Profile Running Process

Run dotTrace as a standalone application. The dotTrace Home window will open.

Under Choose what you want to profile, Running Process, select the process you are going to profile.

(Windows only) If the process you are looking for is missing, click Show All Processes to grant dotTrace administrative permissions.

Make sure the created run configuration is selected in the New Process Run list.

Under Choose how you want to profile it, specify profiling options:

• Profiling Type: choose between Sampling (evaluate performance and determine the slowest methods in your app) and Timeline (same as Sampling but with additional timeline data). Learn more about profiling types

• Optionally, if your application creates a number of processes, and you want to profile only specific ones, configure process filters.

• If required, specify other profiling options.

If you want dotTrace to start collecting profiling data right after you start the session, under Run profiling, select Collect profiling data from start.

Click Start.

Run the application you want to profile. The profiling session will start right after the profiler attaches to the application process.

What if the profiler doesn't attach to my process?

Possible reasons:

• The process you're trying to profile is not a managed process.

• The profiler has attached to another managed process started in the system. Try restarting profiling, and if the problem persists, configure process filters.

• Some issues are possible for processes targeting .NET 6.0 and later. If profiling doesn't start, try restarting the process and all its parent processes. For example, if you run your process from the Windows command prompt, restart both the command prompt and the process.

Go through a particular workflow in your application (if you want to evaluate its performance) or reproduce a particular performance issue. Collect snapshots using the Get Snapshot button in the profiling controller window. Learn more about how to control the profiling session

After you collect the data, either close the profiled application or detach the profiler using the Detach button in the controller window.

Analyze the collected snapshots using dotTrace Viewer.