The Thread Validator API
There are some features of Thread Validator that are useful to call directly from your program, including tracking of memory in custom heap managers.
Thread Validator has an API that makes this possible; just include svlTVAPI.c and svlTVAPI.h to your codebase. There is no library to link to, dlls to copy.
Source files
The source files can be found in the API directory in the Thread Validator install directory.
svlTVAPI.h
svlTVAPI.c
Just add these files to your project and build.
If you are using precompiled headers you will need to disable them for svlTVAPI.c.
Working with services?
If you are working with services you to attach Thread Validator to a service and to start Thread Validator, you should use the NT Service API, not the functions in this API.
All the other functions in this API can be used with applications and with services.
All the API functions are provided in Unicode and ANSI variants where strings are used. We've also provided a character width neutral #define in the same fashion that the Windows.h header files do.
For example the function for naming a heap is provided as tvSetHeapNameA(), tvSetHeapNameW() with the character width neutral tvSetHeapName() mapping to tvSetHeapNameW() for unicode and tvSetHeapNameA() for ANSI.
In this document we're going to use TCHAR like the Window.h header files do.
Loading the Profiler
For most use cases won't need to load the profiler, as the profiler will have been loaded when your launched your program from Thread Validator, or when you injected into your program using Inject or Wait For Application.
However if you're running your program from outside of Thread Validator and want to load the profiler from inside your program you can use tvLoadProfiler() to do that. You'll then need to call tvStartProfiler() to start it.
Function Definition:
extern "C"
void tvLoadProfiler();
If you are using services, you should use the NT Service API to attach Thread Validator to your service, not the functions in this API.
Starting the Profiler
To start the profiler from your API code you need to call the function "startProfiler" from your code before you call any API functions. Ideally you should call this function as early in your program as possible.
Function Definition:
extern "C"
void tvStartProfiler();
If you prefer to start the profiler from the user interface or command line you can omit the startProfiler() call. You can leave it present if you wish to start Thread Validator from your program.
All the API functions are declared as extern "C", so C as well as C++ users can use them.
If you are using services, you should use the NT Service API to start Thread Validator, not the functions in this API.
tvSetThreadNameA()
Sets the name of a thread.
extern "C"
void tvSetThreadNameA(DWORD threadID
const char *name);
tvSetThreadNameW()
Sets the name of a thread.
extern "C"
void tvSetThreadNameW(DWORD threadID
const wchar_t *name);
tvSetCollect()
Enables or disables data collection - i.e. whether data is sent to Thread Validator from your target application.
extern "C"
void tvSetCollect(int enable); // TRUE to enable, FALSE to disable
Returns whether data collection is on.
extern "C"
int tvGetCollect(); // Returns TRUE or FALSE
Calling API functions using GetProcAddress
If you don't want to use the svlTVAPI.c/h files you can use GetProcAddress to find the interface functions in the Thread Validator DLL.
The interface functions have different names and do not use C++ name mangling, but have identical parameters to the API functions.
To determine the function name take any native API name, replace the leading tv with api. For example tvSetThreadNameW() becomes apiSetThreadNameW();
Example usage
HMODULE getValidatorModule()
{
HMODULE hModule;
hModule = GetModuleHandle("svlThreadValidatorStub6432.dll"); // 32 bit DLL with 64 bit Thread Validator GUI
if (hModule == NULL)
hModule = GetModuleHandle("svlThreadValidatorStub_x64.dll"); // 64 bit DLL with 64 bit Thread Validator GUI
if (hModule == NULL)
hModule = GetModuleHandle("svlThreadValidatorStub.dll"); // 32 bit DLL with 32 bit Thread Validator GUI
return hModule;
}
HMODULE hMod;
// get module, will only succeed if Thread Validator launched this app or is injected into this app
hMod = getValidatorModule();
if (hMod != NULL)
{
// MV is present, lookup the function and call it to set a watermark for this location in the code
tvSetNameW_FUNC pFunc;
// "apiSetThreadNameW" is equivalent to linking against "tvSetThreadNameW"
pFunc = (tvSetNameW_FUNC)GetProcAddress(hMod, "apiSetThreadNameW");
if (pFunc != NULL)
{
(*pFunc)(threadName);
}
}
API functions and their GetProcAddress names
For any API functions not listed, try looking up the name in svlMemoryValidatorStub.dll using depends.exe
Other exported functions
You may see some other functions exported from svlThreadValidatorStub.dll(_x64).dll.
These other functions are for Thread Validator's use. Using them may damage memory locations and/or crash your code. Best not to use them!
