[PATCH v3 1/5] perf: detect support for libbpf's emit_strings option

From: Blake Jones
Date: Fri Jun 06 2025 - 17:53:32 EST


This creates a config option that detects libbpf's ability to display
character arrays as strings, which was just added to the BPF tree
(https://git.kernel.org/bpf/bpf-next/c/87c9c79a02b4).

To test this change, I built perf (from later in this patch set) with:

- static libbpf (default, using source from kernel tree)
- dynamic libbpf (LIBBPF_DYNAMIC=1 LIBBPF_INCLUDE=/usr/local/include)

For both the static and dynamic versions, I used headers with and without
the ".emit_strings" option.

I verified that of the four resulting binaries, the two with
".emit_strings" would successfully record BPF_METADATA events, and the two
without wouldn't. All four binaries would successfully display
BPF_METADATA events, because the relevant bit of libbpf code is only used
during "perf record".

Signed-off-by: Blake Jones <blakejones@xxxxxxxxxx>
---
tools/build/Makefile.feature | 1 +
tools/build/feature/Makefile | 4 ++++
tools/build/feature/test-libbpf-strings.c | 10 ++++++++++
tools/perf/Documentation/perf-check.txt | 1 +
tools/perf/Makefile.config | 12 ++++++++++++
tools/perf/builtin-check.c | 1 +
6 files changed, 29 insertions(+)
create mode 100644 tools/build/feature/test-libbpf-strings.c

diff --git a/tools/build/Makefile.feature b/tools/build/Makefile.feature
index 3a1fddd38db0..2e5f4c8b6547 100644
--- a/tools/build/Makefile.feature
+++ b/tools/build/Makefile.feature
@@ -126,6 +126,7 @@ FEATURE_TESTS_EXTRA := \
llvm \
clang \
libbpf \
+ libbpf-strings \
libpfm4 \
libdebuginfod \
clang-bpf-co-re \
diff --git a/tools/build/feature/Makefile b/tools/build/feature/Makefile
index 4aa166d3eab6..0c4e541ed56e 100644
--- a/tools/build/feature/Makefile
+++ b/tools/build/feature/Makefile
@@ -59,6 +59,7 @@ FILES= \
test-lzma.bin \
test-bpf.bin \
test-libbpf.bin \
+ test-libbpf-strings.bin \
test-get_cpuid.bin \
test-sdt.bin \
test-cxx.bin \
@@ -339,6 +340,9 @@ $(OUTPUT)test-bpf.bin:
$(OUTPUT)test-libbpf.bin:
$(BUILD) -lbpf

+$(OUTPUT)test-libbpf-strings.bin:
+ $(BUILD)
+
$(OUTPUT)test-sdt.bin:
$(BUILD)

diff --git a/tools/build/feature/test-libbpf-strings.c b/tools/build/feature/test-libbpf-strings.c
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..83e6c45f5c85
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tools/build/feature/test-libbpf-strings.c
@@ -0,0 +1,10 @@
+// SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0
+#include <bpf/btf.h>
+
+int main(void)
+{
+ struct btf_dump_type_data_opts opts;
+
+ opts.emit_strings = 0;
+ return opts.emit_strings;
+}
diff --git a/tools/perf/Documentation/perf-check.txt b/tools/perf/Documentation/perf-check.txt
index a764a4629220..799982d8d868 100644
--- a/tools/perf/Documentation/perf-check.txt
+++ b/tools/perf/Documentation/perf-check.txt
@@ -52,6 +52,7 @@ feature::
dwarf-unwind / HAVE_DWARF_UNWIND_SUPPORT
auxtrace / HAVE_AUXTRACE_SUPPORT
libbfd / HAVE_LIBBFD_SUPPORT
+ libbpf-strings / HAVE_LIBBPF_STRINGS_SUPPORT
libcapstone / HAVE_LIBCAPSTONE_SUPPORT
libcrypto / HAVE_LIBCRYPTO_SUPPORT
libdw-dwarf-unwind / HAVE_LIBDW_SUPPORT
diff --git a/tools/perf/Makefile.config b/tools/perf/Makefile.config
index d1ea7bf44964..647ade45e4e5 100644
--- a/tools/perf/Makefile.config
+++ b/tools/perf/Makefile.config
@@ -595,8 +595,20 @@ ifndef NO_LIBELF
LIBBPF_STATIC := 1
$(call detected,CONFIG_LIBBPF)
CFLAGS += -DHAVE_LIBBPF_SUPPORT
+ ifneq ($(OUTPUT),)
+ LIBBPF_INCLUDE = $(abspath $(OUTPUT))/libbpf/include
+ else
+ LIBBPF_INCLUDE = $(CURDIR)/libbpf/include
+ endif
endif
endif
+
+ FEATURE_CHECK_CFLAGS-libbpf-strings="-I$(LIBBPF_INCLUDE)"
+ $(call feature_check,libbpf-strings)
+ ifeq ($(feature-libbpf-strings), 1)
+ $(call detected,CONFIG_LIBBPF_STRINGS)
+ CFLAGS += -DHAVE_LIBBPF_STRINGS_SUPPORT
+ endif
endif
endif # NO_LIBBPF
endif # NO_LIBELF
diff --git a/tools/perf/builtin-check.c b/tools/perf/builtin-check.c
index 9a509cb3bb9a..f4827f0ddb47 100644
--- a/tools/perf/builtin-check.c
+++ b/tools/perf/builtin-check.c
@@ -43,6 +43,7 @@ struct feature_status supported_features[] = {
FEATURE_STATUS("dwarf-unwind", HAVE_DWARF_UNWIND_SUPPORT),
FEATURE_STATUS("auxtrace", HAVE_AUXTRACE_SUPPORT),
FEATURE_STATUS_TIP("libbfd", HAVE_LIBBFD_SUPPORT, "Deprecated, license incompatibility, use BUILD_NONDISTRO=1 and install binutils-dev[el]"),
+ FEATURE_STATUS("libbpf-strings", HAVE_LIBBPF_STRINGS_SUPPORT),
FEATURE_STATUS("libcapstone", HAVE_LIBCAPSTONE_SUPPORT),
FEATURE_STATUS("libcrypto", HAVE_LIBCRYPTO_SUPPORT),
FEATURE_STATUS("libdw-dwarf-unwind", HAVE_LIBDW_SUPPORT),
--
2.50.0.rc0.604.gd4ff7b7c86-goog