Intel® VTune™ Profiler User Guide

User Guide

Contents

Windows* Targets

Use the
Intel® VTune™
Profiler
 for the performance analysis of Windows* targets.

Prepare a Windows Target for Analysis

Before you begin analyzing your target for performance, you need to configure and build it as follows:
  • Enable downloading debug information for the system libraries by configuring the Microsoft* Symbol Server.
  • Build your target in the
    Release
     mode with the recommended compiler optimization settings.
  • Create a baseline against which you can compare the performance improvements as a result of tuning.
    For example, you instrument your code to determine how long it takes to compress a certain file. Your original target code, augmented to provide these timing data, serves as your performance baseline. Every time you modify your target, compare the performance metrics of your optimized target with the baseline, to verify that the performance has improved.

Choose a Target from Visual Studio* IDE

For the
VTune
Profiler
 integrated into the Microsoft Visual Studio* IDE, you may choose an analysis target and run a performance analysis directly from your development environment.
To choose an analysis target for an existing solution:
  1. Open a solution in the
    Intel VTune
    Profiler
     Results
     folder. To display the folder, in the Visual Studio IDE, select
    View > Other Windows > Intel
    VTune
    Profiler
     Results
    .
  2. If the solution contains more than one project, select an appropriate project.
    VTune
    Profiler
     toolbar and menu items are enabled. By default, the
    VTune
    Profiler
     inherits the Visual Studio settings and uses the application generated for the selected project as your analysis target. You may right-click the project and select
    Configure Analysis
     toolbar button to verify target properties from the menu. By default, the target type is set to
    Launch Application
    .
To choose an existing standalone executable file:
  1. From the Visual Studio menu, choose
    File > Open > Project/Solution
    .
    The
    Open Project
     dialog box opens.
  2. Select the
    Executable Files (*.exe)
     filter and choose an executable file.
    Visual Studio software creates a solution with a single project that contains your executable file.
    VTune
    Profiler
     features are enabled.
  3. Right-click the project and select
    Intel
    VTune
    Profiler
    version
     >
    Configure Analysis...
     option.
    The
    Configure Analysis
     window opens.
  4. Click the
    Binary/Symbol Search
     or
    Source Search
     button at the bottom to specify search directories. By default, the search directories are defined by the Microsoft Visual Studio* C++ project properties. To view default project search directories for system functions in Visual Studio, right-click the project in the Solution Explorer and select
    Properties
    .
    When finalizing the collected data, the
    VTune
    Profiler
     uses these directories to search for binary (executables and dynamic libraries), symbol (typically
    .pdb
     files), and source files supporting your target in the particular order.
    VTune
    Profiler
     automatically locates the files for C/C++ projects which are not moved after building the application and collecting the performance data.
  5. Save the solution.
Different versions of Visual Studio may have different user interface elements. Refer to the Visual Studio online help for the exact user interface elements that you need to view file location.

Configure a Windows Target

When creating a
VTune
Profiler
 project, you access the
Configure Analysis
 window and select any of the three available target types for further configuration:
Launch Application
,
Attach to Process
, or
Profile System
. For example, for the
Launch Application
 target type, you need to specify an application (and its parameters, if required) for analysis:
When done with the configuration, click the Browse button on the
HOW
 pane on the right to select and run an analysis type.

Product and Performance Information

1

Performance varies by use, configuration and other factors. Learn more at www.Intel.com/PerformanceIndex.