How can I launch Brofiler at program startup?

[chuckleplant]

Currently I start Brofiler while my program is running, so I can't catch the initial frames of my application. Is there a way to attach them on startup?

[JesseRMeyer]

I second this. RenderDoc allows you to launch the target .exe directly.

[Cry-Achim]

Hi chuckleplant,

I did some test with the Brofiler Test example source.
Behavior: Application will not process the update loop until you press the red "Record button" of the Brofiler application.
Note: this does not seem to be the nicest way, but it works.

bool Engine::Update()
{ BROFILER_FRAME("MainThread")

	if (!::Profiler::IsActive()) { return true; } 
	...

As further suggestion, only call this, when passing in some command line argument to your executable.

Kind Regards,
Achim

[chuckleplant]

I guess that could work. Thanks!

[bombomby]

Usually I have a command line parameter for startup profiling.
Then you can have something like this in your code:

bool Engine::Update()
{
     if (startupProfiling)
     {
         Profiler::Core::Get().Activate(true);
         startupProfiling = false;
     }
     BROFILER_FRAME("MainThread")
     ...
}

Then you can connect with Brofiler later and it will cath up with early frames.

[chuckleplant]

Can't I call Activate before entering the Update loop? During Setup?

[bombomby]

You need to do follow these three steps:

1. Register main thread - just put this code in the beginning of your main() function

static ::Brofiler::ThreadScope mainThreadScope("MainThread"); 

2. Add this code at the point where you would like to start the capture - can be the next line after 1)

if (startupProfiling)
{
     Profiler::Core::Get().Activate(true);
     Profiler::NextFrame(); //To start a new "loading" frame
}

3. Replace PROFILER_FRAME in your main thread with this code to avoid double registration

Profiler::NextFrame(); //Update Brofiler and start the next frame
BROFILER_EVENT("Frame"); //Root event for the frame

[MatillaMartin]

Profiler::Core is not accesible in the latest stable release. Is there a way to do this on v1.1.2?

[JesseRMeyer]

The reason why this is important is because time to first rendered frame is an important metric! Profiling start up code is a necessary part of this process and should be simple to do.

[mikaelwallin]

I agree with previous comment would be awesome if this could be supported.

[BrodyHiggerson]

Profiler::Core is not accesible in the latest stable release. Is there a way to do this on v1.1.2?

Still a problem in 1.2.4 - is there some other way we should do this?

[bombomby]

I am planning to provide a special API for this in the next release.

[bombomby]

Support for game startup performance analysis has been added in v1.2.5.
https://github.com/bombomby/optick/wiki/Optick-API#automation