contents/installing-lttng/intro.md

   1 ---
   2 id: installing-lttng
   3 ---
   4
   5 **LTTng** is a set of software components which interact to allow
   6 instrumenting the Linux kernel and user applications as well as
   7 controlling tracing sessions (starting/stopping tracing,
   8 enabling/disabling events, and more). Those components are bundled into
   9 the following packages:
  10
  11   * **LTTng-tools**: libraries and command line interface to control
  12     tracing sessions.
  13   * **LTTng-modules**: Linux kernel modules for tracing the kernel.
  14   * **LTTng-UST**: user space tracing library.
  15
  16 Most distributions mark the LTTng-modules and LTTng-UST packages as
  17 optional. In the following sections, the steps to install all three are
  18 always provided, but note that LTTng-modules is only required if
  19 you intend to trace the Linux kernel and LTTng-UST is only required if
  20 you intend to trace user space applications.
  21
  22 This chapter shows how to install the above packages on a Linux
  23 system. The easiest way is to use the package manager of the system's
  24 distribution ([desktop](#doc-desktop-distributions) or
  25 [embedded](#doc-embedded-distributions)). Support is also available for
  26 [enterprise distributions](#doc-enterprise-distributions), such as
  27 Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) and SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES).
  28 Otherwise, you can
  29 [build the LTTng packages from source](#doc-building-from-source).