Arthas: A must-have tool for Java developers
Arthas is an open source Java diagnostic tool, known as a must-have tool for Java developers. It provides rich and powerful functions that can help developers perform dynamic diagnosis, troubleshooting and performance optimization during the running of the application. This article will introduce the basic usage, core functions and a practical case of Arthas to help readers better understand and use this excellent tool.
background
Typically, the local development environment cannot access the production environment. If you encounter problems in a production environment, you cannot use IDE remote debugging. Worse, debugging is unacceptable in a production environment, because it will suspend all threads, causing the service to pause.
Developers can try to reproduce the problems in the production environment in the test environment or the pre-release environment. However, some issues cannot be easily reproduced in a different environment, and even disappear after a reboot.
If you're thinking of adding some logging to your code to help troubleshoot issues, you're going to have to go through the following phases: testing, staging, then production. This approach is inefficient, and worse, the problem may not be fixed since it may not be reproducible once the JVM is restarted, as described above.
Arthas aims to solve these problems. Developers can troubleshoot production issues online. No JVM restarts, no code changes. Arthas as an observer never suspends a running thread.
Official tutorial: https://arthas.aliyun.com/doc/quick-start.html
Features
dynamic tracking
Arthas can track the execution of the target Java application in real time, including information such as method calls, parameter passing, and return values. Through the dynamic tracking function, developers can accurately capture the running status of the application, so as to locate the problem faster.
method probe
Arthas provides a powerful method probe function, which can insert custom code snippets in the methods of the target application. This means that developers can dynamically add functions such as log output and performance statistics without modifying the source code, so as to facilitate code debugging and optimization.
real time monitoring
Arthas can monitor various indicators of the target application in real time, including CPU usage, memory usage, thread status, etc. Developers can understand the running status of the application through the monitoring function, and discover potential performance problems in time.
remote debugging
Arthas supports remote debugging mode, developers can debug programs in different environments. This provides great convenience for debugging distributed systems or applications running on remote servers.
An Example: Performance Optimization
Suppose we have a web application based on the Spring Boot framework, and there is a performance bottleneck under high concurrency. We hope to locate and solve this problem through Arthas.
First, we can use Arthas' dynamic tracking feature to find method calls that take a long time. Then, use the method probe function to insert time statistics codes in these methods to obtain the execution time of each method.
Then, through the real-time monitoring function of Arthas, you can observe the CPU usage and memory usage of the application under high concurrency conditions. If you find that a method takes too long to execute and consumes a lot of system resources, it is likely to be the performance bottleneck.
Finally, by analyzing the collected data, we can draw a conclusion and optimize the code. For example, algorithms and caching can be optimized for methods with long response times in order to improve the performance of the entire system.
Summarize
Arthas is a powerful Java diagnostic tool that provides dynamic tracing, method probes, real-time monitoring, and remote debugging. By using Arthas, developers can diagnose and optimize applications more efficiently, improving the convenience and efficiency of development and debugging.
Now you have a tool that can easily locate and solve performance problems! Try Arthas and make your Java development more efficient!