DTrace Providers

A provider represents a methodology for instrumenting the system. Providers make probes available to the DTrace framework. DTrace sends information to a provider regarding when to enable a probe. When an enabled probe fires, the provider transfers control to DTrace.

Providers are packaged as a set of kernel modules. Each module performs a particular kind of instrumentation to create probes. When you use DTrace, each provider has the ability to publish the probes it can provide to the DTrace framework. You can enable and bind tracing actions to any of the published probes.

Some providers have the capability to create new probes based on the user's tracing requests.