Install TraceLens

Install TraceLens#

2026-07-22

2 min read time

This topic provides step-by-step instructions to install TraceLens and verify the installation. TraceLens is distributed as a Python package; install it with pip either directly from the public GitHub repository (recommended) or from a local source checkout for development.

Before you begin#

Confirm you have the following before installing TraceLens.

  • No GPU required to run TraceLens. TraceLens analyzes trace files on any host; it does not execute GPU kernels. GPU hardware and ROCm are only required by the profiling tools that produce the traces (for example, rocprofv3). See the compatibility matrix for details.

  • Python 3.6 or later (3.10 recommended). Confirm your version:

    python3 --version

  • A recent pip. Upgrade it inside your environment:

    python3 -m pip install --upgrade pip

  • (Recommended) An isolated virtual environment:

    python3 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate

Method 2: Install from source (development)#

Use an editable install when you want to modify TraceLens or run its test suite. The [dev] extra installs the development and test dependencies:

git clone https://github.com/AMD-AGI/TraceLens.git && cd TraceLens
pip install -e .[dev]
python -m pytest tests/ -v

Optional: traceconv for .pftrace input#

traceconv is needed only when you pass a Perfetto-style .pftrace trace (produced by rocprofv3 --output-format pftrace) to one of the pftrace report tools (TraceLens_generate_perf_report_pftrace_hip_activity, ..._hip_api, or ..._memory_copy); it converts the .pftrace to JSON. The other report tools (PyTorch, JAX, rocprofv3 JSON) don’t use it. TraceLens looks for traceconv on your PATH; if it isn’t found, it downloads it automatically from https://get.perfetto.dev into the trace file’s directory (network access required). To use a specific binary instead, pass --traceconv /path/to/traceconv to any pftrace tool.

Verify the installation#

Run the following checks to confirm TraceLens is installed correctly:

  1. Confirm the package imports:

    python3 -c "import TraceLens; print('TraceLens import OK')"

  2. Confirm the command-line tools are available:

    TraceLens_generate_perf_report_pytorch --help

    Expected output: the tool prints its usage and the list of accepted arguments (for example, --profile_json_path) and exits without error.

  3. (Optional) Generate a report from a bundled demo trace to confirm end-to-end operation. The repository ships sample traces under tests/traces/, so run this from a source checkout (see Method 2):

    TraceLens_generate_perf_report_pytorch \
    --profile_json_path tests/traces/mi300/Qwen_Qwen1.5-0.5B-Chat__1016005.json.gz

    Expected output: an Excel report (.xlsx) is written next to the trace, containing the GPU-timeline and operator-summary sheets.

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