final release is now available! My colleagues and I have blogged about Java SE 6 monitoring, management and diagnosability features in the past 1-2 years.
This presents an overview of the monitoring, management, and diagnosability features in Java SE 6 and also serves as a starting point for you to find the relevant blogs/articles/documentation. Enjoy!
| Feature |
Brief Description |
Blogs/Articles |
| Dynamic Attach Capability |
With JDK 6, you no longer require to start your application with any special option to be attached by JDK 6 tools. The Attach API enables you to build your own tool to attach to a running JVM and load a Java or native agent. |
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| Heap Dump and Analysis |
JDK 6 significantly enhances the ability of diagnosing memory problem. The HotSpot VM provides the ability to request a heap dump on demand from the jmap tool as well as programmatically. A heap analysis tool (jhat) is added in JDK 6 to browse the heap dump snapshot you obtain (see below for details). |
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| OutOfMemoryError Diagnosability |
JDK 6 provides a better support to diagnose OutOfMemoryError. This error now includes a stack trace where the allocation failed. Another useful improvement is the -XX:+HeapDumpOnOutOfMemoryError option which tells the HotSpot VM to generate a heap dump when an allocation from the java heap or the permanent generation cannot be satisfied. In addition, a new -XX:OnOutOfMemoryError=<command> option is added for you to specify a command that the HotSpot VM will invoke when the OutOfMemoryError is thrown. |
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| DTrace on Solaris |
JDK 6 HotSpot VM provides the built-in dtrace probes. You can now use dtrace to trace the whole stack of any running Java application on Solaris 10. JDK 6 comes with the sample DTrace scripts for you to start with (under the <Solaris JDK6>/sample/dtrace directory). |
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| Troubleshooting Guide |
Java SE Troubleshooting Guide, a very popular and useful documentation , has been updated to include troubleshooting information for JDK 6. |
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JDK Monitoring and Troubleshooting Tools
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| jconsole |
The major JConsole enhancements include dynamic attach capability, the plugin API support and various UI improvement.
JConsole can attach to any running application which does not need to start with -Dcom.sun.management.jmxremote option. The new JConsole plugin API enables you to extend JConsole to add your own tab or custom UI for the application MBeans. |
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| jhat |
A heap analysis tool, formerly HAT, is added in JDK 6 to browse a heap dump snapshot. It provides built-in queries to examine classes, instances, root set, heap histogram and objects pending for finalization. It also supports a built-in query language, OQL, to query the heap which is particular useful when searching on large number of objects. |
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| jmap |
The jmap -dump and -histo options are now supported on Windows. It provides a light weight mechanism to obtain a heap histogram and heap snapshot on all platforms. |
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| jstack |
The jstack tool is now supported on Windows. You can print Java stack traces and also detect deadlocks on all platforms. You can also use the new jstack -l option to print the list of owned java.util.concurrent locks. |
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| jinfo |
The jinfo tool adds a new -flag option to get and set an VM option. For example you can use jinfo to set HeapDumpOnOutOfMemoryError at runtime. |
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| API Enhancements |
| Java Management Extensions (JMX) |
The important features of the JMX API in JDK 6 are MXBeans and Descriptors. MXBeans enable bundling of related values in a MBean without requiring special client configurations to handle to bundle. Descriptors provide you a convenient way to attach additional metadata to your MBeans. |
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| java.lang.management |
The java.lang.management API has been enhanced for monitors and java.util.concurrent locks monitoring. You can find the list of locks owned by a thread and also report which stack frame locked a monitor. It also provides a new method to obtain the system load average. In addition, a new HotSpotDiagnosticMXBean API provides the programmatic interface to obtain a heap dump and set a VM option. |
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| java.lang.instrument |
The java.lang.instrument API has been enhanced to provide support for dynamic transformation of loaded classes, multiple agents and appending to class loader search. |
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| JVM Tool Interface |
JVM TI has been enhanced to provide multiple agents support, better dynamic instrumentation, enhanced heap walking API, resource exhaustion notification, support for early return and monitor stack depth. |
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| Java Platform Debugger Architecture (JPDA) |
JPDA has been enhanced to support heap walking functionality, force early return, view method arguments when not compiled with -g, process attach connector, monitor stack depth, and breakpoint on monitor locks/release. |
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