Chitra: visual analysis of parallel and distributed programs in the time, event, and frequency domains

Abstract

Chitra analyzes a program execution sequence (PES) collected during execution of a program and produces a homogeneous, semi-Markov chain model fitting the PES. The PES represents the evolution of a program state vector in time. Therefore Chitra analyzes the time-dependent behavior of a program. The authors describe a set of transforms that map a PES to a simplified PES. Because the transforms are program-independent. Chitra can be used with any program. Chitra provides a visualization of PESs and transforms, to allow a user to visually guide transform selection in an effort to generate a simple yet accurate semi-Markov chain model. The resultant chain can predict performance at program parameters different than those used in the input PES, and the chain structure can diagnose performance problems.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">&gt;</ETX>