McPAT Utilities

This repo contains two Perl modules for working with the McPAT power model: McPAT::M5XML and McPAT::ParseOut. The first one helps generate input for McPAT, and the second one helps parse output from McPAT. gather.pl, a script for building tables from gem5 and McPAT simulation results, is also included.

Quick Set-Up

$> git clone https://github.com/etomzak/McPAT-Utils.git utils_trunk

Then add the following to the top of your perl script:

use lib "/path/to/utils_trunk";
use McPAT::M5XML;
use McPAT::ParseOut;

Note that M5XML and ParseOut currently have no interdependencies and can be used separately.

McPAT::M5XML

McPAT::M5XML is a Perl 5 module that parses gem5 config.ini and stats.txt files for parameter values and hardware counters, and plugs them into a template XML file. The resulting file is used as input for the McPAT power model.

Usage

($errors, $warnings) = m5xml($stats, $config, $template, $xml);

$stats is the path to a stats.txt file, $config is the path to a config.ini file, $template is the path to a template XML file, and $xml is the path to the output XML file (which will be created). Complete documentation is available with

$> perldoc McPAT/M5XML.pm

Template File

A template XML file is just a McPAT configuration XML file like the ones distributed with McPAT, but some values have been replaced with placeholders. The parameter and counter names in the placeholders are replaced with parameter and counter values and then executed as Perl expressions. Some examples:

<!-- config.ini replacement: -->
<param name="ROB_size" value="{config.system.cpu.numROBEntries}"/>
<!-- might turn into: -->
<param name="ROB_size" value="16"/>

<!-- stats.txt replacement: -->
<stat name="total_cycles" value="{stats.system.cpu.numCycles}"/>
<!-- might turn into: -->
<stat name="total_cycles" value="123456"/>

<!-- arithmetic in placeholder: -->
<stat name="runtime_sec" value="{stats.system.cpu.numCycles * config.system.cpu.clock / stats.sim_freq}"/>
<!-- might turn into: -->
<stat name="runtime_sec" value="0.321"/>

<!-- logic in placeholder: -->
<param name="number_of_L2s" value="{('config.system.children' =~ /l2/) ? 1 : 0}"/>
<!-- if an L2 cache is simulated: -->
<param name="number_of_L2s" value="1"/>
<!-- else: -->
<param name="number_of_L2s" value="0"/>

McPAT::ParseOut

McPAT::ParseOut is a Perl 5 module for parsing the output from the McPAT power model. It turns the output from McPAT into a tree made of perl hashes.

Usage

my ($tree, $errors, $warnings) = parseOut("/path/to/mcpat/output");

$tree points to the parsed output. $errors and $warnings point to arrays of errors and warnings encountered when parsing the McPAT output. Complete documentation is available with

$> perldoc McPAT/ParseOut.pm