# brendangregg/perf-tools

Performance analysis tools based on Linux perf_events (aka perf) and ftrace

Repository: https://github.com/brendangregg/perf-tools
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/perf-tools
Language: Shell
License: GPL-2.0
License Family: copyleft
Last push: 2023-11-22T18:01:21+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 23/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:20:16.233290+00:00)
- activity 0, release rhythm 8, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 4437, "days_push": 1015, "days_rel": null, "gap_med": null, "n_releases_24m": 0}
- flags: none
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 10460, forks 1668 (observed 2026-08-28T04:10:42.048228+00:00)

## What it is
A collection of shell-based Linux performance analysis tools built on ftrace and perf_events, created by Brendan Gregg. Each tool does one thing well, such as tracing disk I/O, syscalls, kernel functions, and TCP retransmits, with minimal dependencies.

## Use cases
- trace disk I/O latency on a Linux server
- find which processes are calling exec or open syscalls
- summarize disk I/O latency as a histogram
- count or trace kernel function calls
- show TCP retransmits with address details
- profile page cache hit and miss statistics
- trace slow kernel functions above a threshold

## When to choose
- you need lightweight, dependency-free tracing on Linux 3.2+ kernels
- you want quick one-off performance diagnostics without installing BPF tooling
- you are on older kernels where modern BCC/bpftrace is unavailable

## When to avoid
- you need actively developed tooling with modern kernel feature support
- you want BPF-based observability with richer programmatic tracing
- you need supported, production-grade tooling rather than in-development scripts with caveats

## Facets
- artifact type: cli-tool
- maturity: maintenance
- function: monitoring, tracing, developer-tools
- domain: performance, operating-systems, developer-tools
- platform: cli
- tags: perf-events, ftrace, system-tracing, observability, shell-scripts, kernel-tracing, command-line, linux

## Member repositories
- brendangregg/perf-tools (main) score 23

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:10:42.048228+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-29T17:18:59.964258+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/brendangregg/perf-tools (fetched 2026-08-28T04:10:42.048228+00:00, sha eb39bbd572ca)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.