android-profiler

Use the official Perfetto helper scripts such as record_android_trace with your device connected via USB and USB debugging enabled. For example, run record_android_trace with a duration, buffer size, and categories like sched, gfx, and wm to capture scheduling and graphics events.

Load the trace into a trace_processor session and run a system-wide triage using metrics like android_cpu and android_surfaceflinger to identify candidate janky frames. Then investigate the victim thread's state distribution and follow blocker dependency chains across threads and processes to reach the root cause.

Use the java_heap_dump helper script from the Perfetto tools repository with your app's package name to capture a snapshot of all Java objects. The resulting trace can be queried with PerfettoSQL heap graph modules to trace retainer paths back to GC roots.

The recording workflow in this Skill is strictly for Android devices connected via adb. For other platforms such as Linux, macOS, or Chrome, refer to the platform-specific documentation on perfetto.dev.

Common causes include guessing column names instead of validating schemas with LIMIT 0 queries, joining on tid or pid instead of the unique utid or upid, and using LIKE instead of GLOB for string matching. Always verify table schemas and use standard library modules before writing custom joins.

Java heap dumps capture a snapshot of all Java objects for retention analysis, while native heap profiling with heapprofd samples C/C++ malloc and free callstacks over time to find native leaks. Use java_heap_dump for Java leaks and heap_profile for native allocations.