2010-06-08 Nick Clifton <nickc@redhat.com>
+ * gprof.texi (Sampling Error): Note that call counts and basic
+ block counts are only reliable for multi-threaded applications if
+ the counting function itself is thread safe.
+
+2010-06-08 Nick Clifton <nickc@redhat.com>
+
* gprof.texi: Replace abbreviated 20th century year numbers with
full versions.
ought to catch that function in the act only once, there is a pretty good
chance it will actually find that function zero times, or twice.
-By contrast, the number-of-calls and basic-block figures
-are derived by counting, not
-sampling. They are completely accurate and will not vary from run to run
-if your program is deterministic.
+By contrast, the number-of-calls and basic-block figures are derived
+by counting, not sampling. They are completely accurate and will not
+vary from run to run if your program is deterministic and single
+threaded. In multi-threaded applications, or single threaded
+applications that link with multi-threaded libraries, the counts are
+only deterministic if the counting function is thread-safe. (Note:
+beware that the mcount counting function in glibc is @emph{not}
+thread-safe). @xref{Implementation, ,Implementation of Profiling}.
The @dfn{sampling period} that is printed at the beginning of the flat
profile says how often samples are taken. The rule of thumb is that a