xref: /xsrc/external/mit/MesaLib/dist/src/vulkan/overlay-layer/README

A Vulkan layer to display information about the running application
using an overlay.

To turn on the layer run :

VK_INSTANCE_LAYERS=VK_LAYER_MESA_overlay /path/to/my_vulkan_app

List the available statistics :

VK_INSTANCE_LAYERS=VK_LAYER_MESA_overlay VK_LAYER_MESA_OVERLAY_CONFIG=help /path/to/my_vulkan_app

Turn on some statistics :
VK_INSTANCE_LAYERS=VK_LAYER_MESA_overlay VK_LAYER_MESA_OVERLAY_CONFIG=submit,draw,pipeline_graphics /path/to/my_vulkan_app

Position the layer :

VK_INSTANCE_LAYERS=VK_LAYER_MESA_overlay VK_LAYER_MESA_OVERLAY_CONFIG=submit,draw,pipeline_graphics,position=top-right /path/to/my_vulkan_app

Dump statistics into a file:

VK_INSTANCE_LAYERS=VK_LAYER_MESA_overlay VK_LAYER_MESA_OVERLAY_CONFIG=position=top-right,output_file=/tmp/output.txt /path/to/my_vulkan_app

Dump statistics into a file, controlling when such statistics will start
to be captured:

VK_INSTANCE_LAYERS=VK_LAYER_MESA_overlay VK_LAYER_MESA_OVERLAY_CONFIG=position=top-right,output_file=/tmp/output.txt,control=mesa_overlay /path/to/my_vulkan_app

The above command will open a unix socket with abstract path
'mesa_overlay'.  Once a client connects to the socket, the overlay layer
will immediately send the following commands to the client:

:MesaOverlayControlVersion=1;
:DeviceName=<device name>;
:MesaVersion=<mesa version>;

The client connected to the overlay layer can enable statistics
capturing by sending the command:

:capture=1;

And disable it by emitting

:capture=0;

By default, capture is enabled when an output_file is specified, but it
will be disabled by default when a control socket is in use. In the
latter case, it needs to be explicitly enabled through the sockets, by
using the commands above.

The provided script overlay-control.py can be used to start/stop
capture. The --path option can be used to specify the socket path. By
default, it will try to connect to a path named "mesa_overlay".