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NAME

       pmprobe - lightweight probe for performance metrics

SYNOPSIS

       pmprobe  [-fIiLVvz]  [-a archive] [-h hostname] [-K spec] [-n pmnsfile]
       [-O time] [-Z timezone] [metricname ...]

DESCRIPTION

       pmprobe determines the availability  of  performance  metrics  exported
       through the facilities of the Performance Co-Pilot (PCP).

       The  metrics  of  interest  are  named in the metricname arguments.  If
       metricname is a non-leaf node in the  Performance  Metrics  Name  Space
       (pmns(4)), then pmprobe will recursively descend the PMNS and report on
       all leaf nodes.  If no metricname argument is given, the  root  of  the
       namespace is used.

       The  output  format  is spartan and intended for use in wrapper scripts
       creating configuration files for other PCP tools.  By default, there is
       one line of output per metric, with the metric name followed by a count
       of the number of available values.  Error conditions are encoded  as  a
       negative value count (as per the PMAPI(3) protocols, but may be decoded
       using pmerr(1)) and followed by a textual description of the error.

       Unless directed to another host by the -h option, pmprobe will  contact
       the Performance Metrics Collector Daemon (PMCD) on the local host.

       The  -a  option causes pmprobe to use the specified archive rather than
       connecting to a PMCD.  The -a and -h options are mutually exclusive.

       The -L option causes pmprobe to use a local context to collect  metrics
       from  PMDAs  on  the  local  host  without PMCD.  Only some metrics are
       available in  this  mode.   The  -a,-h  and  -L  options  are  mutually
       exclusive.

       Normally  pmprobe  operates on the distributed Performance Metrics Name
       Space (PMNS), however, if the -n option  is  specified  an  alternative
       local PMNS file is loaded from the file pmnsfile.

       Other  options control the output of additional information when one or
       more values is available.

       -f   When used with -i or -I the set of instances reported will be  all
            of  those known at the source of the performance data.  By default
            the set of reported instances  are  those  for  which  values  are
            currently  available,  which  may be smaller than the set reported
            with -f.

       -I   Report the external identifiers for each  instance.   The  literal
            string PM_IN_NULL is reported for singular metrics.

       -i   Report the internal identifiers for each instance.  The values are
            in decimal and prefixed by ‘‘?’’.  As a special case, the  literal
            string PM_IN_NULL is reported for singular metrics.

       -K   When  using  the  -L option to fetch metrics from a local context,
            the -K option may be used to control the DSO PMDAs that should  be
            made  accessible.   The  spec  argument  conforms  to  the  syntax
            described in __pmSpecLocalPMDA(3).  More than one -K option may be
            used.

       -O   When used in conjunction with an archive source of metrics and the
            -v option the time argument defines a time  origin  at  which  the
            metrics  should be fetched from the archive.  Refer to PCPIntro(1)
            for a complete description of this option, and the syntax for  the
            time argument.

            When  the  ‘‘ctime’’  format is used for the time argument in a -O
            option, the timezone becomes an issue.  The default is to use  the
            local  timezone on the system where pmprobe is run.  The -Z option
            changes the timezone to timezone in the format of the  environment
            variable TZ as described in environ(5).  The -z option changes the
            timezone to the local timezone at the host that is the  source  of
            the performance metrics, as identified via the -a option.

       -v   Report the value for each instance, as per the formatting rules of
            pmPrintValue(3).   When  fetching  from  an  archive,  only  those
            instances present in the first archive record for a metric will be
            displayed; see also the -O option.

       The -v option is mutually exclusive with either the -I or -i options.

       The -V option provides a cryptic summary of the number of messages sent
       and received across the PMAPI interface.

EXAMPLES

       $ pmprobe disk.dev
       disk.dev.read 2
       disk.dev.write 2
       disk.dev.total 2
       disk.dev.blkread 2
       disk.dev.blkwrite 2
       disk.dev.blktotal 2
       disk.dev.active 2
       disk.dev.response 2

       $ pmprobe -I disk.dev.read disk.dev.write disk.all.total
       disk.dev.read 2 "dks0d1" "dks0d2"
       disk.dev.write 2 "dks0d1" "dks0d2"
       disk.all.total 1 PM_IN_NULL

       $ pmprobe -v pmcd.numagents pmcd.version pmcd.control.timeout
       pmcd.numagents 1 9
       pmcd.version 1 "2.0 beta-1"
       pmcd.control.timeout 1 5

       $ pmprobe -v disk.dev.total disk.all.total
       disk.dev.total -1012 Unknown metric name
       disk.all.total 1 4992466

FILES

       $PCP_VAR_DIR/pmns/*
                 default PMNS specification files

PCP ENVIRONMENT

       Environment variables with the prefix PCP_ are used to parameterize the
       file and directory names used by PCP.  On each installation,  the  file
       /etc/pcp.conf  contains  the  local  values  for  these variables.  The
       $PCP_CONF variable may be used to specify an alternative  configuration
       file, as described in pcp.conf(4).

SEE ALSO

       PCPIntro(1),  pmcd(1),  pmdumplog(1), pminfo(1), PMAPI(3), pmErrStr(3),
       __pmSpecLocalPMDA(3), pcp.conf(4), pcp.env(4) and pmns(4).