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<h2 class="chapter">4 <code>gprof</code> Command Summary</h2>
<p>After you have a profile data file <samp><span class="file">gmon.out</span></samp>, you can run <code>gprof</code>
to interpret the information in it. The <code>gprof</code> program prints a
flat profile and a call graph on standard output. Typically you would
redirect the output of <code>gprof</code> into a file with ‘<samp><span class="samp">></span></samp>’.
<p>You run <code>gprof</code> like this:
<pre class="smallexample"> gprof <var>options</var> [<var>executable-file</var> [<var>profile-data-files</var>...]] [> <var>outfile</var>]
</pre>
<p class="noindent">Here square-brackets indicate optional arguments.
<p>If you omit the executable file name, the file <samp><span class="file">a.out</span></samp> is used. If
you give no profile data file name, the file <samp><span class="file">gmon.out</span></samp> is used. If
any file is not in the proper format, or if the profile data file does not
appear to belong to the executable file, an error message is printed.
<p>You can give more than one profile data file by entering all their names
after the executable file name; then the statistics in all the data files
are summed together.
<p>The order of these options does not matter.
<ul class="menu">
<li><a accesskey="1" href="Output-Options.html#Output-Options">Output Options</a>: Controlling <code>gprof</code>'s output style
<li><a accesskey="2" href="Analysis-Options.html#Analysis-Options">Analysis Options</a>: Controlling how <code>gprof</code> analyzes its data
<li><a accesskey="3" href="Miscellaneous-Options.html#Miscellaneous-Options">Miscellaneous Options</a>
<li><a accesskey="4" href="Deprecated-Options.html#Deprecated-Options">Deprecated Options</a>: Options you no longer need to use, but which
have been retained for compatibility
<li><a accesskey="5" href="Symspecs.html#Symspecs">Symspecs</a>: Specifying functions to include or exclude
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