Enable Full PerfSpect Functionality by Removing --noroot Flag

[artursarlo]

Enable Full PerfSpect Functionality by Removing --noroot Flag

Motivation

PerfSpect was previously run with the --noroot flag, which disables some expected functionalities and limits hardware metrics collection capabilities. This PR removes the --noroot flag and instead configures the containerized environment with the dependencies PerfSpect requires to run with full functionality.

Problem

When running PerfSpect without the --noroot flag in a PyInstaller-packaged gProfiler container, two issues prevented successful execution:

1. Missing runtime dependencies: Alpine Linux doesn't include sudo and bash by default, which PerfSpect requires
2. LD_LIBRARY_PATH pollution: PyInstaller bundles glibc-built libraries (like libz.so.1) and sets LD_LIBRARY_PATH to find them. When PerfSpect runs sudo perf, sudo inherits this environment and attempts to load the glibc version of libz.so.1 instead of Alpine's musl version, causing a symbol mismatch error:

   sudo: unable to load /usr/lib/sudo/sudoers.so: Error relocating /tmp/_MEIEXxh0f/libz.so.1: __vsnprintf_chk: symbol not found
   

Solution

1. Install Required Dependencies in Container (container.Dockerfile)

RUN apk add --no-cache sudo bash

• sudo: Required by PerfSpect to run perf commands with elevated privileges
• bash: Required by PerfSpect's internal scripts (Alpine uses ash by default)

2. Clean PyInstaller Environment Variables (gprofiler/hw_metrics.py)

Filter out PyInstaller's temporary library paths from LD_LIBRARY_PATH before spawning PerfSpect:

env = os.environ.copy()
if 'LD_LIBRARY_PATH' in env:
    ld_paths = env['LD_LIBRARY_PATH'].split(':')
    # Filter out paths that contain _MEI (PyInstaller temp directories)
    cleaned_paths = [p for p in ld_paths if '_MEI' not in p]
    if cleaned_paths:
        env['LD_LIBRARY_PATH'] = ':'.join(cleaned_paths)
    else:
        del env['LD_LIBRARY_PATH']

subprocess.Popen(ps_cmd, env=env)

This ensures sudo loads the correct system libraries compatible with Alpine's musl libc.

3. Fix PyInstaller Hidden Imports (pyinstaller.spec)

Added missing hidden imports that PyInstaller wasn't detecting automatically:

hiddenimports=[
    'backports',
    'backports.tarfile',
    'jaraco.text',
    'jaraco.context',
    'jaraco.functools',
]

These are dependencies of pkg_resources/setuptools that were causing runtime import errors.

Changes

• container.Dockerfile: Install sudo and bash packages
• gprofiler/hw_metrics.py: Remove --noroot flag and add LD_LIBRARY_PATH cleaning
• pyinstaller.spec: Add hidden imports for backports and jaraco modules

Benefits

• ✅ PerfSpect runs with full functionality (no --noroot limitations)
• ✅ Hardware metrics collection works properly in containerized environments
• ✅ Maintains compatibility with PerfSpect's expected runtime environment
• ✅ Minimal overhead (~1-2MB for sudo and bash packages)

Testing

• ✅ Verified PerfSpect collects hardware metrics successfully without --noroot
• ✅ Confirmed sudo works correctly with cleaned environment
• ✅ Tested in Alpine-based container where issues were originally observed
• ✅ Verified no PyInstaller import errors with added hidden imports

[prashantbytesyntax]

how are we sure that this change in env['LD_LIBRARY_PATH'] wont cause the regression

[prashantbytesyntax]

perfspect ran perfectly with --noroot. What new capabilities are enabled when running as root. Giving root access to run perfspect incurs security risk