PRES: probabilistic replay with execution sketching on multiprocessors

Bug reproduction is critically important for diagnosing a production-run failure. Unfortunately, reproducing a concurrency bug on multi-processors (e.g., multi-core) is challenging. Previous techniques either incur large overhead or require new non-trivial hardware extensions. This paper proposes a novel technique called PRES (probabilistic replay via execution sketching) to help reproduce concurrency bugs on multi-processors. It relaxes the past (perhaps idealistic) objective of “reproducing the bug on the first replay attempt” to significantly lower production-run recording overhead. This is achieved by (1) recording only partial execution information (referred to as “sketches”) during the production run, and (2) relying on an intelligent replayer during diagnosis time (when performance is less critical) to systematically explore the unrecorded non-deterministic space and reproduce the bug. With only partial information, our replayer may require more than one coordinated re...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2009
• Where: SOSP
• Authors: Soyeon Park, Yuanyuan Zhou, Weiwei Xiong, Zuoning Yin, Rini Kaushik, Kyu H. Lee, Shan Lu
• Keywords: Concurrency Bug, Execution Sketching Mechanisms, Operating System, SOSP 2009, Technique Called Pres