batterystats

Batterystats Plugin

This plugin uses the Batterystats utility and estimates energy consumption via the algorithm proposed in this article.

The thesis regarding the implementation of the Batterystats plugin can be found here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1O7BqmkRFRDq7AD1oKOGjHqJzCTEe8AMz/view?usp=sharing

Dependencies and requirements

The following are required for the Batterystats plugin:

• Python2 to use Systrace
• power_profile.xml (retrievable from the device using APKTool; detailed installation instructions can be found here).
• systrace.py (from the Android SDK Tools): sudo apt update && sudo apt install android-sdk for Ubuntu users
• A device that is able to report on the idle and frequency states of the CPU using systrace.py

Note: To check whether the the device is able to report on the idle and frequency states of the CPU, you can run the command python2 systrace.py -l and ensure both categories are listed among the supported categories.

Configuration

Below, an example configuration can be found.

  ...
  "powerprofile_path": "path",
  "systrace_path": "path",
  "profilers": {
    "batterystats": {
      "cleanup": true,
      "subject_aggregation": "default",
      "experiment_aggregation": "default",
      "enable_systrace_parsing": true,
      "python2_path": "python2"
    }
  }

systrace_path string Path to Systrace.py. Example path: /home/user/Android/Sdk/platform-tools/systrace/systrace.py

powerprofile_path string Path to power_profile.xml. Example path: android-runner/example/batterystats/power_profile.xml

cleanup boolean Delete log files required by Batterystats after completion of the experiment. The default is true.

enable_systrace_parsing boolean The Batterystats profiler uses the profiling tool Systrace internally to measure CPU specific activity and energy consumption on the mobile device. For some devices the parsing of the output of Systrace fails, causing the experiment run to fail. You can safely disable the Systrace parsing when you encounter Systrace parsing errors given that your experiment does not need rely on CPU specific information, but rather on the overall energy consumption of the mobile device. The overall energy consumption is not affected by the Systrace logs since it is tracked using another tool. The default is true.

python2_path string The path to python 2 that is used to launch Systrace. The default is python2.

Troubleshooting

Devices have no permissions (udev requires plugdev group membership)

This happens when the user calling adb is not in the plugdev group.

Fix

sudo usermod -aG plugdev $LOGNAME

References

https://developer.android.com/studio/run/device.html

http://www.janosgyerik.com/adding-udev-rules-for-usb-debugging-android-devices/

[Batterystats] IOError: Unable to get atrace data. Did you forget adb root?

This happens when the device is unable to retrieve CPU information using systrace.py.

Fix

Check whether the device is able to report on both categories freq and idle using Systrace:

python2 systrace.py -l

If the categories are not listed, use a different device.

References

https://developer.android.com/studio/command-line/systrace