hwloc-annotate(1) hwloc hwloc-annotate(1)
NAME
hwloc-annotate - Modify attributes in a XML topology
SYNOPSIS
hwloc-annotate [options] <input.xml> <output.xml> -- <location1>
<location2> ... -- <mode> <annotation>
hwloc-annotate [options] <input.xml> <output.xml> <location> <mode>
<annotation>
Note that hwloc(7) provides a detailed explanation of the hwloc system
and of valid <location> formats; it should be read before reading this
man page.
OPTIONS
--ri Remove all info attributes that exist with the same name
before adding the new one. This option is only accepted in
"info" mode. If the info value is omitted, existing infos
are replaced with nothing.
--ci Clear the existing info attributes in the target objects
before annotating. If no new annotation has to be added
after clearing, mode should be set to none.
--cu Clear the existing userdata from the target objects. If
nothing else has to be performed after clearing, mode should
be set to none.
--cd Clear the existing distances from the topology. If nothing
else has to be performed after clearing, mode should be set
to none.
--version Report version and exit.
-h --help Display help message and exit.
DESCRIPTION
hwloc-annotate loads a topology from a XML file, adds some annotations,
and export the resulting topology to another XML file. The input and
output files may be the same.
The annotation may be string info attributes. This is specified by the
mode:
info <name> <value>
Specifies a new string info attribute whose name is name and
value is value.
subtype <subtype>
Specifies that the subtype attribute of the object should now be
subtype. If an empty string is given, the subtype is removed.
size <size>
Specifies the size of a cache or NUMA node. The value may be
suffixed with kB, KiB, MB, MiB, GB, GiB, etc.
misc <name>
Specifies a new Misc object name.
memattr <name> <flags>
Register a new memory attribute whose name is name and flags is
flags. location is ignored in this mode.
Flags may be given as numeric values or as a comma-separated
list of flag names that are passed to hwloc_memattr_register().
Those names may be substrings of actual flag names as long as a
single one matches. For instance, a value of 1 (or higher)
means that highest values are considered best for this
attribute.
memattr <name> <initiator> <value>
Set the memory attribute (whose name is name) from initiator
initiator (either an object or a CPU-set) to target NUMA node
location to value value.
If this attribute does not require specific initiators,
initiator is ignored.
Standard attribute names are Capacity, Locality, Bandwidth, and
Latency. All existing attributes in the input topology may be
listed with
$ lstopo --memattrs -i input.xml
cpukind <cpuset> <efficiency> <flags> [<infoname> <infovalue>]
Specifies the kind of CPU for PUs listed in the given cpuset.
location is ignored in this mode.
efficiency is an abstracted efficiency value that will enforce
ranking of kinds. It should be -1 if unknown.
flags must be 0 for now.
If infoname and infovalue are given and non-empty, they are
added as info attributes to this kind of CPU.
See the function hwloc_cpukinds_register() for details.
distances <filename> [<flags>]
Specifies new distances to be added to the topology using
specifications in <filename>. The optional flags (0 unless
specified) corresponds to the flags given to the function
hwloc_distances_set(). location is ignored in this mode.
The real first line of the pointed file must be a integer
representing a distances kind as defined in hwloc/distances.h.
The second line is the number of objects involved in the
distances. The next lines contain one object each. The next
lines contain one distance value each, or a single line may be
given with a integer combination of format x*y or x*y*z. An
optional line before all others may start with name= to specify
the name of the distances structure if any.
distances-transform <name> links
Transform a bandwidth distances structure named <name> into
links. See the documentation of HWLOC_DISTANCES_TRANSFORM_LINKS
in hwloc/distances.h for details.
distances-transform <name> merge-switch-ports
When switches appear in the matrix as different ports, merge all
of them into a single port for clarity. This currently only
applies to the NVLinkBandwidth matrix between NVIDIA GPUs. See
the documentation of
HWLOC_DISTANCES_TRANSFORM_MERGE_SWITCH_PORTS in
hwloc/distances.h for details.
distances-transform <name> transitive-closure
If objects are connected across a switch, apply a transitive-
closure to report the bandwidth through that switch. This
currently only applies to the NVLinkBandwidth matrix between
NVIDIA GPUs. The bandwidth between all pairs of GPUs will be
exposed instead of bandwidths between single GPUs and single
NVSwitch ports. See the documentation of
HWLOC_DISTANCES_TRANSFORM_TRANSITIVE_CLOSURE in
hwloc/distances.h for details.
distances-transform <name> remove-obj <obj>
Remove the given object from the distances structure named
<name>.
distances-transform <name> replace-objs <oldtype> <newtype>
Replace objects of type <oldtype> in distances structure named
<name> with objects of type <newtype> with same locality. If
<oldtype> or <newtype> are not object types, they are assumed
subtypes of OS devices, e.g. "NVML" or "OpenCL". See the
documentation of hwloc_get_obj_with_same_locality() in
hwloc/helper.h for details.
If <newtype> is "NULL", objects are removed from the distances
structure.
none No new annotation is added. This is useful when clearing
existing attributes.
Annotations may be added to one specific object in the topology, all of
them, or all of a given type. This is specified by the location (see
also EXAMPLES below). Multiple locations may be affected if they are
specified between --. Objects may be specified as location tuples, as
explained in hwloc(7). However hexadecimal bitmasks are not accepted
since they may correspond to multiple objects.
NOTE: The existing annotations may be listed with hwloc-info.
NOTE: It is highly recommended that you read the hwloc(7) overview page
before reading this man page. Most of the concepts described in
hwloc(7) directly apply to the hwloc-annotate utility.
EXAMPLES
hwloc-annotate's operation is best described through several examples.
Add an info attribute to all Core and PU objects:
$ hwloc-annotate input.xml output.xml -- Core:all PU:all -- info
infoname infovalue
Only add to all Core objects:
$ hwloc-annotate input.xml output.xml Core:all info infoname
infovalue
Add an info attribute to OS device #2 and #3:
$ hwloc-annotate input.xml output.xml os:2-3 info infoname
infovalue
Change package objects to green with red text in the lstopo graphical
output:
$ hwloc-annotate topo.xml topo.xml package:all info lstopoStyle
"Background=#00ff00;Text=#ff0000"
$ lstopo -i topo.xml
Add a Misc object named "foobar" under the root object of the topology
and modify the input XML directly:
$ hwloc-annotate file.xml file.xml root misc foobar
Examples with memory attributes
Set the memory attribute latency to 123 nanoseconds from the PUs in the
first package to the first NUMA node:
$ hwloc-annotate topo.xml topo.xml numanode:0 memattr Latency
$(hwloc-calc package:0) 123
Register a memory attribute MyApplicationPerformance (with flags
specifying that it requires an initiator and reports higher values
first) and set its value for initiator CPU-set 0x11 to NUMA node #2 to
2345:
$ hwloc-annotate topo.xml topo.xml ignored memattr
MyApplicationPerformance need_init,higher
$ hwloc-annotate topo.xml topo.xml numanode:2 memattr
MyApplicationPerformance 0x11 2345
To clarify that NUMA node #0 is DDR while NUMA node #1 is HBM:
$ hwloc-annotate topo.xml topo.xml numa:0 subtype DDR
$ hwloc-annotate topo.xml topo.xml numa:1 subtype HBM
Examples with CPU kinds
Specify that PU 0-3 and PU 4-7 are of different kinds, and the latter
is more efficient:
$ hwloc-annotate topo.xml topo.xml dummy cpukind 0x0f 0 0 CoreType
Small
$ hwloc-annotate topo.xml topo.xml dummy cpukind 0xf0 1 0 CoreType
Big
Examples with distances matrices
Replace NUMA nodes with Packages in the NUMALatency distances matrix,
when they have the exact same locality.
$ hwloc-annotate topo.xml topo.xml -- dummy -- distances-transform
NUMALatency replace-objs numanode packages
Remove NUMA node #3 from the NUMALatency distances matrix:
$ hwloc-annotate topo.xml topo.xml -- dummy -- distances-transform
NUMALatency remove-obj numa:3
Merge all NVSwitch ports bandwidth information into a single port in
the NVLinkBandwidth matrix:
$ hwloc-annotate topo.xml topo.xml -- dummy -- distances-transform
NVLinkBandwidth merge-switch-ports
Apply a transitive closure to get inter-GPU bandwidth across NVSwitches
in the NVLinkBandwidth matrix:
$ hwloc-annotate topo.xml topo.xml -- dummy -- distances-transform
NVLinkBandwidth transitive-closure
RETURN VALUE
Upon successful execution, hwloc-annotate generates the output
topology. The return value is 0.
hwloc-annotate will return nonzero if any kind of error occurs, such as
(but not limited to) failure to parse the command line.
SEE ALSO
hwloc(7), lstopo(1), hwloc-info(1)
2.12.0 February 17, 2025 hwloc-annotate(1)
hwloc 2.12.0 - Generated Thu May 8 13:31:12 CDT 2025