You can collect performance data on user-mode targets in several ways:
Using the collect command from the command line (see Collecting Data Using the collect Command and the collect(1) man page). The collect command-line tool has smaller data collection overheads than dbx so this method can be superior to the others.
Using the Profile Application dialog box in Performance Analyzer. (See "Profiling an Application" in the Performance Analyzer help.)
Using the collector command from the dbx command line. (See Collecting Data Using the dbx collector Subcommands).
Collecting data automatically on descendant processes can only be done from the Profile Application dialog box and the collect command.
You can collect performance data on the Oracle Solaris kernel using the er_kernel utility or the Profile Kernel dialog box. See Chapter 9, Kernel Profiling for more information.