0.
If specifying multiple dump_levels with the delimiter ',', makedumpfile retries to
create DUMPFILE using the next dump_level when the size of a dumpfile exceeds the
limit specified with '-L' or when a "No space on device" error happens. For
example, if dump_level is "11,31" and makedumpfile fails with dump_level 11,
makedumpfile retries with dump_level 31.
Example:
# makedumpfile -d 11 -x vmlinux /proc/vmcore dumpfile
# makedumpfile -d 11,31 -x vmlinux /proc/vmcore dumpfile
Base level:
dump_level consists of five bits, so there are five base levels to specify the type
of unnecessary page.
1 : Exclude the pages filled with zero.
2 : Exclude the non-private cache pages.
4 : Exclude all cache pages.
8 : Exclude the user process data pages.
16 : Exclude the free pages.
Here is the all combinations of the bits.
| |non- | | |
dump | zero |private|private| user | free
level | page |cache |cache | data | page
-------+------+-------+-------+------+------
0 | | | | |
1 | X | | | |
2 | | X | | |
3 | X | X | | |
4 | | X | X | |
5 | X | X | X | |
6 | | X | X | |
7 | X | X | X | |
8 | | | | X |
9 | X | | | X |
10 | | X | | X |
11 | X | X | | X |
12 | | X | X | X |
13 | X | X | X | X |
14 | | X | X | X |
15 | X | X | X | X |
16 | | | | | X
17 | X | | | | X
18 | | X | | | X
19 | X | X | | | X
20 | | X | X | | X
21 | X | X | X | | X
22 | | X | X | | X
23 | X | X | X | | X
24 | | | | X | X
25 | X | | | X | X
26 | | X | | X | X
27 | X | X | | X | X
28 | | X | X | X | X
29 | X | X | X | X | X
30 | | X | X | X | X
31 | X | X | X | X | X
-L SIZE
Limit the size of the output file to SIZE bytes. An incomplete DUMPFILE or LOGFILE
is written if the size would otherwise exceed SIZE.
-E Create DUMPFILE in the ELF format.
This option cannot be specified with the -c, -l or -p options, because the ELF
format does not support compressed data.
Example:
# makedumpfile -E -d 31 -x vmlinux /proc/vmcore dumpfile
-f Force existing DUMPFILE to be overwritten and mem-usage to work with older kernel
as well.
Example:
# makedumpfile -f -d 31 -x vmlinux /proc/vmcore dumpfile
This command overwrites DUMPFILE even if it already exists.
# makedumpfile -f --mem-usage /proc/kcore
Kernel version lesser than v4.11 will not work with --mem-usage functionality until
it has been patched with upstream commit 464920104bf7. Therefore if you have
patched your older kernel then use -f.
-x VMLINUX
Specify the first kernel's VMLINUX with debug information to analyze the first
kernel's memory usage.
This option is necessary if VMCORE does not contain VMCOREINFO, [-i VMCOREINFO] is
not specified, and dump_level is 2 or more.
The page size of the first kernel and the second kernel should match.
Example:
# makedumpfile -d 31 -x vmlinux /proc/vmcore dumpfile
-i VMCOREINFO
Specify VMCOREINFO instead of VMLINUX for analyzing the first kernel's memory
usage.
VMCOREINFO should be made beforehand by makedumpfile with -g option, and it
contains the first kernel's information.
This option is necessary if VMCORE does not contain VMCOREINFO, [-x VMLINUX] is not
specified, and dump_level is 2 or more.
Example:
# makedumpfile -d 31 -i vmcoreinfo /proc/vmcore dumpfile
-g VMCOREINFO
Generate VMCOREINFO from the first kernel's VMLINUX with debug information.
VMCOREINFO must be generated on the system that is running the first kernel. With
-i option, a user can specify VMCOREINFO generated on the other system that is
running the same first kernel. [-x VMLINUX] must be specified.
Example:
# makedumpfile -g vmcoreinfo -x vmlinux
--config FILTERCONFIGFILE
Used in conjunction with -x VMLINUX option, to specify the filter config file
FILTERCONFIGFILE that contains erase commands to filter out desired kernel data
from vmcore while creating DUMPFILE. For filter command syntax please refer to
makedumpfile.conf(5).
--eppic EPPICMACRO
Used in conjunction with -x VMLINUX option, to specify the eppic macro file that
contains filter rules or directory that contains eppic macro files to filter out
desired kernel data from vmcore while creating DUMPFILE. When directory is
specified, all the eppic macros in the directory are processed.
-F Output the dump data in the flattened format to the standard output for
transporting the dump data by SSH.
Analysis tools (crash utility before version 5.1.2 or GDB) cannot read the
flattened format directly. For analysis, the dump data in the flattened format
should be rearranged to a normal DUMPFILE (readable with analysis tools) by -R
option. By which option is specified with -F option, the format of the rearranged
DUMPFILE is fixed. In other words, it is impossible to specify the DUMPFILE format
when the dump data is rearranged with -R option. If specifying -E option with -F
option, the format of the rearranged DUMPFILE is the ELF format. Otherwise, it is
the kdump-compressed format. All the messages are output to standard error output
by -F option because standard output is used for the dump data.
Example:
# makedumpfile -F -c -d 31 -x vmlinux /proc/vmcore \
| ssh user@host "cat > dumpfile.tmp"
# makedumpfile -F -c -d 31 -x vmlinux /proc/vmcore \
| ssh user@host "makedumpfile -R dumpfile"
# makedumpfile -F -E -d 31 -i vmcoreinfo /proc/vmcore \
| ssh user@host "makedumpfile -R dumpfile"
# makedumpfile -F -E --xen-vmcoreinfo VMCOREINFO /proc/vmcore \
| ssh user@host "makedumpfile -R dumpfile"
-R Rearrange the dump data in the flattened format from the standard input to a normal
DUMPFILE (readable with analysis tools).
Example:
# makedumpfile -R dumpfile < dumpfile.tmp
# makedumpfile -F -d 31 -x vmlinux /proc/vmcore \
| ssh user@host "makedumpfile -R dumpfile"
Instead of using -R option, a perl script "makedumpfile-R.pl" rearranges the dump
data in the flattened format to a normal DUMPFILE, too. The perl script does not
depend on architecture, and most systems have perl command. Even if a remote host
does not have makedumpfile, it is possible to rearrange the dump data in the
flattened format to a readable DUMPFILE on a remote host by running this script.
Example:
# makedumpfile -F -d 31 -x vmlinux /proc/vmcore \
| ssh user@host "makedumpfile-R.pl dumpfile"
--split
Split the dump data to multiple DUMPFILEs in parallel. If specifying DUMPFILEs on
different storage devices, a device can share I/O load with other devices and it
reduces time for saving the dump data. The file size of each DUMPFILE is smaller
than the system memory size which is divided by the number of DUMPFILEs. This
feature supports only the kdump-compressed format.
Example:
# makedumpfile --split -d 31 -x vmlinux /proc/vmcore dumpfile1 dumpfile2
--num-threads THREADNUM
Using multiple threads to read and compress data of each page in parallel. And it
will reduces time for saving DUMPFILE. Note that if the usable cpu number is less
than the thread number, it may lead to great performance degradation. This feature
only supports creating DUMPFILE in kdump-comressed format from VMCORE in
kdump-compressed format or elf format.
Example:
# makedumpfile -d 31 --num-threads 4 /proc/vmcore dumpfile
--reassemble
Reassemble multiple DUMPFILEs, which are created by --split option, into one
DUMPFILE. dumpfile1 and dumpfile2 are reassembled into dumpfile on the following
example.
Example:
# makedumpfile --reassemble dumpfile1 dumpfile2 dumpfile
-b <order>
Cache 2^order pages in ram when generating DUMPFILE before writing to output. The
default value is 4.
--cyclic-buffer buffer_size
Specify the buffer size in kilo bytes for bitmap data. Filtering processing will
be divided into multi cycles to fix the memory consumption, the number of cycles is
represented as:
num_of_cycles = system_memory / (buffer_size * 1024 * bit_per_bytes * page_size
)
The lesser number of cycles, the faster working speed is expected. By default,
buffer_size will be calculated automatically depending on system memory size, so
ordinary users don't need to specify this option.
Example:
# makedumpfile --cyclic-buffer 1024 -d 31 -x vmlinux /proc/vmcore dumpfile
--splitblock-size splitblock_size
Specify the splitblock size in kilo bytes for analysis with --split. If
--splitblock N is specified, difference of each splitted dumpfile size is at most N
kilo bytes.
Example:
# makedumpfile --splitblock-size 1024 -d 31 -x vmlinux --split /proc/vmcore
dumpfile1 dumpfile2
--work-dir
Specify the working directory for the temporary bitmap file. If this option isn't
specified, the bitmap will be saved on memory. Filtering processing has to do 2
pass scanning to fix the memory consumption, but it can be avoided by using working
directory on file system. So if you specify this option, the filtering speed may
be bit faster.
Example:
# makedumpfile --work-dir /tmp -d 31 -x vmlinux /proc/vmcore dumpfile
--non-mmap
Never use mmap(2) to read VMCORE even if it supports mmap(2). Generally, reading
VMCORE with mmap(2) is faster than without it, so ordinary users don't need to
specify this option. This option is mainly for debugging.
Example:
# makedumpfile --non-mmap -d 31 -x vmlinux /proc/vmcore dumpfile
--xen-syms XEN-SYMS
Specify the XEN-SYMS with debug information to analyze the xen's memory usage.
This option extracts the part of xen and domain-0.
Example:
# makedumpfile -E --xen-syms xen-syms /proc/vmcore dumpfile
--xen-vmcoreinfo VMCOREINFO
Specify VMCOREINFO instead of XEN-SYMS for analyzing the xen's memory usage.
VMCOREINFO should be made beforehand by makedumpfile with -g option, and it
contains the xen's information.
Example:
# makedumpfile -E --xen-vmcoreinfo VMCOREINFO /proc/vmcore dumpfile
-X Exclude all the user domain pages from Xen kdump's VMCORE, and extracts the part of
xen and domain-0. If VMCORE contains VMCOREINFO for Xen, it is not necessary to
specify --xen-syms and --xen-vmcoreinfo.
Example:
# makedumpfile -E -X /proc/vmcore dumpfile
--xen_phys_start xen_phys_start_address
This option is only for x86_64. Specify the xen_phys_start_address, if the xen
code/data is relocatable and VMCORE does not contain xen_phys_start_address in the
CRASHINFO. xen_phys_start_address can be taken from the line of "Hypervisor code
and data" in /proc/iomem. For example, specify 0xcee00000 as xen_phys_start_address
if /proc/iomem is the following:
-------------------------------------------------------
# cat /proc/iomem
...
cee00000-cfd99999 : Hypervisor code and data
...
-------------------------------------------------------
Example:
# makedumpfile -E -X --xen_phys_start 0xcee00000 /proc/vmcore dumpfile
--message-level message_level
Specify the message types.
Users can restrict outputs printed by specifying message_level with this option.
The message type marked with an X in the following table is printed. For example,
according to the table, specifying 7 as message_level means progress indicator,
common message, and error message are printed, and this is a default value. Note
that the maximum value of message_level is 31.
message | progress | common | error | debug | report
level | indicator| message | message | message | message
---------+----------+---------+---------+---------+---------
0 | | | | |
1 | X | | | |
2 | | X | | |
3 | X | X | | |
4 | | | X | |
5 | X | | X | |
6 | | X | X | |
* 7 | X | X | X | |
8 | | | | X |
9 | X | | | X |
10 | | X | | X |
11 | X | X | | X |
12 | | | X | X |
13 | X | | X | X |
14 | | X | X | X |
15 | X | X | X | X |
16 | | | | | X
17 | X | | | | X
18 | | X | | | X
19 | X | X | | | X
20 | | | X | | X
21 | X | | X | | X
22 | | X | X | | X
23 | X | X | X | | X
24 | | | | X | X
25 | X | | | X | X
26 | | X | | X | X
27 | X | X | | X | X
28 | | | X | X | X
29 | X | | X | X | X
30 | | X | X | X | X
31 | X | X | X | X | X
--vtop virtual_address
This option is useful, when user debugs the translation problem of virtual address.
If specifing virtual_address, its physical address is printed. It makes debugging
easy by comparing the output of this option with the one of "vtop" subcommand of
the crash utility. "--vtop" option only prints the translation output, and it does
not affect the dumpfile creation.
--dump-dmesg
This option overrides the normal behavior of makedumpfile. Instead of compressing
and filtering a VMCORE to make it smaller, it simply extracts the dmesg log from a
VMCORE and writes it to the specified LOGFILE. If a VMCORE does not contain
VMCOREINFO for dmesg, it is necessary to specfiy [-x VMLINUX] or [-i VMCOREINFO].
Example:
# makedumpfile --dump-dmesg /proc/vmcore dmesgfile
# makedumpfile --dump-dmesg -x vmlinux /proc/vmcore dmesgfile
--partial-dmesg
This option will make --dump-dmesg extract only dmesg logs since that buffer was
last cleared on the crashed kernel, through "dmesg --clear" for example.
--mem-usage
This option is currently supported on x86_64, arm64, ppc64 and s390x. This option
is used to show the page numbers of current system in different use. It should be
executed in 1st kernel. By the help of this, user can know how many pages is
dumpable when different dump_level is specified. It analyzes the 'System Ram' and
'kernel text' program segment of /proc/kcore excluding the crashkernel range, then
calculates the page number of different kind per vmcoreinfo. So currently
/proc/kcore need be specified explicitly.
Example:
# makedumpfile --mem-usage /proc/kcore
--diskset=VMCORE
Specify multiple VMCOREs created on sadump diskset configuration the same number of
times as the number of VMCOREs in increasing order from left to right. VMCOREs are
assembled into a single DUMPFILE.
Example:
# makedumpfile -x vmlinux --diskset=vmcore1 --diskset=vmcore2 dumpfile
-D Print debugging message.
-h (--help)
Show help message and LZO/snappy support status (enabled/disabled).
-v Show the version of makedumpfile.
--check-params
Only check whether the command-line parameters are valid or not, and exit.
Preferable to be given as the first parameter.
--dry-run
Do not write the output dump file while still performing operations specified by
other options. This option cannot be used with the --dump-dmesg, --reassemble and
-g options.
--show-stats
Display report messages. This is an alternative to enabling bit 4 in the level
provided to --message-level.
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
TMPDIR This environment variable is used in 1st kernel environment for a temporary memory
bitmap file. If your machine has a lots of memory and you use small tmpfs on
/tmp, makedumpfile can fail for a little memory because makedumpfile makes a very
large temporary memory bitmap file in this case. To avoid this failure, you should
specify --work-dir option to use file system on storage for the bitmap file.
DIAGNOSTICS
makedumpfile exits with the following value.
0 : makedumpfile succeeded.
1 : makedumpfile failed without the following reasons.
2 : makedumpfile failed due to the different version between VMLINUX and VMCORE.
AUTHORS
Written by Masaki Tachibana, and Ken'ichi Ohmichi.
SEE ALSO
crash(8), gdb(1), kexec(8), makedumpfile.conf(5)