Starting a Flight Recording

You start a flight recording by connecting the Flight Recorder plugin to a JVM. The Flight Recorder plugin launches the JFR runtime engine on the JVM and creates a recording file.

To start a flight recording:

Right-click a JVM in the JVM Browser and select Start Flight Recording.
Select the path and file name for the recording by clicking the Browse button.
Specify the name for the recording.
Select the type of recording. The following options are available:
- Time fixed recording: Creates a recording with a fixed duration specified in the Recording time field. JFR will collect events for a fixed duration and then dump the recording to the specified file.
- Continuous recording: Creates a recording that runs continuously. JFR will collect events and write data to the global buffer. When the global buffer fills up, the oldest data is discarded. The data currently in the buffer can be written to the specified file whenever you request a dump, or if the dump is triggered by a rule. For this type of recording, you can set the maximum allowed size of data to keep on disk using the Maximum size field, and the maximum allowed age of events using the Maximum age field. These values are approximate, because the dumps are performed on complete chunks of data.
Select the flight recording template in the Event settings drop-down list. Templates define the events that you want to be recorded. To manage templates, click Template Manager. For information about using templates, see: Managing Flight Recording Templates.
Click Finish to start the recording or click Next to modify the event options defined in the selected template.
(Optional) Modify the event options for the selected flight recording template.
Click Finish to start the recording or click Next to modify the event details defined in the selected template.
(Optional) Modify the event details for the selected flight recording template. Event details define whether the event should be included in the recording. For some events, you can also define whether a stack trace should be attached to the event, specify the duration threshold (for duration events) and a request period (for requestable events).
Click Back if you want to modify any of the settings set in the previous steps. Click Finish to start the recording.

When you start a fixed time recording, it appears in the Progress View. To open the Progress View, open the Window menu, select Show View, then select Progress View.

To see all running recordings for a JVM (including continuous recordings), expand the necessary connection in the JVM Browser and then expand the Flight Recorder node. If you right-click a running recording, you have the following options:

Dump: Opens the Dump Recording window to create a dump of the current events in the global buffer to a recording file. For more information, see: Dumping a Running Flight Recording.
Edit: Open the Edit Flight Recording Wizard that is similar to the Start Flight Recording Wizard.
Stop: Stop recording but keep the collected data in the global buffer. The stopped recording remains in the list of recordings for the JVM.
Close: Dump the collected data from the global buffer to a recording file and stop the recording.