bpftrace vs Kindling
bpftrace
bpftrace.orgKindling
kindlingwriter.comSide by side
| Figure | bpftrace | Kindling |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | Free |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| Windows | — | Yes |
| macOS | — | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| Self-hosted | Yes | — |
| Plans published | 1 | 1 |
| Spec score · eBPF Observability Tools | 8.6 (#4) | 7.7 (#17) |
| Support | The project README lists GitHub Discussions, the issue tracker, monthly office hours, and Discord as ways to get help or participate. | The maker links to GitHub Issues and Discord for questions and contributions. |
Plans
In their own words
bpftrace
bpftrace is a free, high-level tracing language and general-purpose Linux tracing tool built on eBPF. It supports kernel and user-space dynamic tracing, perf events, USDT, uprobes, and tracepoints. Its language draws from awk, C, DTrace, and SystemTap. Programs can come from files, inline -e input, or standard input, and the standard library supplies builtins, functions, macros, and map-value functions. LLVM compiles scripts to eBPF bytecode; libbpf interacts with Linux’s BPF subsystem, with bcc also used in the implementation. Scripts can import bpftrace files, C headers, BPF C source, and supported directory files. Unsafe helpers require --unsafe, and imports from world-writable directories are refused. The default probe maximum is 1,024; increasing it can raise memory use, startup time, overhead, or risk freezes and crashes. Supported architectures include x86_64, arm64, s390x, arm32, loongarch64, mips64, ppc64, and riscv64. Some features need kernel headers; vmlinux BTF needs Linux 4.18 or later with CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO_BTF enabled.
Kindling
Kindling is a free desktop writing app for fiction writers who plan their stories while drafting. Its writing view can show scene beats as expandable prompts, or switch to a full-page prose editor. Tagged characters and locations appear in a reference panel with descriptions, notes, and custom fields. Projects import from Plottr, Scrivener, yWriter, Obsidian Longform, novelWriter, and Markdown, then export to DOCX, EPUB, HTML, plain text, Markdown, Scrivener, Longform, and novelWriter. Editorial review uses a .kindling-review file containing tracked suggestions and threaded comments; feedback can be imported and changes accepted or rejected. Screenplay projects add slugline entry, page-count estimates, and one-page or five-page DOCX treatments. Data stays in local SQLite files, with no account, analytics, telemetry, or usage tracking required. Writing and review work offline. Kindling is open source under MIT, does not use AI to analyze writing, and runs on Windows 10+, macOS 12+, and x86_64 Linux.