Performance Report Overview
Note
This article applies to Visual Studio 2015. If you're looking for the latest Visual Studio documentation, see Visual Studio documentation. We recommend upgrading to the latest version of Visual Studio. Download it here
You can view the profiling data of a performance session in the Performance Report window of the Visual Studio Team System Development Edition integrated development environment (IDE). The profiling data is saved in .vsp and .vsps files. Report view windows enable you to view and analyze application performance issues.
Caution
A profiling data file contains sensitive information such as the computer name, the version of the operating system, file paths, memory information, and other computer setup information. You should maintain strict control over the distribution of the data, both in its native .vsp format and when it is exported to a .csv or an .xml file.
If event tracing data is collected as part of the performance session, additional information might appear in the event tracing log (.etl) file. This information includes your domain and user name; therefore, you should maintain strict control over the distribution of the log file.
Performance Report Window
The Performance Report window is a tool window that is used to view, manage, and filter performance data and it includes a customizable query control.
On the main toolbar of the Performance Report window, you can access each view. Click the arrow next to the Current View list to display and select the individual views that are available.
The Performance Report window provides the following data views:
Summary View
By default, profiling data is displayed in the Summary view. This view is a starting point in your investigation into performance issues. From each line in the Summary view, you can move to more detailed views by right-clicking the function or module name. For more information, see Summary View.
Caller/Callee View
The Caller/Callee view displays a call tree for an individual function. The view is divided into three parts:
The target function is displayed in the middle of the view.
The functions that called the function (callers) are displayed above the target function.
The functions that are called by the target function (callees) are displayed below the target.
You can select a different function by double-clicking any function in the called list or the callee list. For more information, see Caller/Callee View.
Call Tree View
The Call Tree view displays the function execution paths that were traversed in the profiled application. The root of the tree is the entry point into the application or component. Each function node lists all the functions that it called and performance data about those function calls.
The Call Tree view can also expand and highlight the execution path of a function that consumed the most time or was sampled most frequently. To display the most active path, right-click the function and then click Expand Hot Path. For more information, see Call Tree View.
Process View
The Process view displays performance data for each process and thread that was profiled. For more information, see Process View.
Modules View
The Modules view lists the modules in the project and presents profiling data for each module. Expand or collapse the module name to display function profiling data. When the data was collected by using sampling, source code line and instruction pointer profiling data is also available. For more information, see Modules View.
Functions View
The Functions view lists the functions that were called during profiling. For more information, see Functions View.
Line View
The Lines view enables you to view the specific source code lines that were executed during sampling profiling. For more information, see Lines View.
Instruction Pointer (IP) View
The Instruction Pointer view enables you to view the specific instructions that were executed during sampling profiling. For more information, see Instruction Pointers (IPs) View.
Allocation View
The Allocation view is available if Collect .NET object allocation was selected on the General page of the Performance Session properties dialog box. See Performance Session Overview. The Allocation view lists the .NET objects that were allocated by the application or component. When an object row is expanded, a call tree is displayed. The call tree shows the execution paths that resulted in the creation of the object. Information is also displayed about the number of inclusive and exclusive allocations for each function in the call tree. The Allocation view can also expand and highlight the execution path of a function that allocated the largest number of objects. To display the most active path, right-click the function and then click Expand Hot Path. For more information, see Collecting .NET Memory Allocation and Lifetime Data and Allocations View.
Objects Lifetime View
The Object Lifetime view is available if Collect .NET object allocation information and Also collect .NET object lifetime information were selected on the General page of the Performance Session properties dialog box.
The Object Lifetime view displays the total number of instances of each type and the number of objects that were collected in each garbage collection generation. For more information, see Object Lifetime View.
Customizable Filter Control
The customizable filter control has the following options:
Import Filter - retrieves a previously saved custom query.
Export Filter - saves the custom query to the specified location.
Execute Query - runs the query as displayed in the custom query control.
Stop Query - stops execution of a query that is running. This button is not available if no query is running.
Show Query - shows/hides the custom query control.
Save Analyzed - saves the report together with its current analysis as a .vsps file.
Export - saves the current report in .CVS-formatted or .XML-formatted file, with options to save the different views.