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Give me 15 minutes and I'll change your view of GDB (2015) [video]

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Re: Give me 15 minutes and I'll change your view of GDB (2015) [video]

#61

Post by akovaski »

corndoge wrote: post #45
jussij wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I am kind of lost when trying to debug a binary on windows When I want to debug a program using the Visual Studio IDE I do the following: 1. Start the IDE and open the solution file. 2. Make sure the Debug Build option is selected. 3. Open a given file in the solution that I want to debug. 4. Select a line in that file and use the Debug, Toggle Breakpoint menu to set a breakpoint. 5. Run the debugger using the Debu…

While a simple series of steps it's still pretty complex compares to the equivalent in gdb: $ gdb ./binary (gdb) break file.c:line (gdb) run I think this is merely a disguised version of the "CLIs are too hard" argument...

However, it is a lot more intuitive compared to gdb: Click the green arrow. Click the line you want to set a breakpoint on. See where you stopped in the same editor that you wrote the code in. Hover your mouse over variables to see their values, visually explore class and array variables. Dig down into functions that are about to be called, before you actually call them.

Re: Give me 15 minutes and I'll change your view of GDB (2015) [video]

#62

Post by jcelerier »

yen223 wrote: post #5

I used to think GDB was a tool with the most broken interface I've ever seen, and which requires arcane commands to do the most trivial of debugging things. I still do, but I used to too. That early dig against Windows was particularly funny. There's no way I would pick that over Visual Studio's debugging tools.

you have plenty of graphical frontends that bring it "down" to the ease of use of VS. I like QtCreator's gdb integration personnally.

Re: Give me 15 minutes and I'll change your view of GDB (2015) [video]

#63

Post by jcelerier »

jussij wrote: post #40
bennofs wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you tell me some of the things that VS does much better? I've only ever used GDB, and I am kind of lost when trying to debug a binary on windows

> I am kind of lost when trying to debug a binary on windows When I want to debug a program using the Visual Studio IDE I do the following: 1. Start the IDE and open the solution file. 2. Make sure the Debug Build option is selected. 3. Open a given file in the solution that I want to debug. 4. Select a line in that file and use the Debug, Toggle Breakpoint menu to set a breakpoint. 5. Run the debugger using the Debu…

So... just like every IDE that integrates GDB then ?

Re: Give me 15 minutes and I'll change your view of GDB (2015) [video]

#64

Post by cma »

jussij wrote: post #40
bennofs wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you tell me some of the things that VS does much better? I've only ever used GDB, and I am kind of lost when trying to debug a binary on windows

> I am kind of lost when trying to debug a binary on windows When I want to debug a program using the Visual Studio IDE I do the following: 1. Start the IDE and open the solution file. 2. Make sure the Debug Build option is selected. 3. Open a given file in the solution that I want to debug. 4. Select a line in that file and use the Debug, Toggle Breakpoint menu to set a breakpoint. 5. Run the debugger using the Debu…

Now try complex logic, only break here if this this and that happened just before. GDB can be much better for that.

Where VS shines for me is inspecting the state of datastructures. As long as you don't need to do any complex search on them, or programmatically walk a graph of them.

Re: Give me 15 minutes and I'll change your view of GDB (2015) [video]

#65

Post by SimonPStevens »

pmoriarty wrote: post #60
nmg wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

off-topic.

This is another example where HN needs tags. The original humorous comment could have been tagged "humor" and the parent reply could have been tagged "meta", and an HN reader could have their client filter posts based on their preferences: if they want to see humor or meta posts, they could have them -- if they don't they won't and their feed will be leaner and less annoying to them, and there'll be less need to down…

I really like this idea.

[meta], [general-agreement], [non-contributing]

Re: Give me 15 minutes and I'll change your view of GDB (2015) [video]

#66

Post by sigjuice »

userbinator wrote: post #48
yen223 wrote: post #5

I used to think GDB was a tool with the most broken interface I've ever seen, and which requires arcane commands to do the most trivial of debugging things. I still do, but I used to too. That early dig against Windows was particularly funny. There's no way I would pick that over Visual Studio's debugging tools.

I agree that gdb's syntax is ridiculous, having come from a background of DOS DEBUG and WinDbg, but what irritates me more are the implementations of certain functionality: - No way to get a 16-column (bytes+ASCII) standard hexdump. This is functionality that even the most basic debugger should have, yet it's missing from gdb. - "disassemble" command is next to useless. - If you write "b 0x12345" intending to set a b…

You don't explain how "disassemble" is useless, but the rest of the things you mention are extremely superficial.

Re: Give me 15 minutes and I'll change your view of GDB (2015) [video]

#67

Post by bramv »

fest wrote: post #18
yen223 wrote: post #5

I used to think GDB was a tool with the most broken interface I've ever seen, and which requires arcane commands to do the most trivial of debugging things. I still do, but I used to too. That early dig against Windows was particularly funny. There's no way I would pick that over Visual Studio's debugging tools.

I could agree with you on gdb's user interface. However, working on embedded hardware, plain gdb and it's architecture-specific forks|variants have been the least fiddly things to use. The most recent examples I've stumbled upon were System Workbench for STM32 and Atollic Studio debugging relatively recent STM32F7 series. When the debugging from IDE doesn't work, it's very hard to see where the problem is (is the har…

I stopped using the integrated debugging from an IDE because of the problems you described. Segger Ozone is doing a good job if you like a graphic interface.

(BTW nice to see you here again. I think we met at some point playing with a laser cutter next to your old office in Riga).

Re: Give me 15 minutes and I'll change your view of GDB (2015) [video]

#68

Post by alkonaut »

bennofs wrote: post #32
yen223 wrote: post #5

I used to think GDB was a tool with the most broken interface I've ever seen, and which requires arcane commands to do the most trivial of debugging things. I still do, but I used to too. That early dig against Windows was particularly funny. There's no way I would pick that over Visual Studio's debugging tools.

Can you tell me some of the things that VS does much better? I've only ever used GDB, and I am kind of lost when trying to debug a binary on windows

Debugging a binary that you don't have source to, and that you don't intend to modify the reduces the benefit of the full IDE (where your syntax view in debugging is the same as your editor). Still, you get all the niceties of the IDE. You break on a line, step further on some lines. Notice the bug happen after y = foo() + bar(). So you wonder "where are those?" and you F12 with the cursor on the method name to nav to that method once there you set a breakpoint on the first line, and run so you debug that next.

Also, if you add in edit-and-continue so you can modify the code and have it automatically recompiled and keep debugging it, that adds value too.

I assume that various editor adaptations for vim/emacs etc means that you get almost all the IDE experience with gdb as well (symbol navigation, syntax highlight etc) and at that point there is of course little difference between one IDE and another.

Re: Give me 15 minutes and I'll change your view of GDB (2015) [video]

#69

Post by dman »

ustokes wrote: post #37

Agree. I started embedded coding on Linux + Qt-Creator. I have everything working, compiling and running on my ARM and AVR chips, but Debuging jsut does nto work. Just can't find any proper info on how to integrate GDB into Qt-Creator and be able to just Debug like in Visual Studio. If this is not possible, that this endeed is very stupid, starting/stopping servers on a remote target and the rest...

I don't think the situation is likely to improve much unless as a profession we become open to paying for quality tools.

Re: Give me 15 minutes and I'll change your view of GDB (2015) [video]

#70

Post by alkonaut »

jcelerier wrote: post #63
jussij wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I am kind of lost when trying to debug a binary on windows When I want to debug a program using the Visual Studio IDE I do the following: 1. Start the IDE and open the solution file. 2. Make sure the Debug Build option is selected. 3. Open a given file in the solution that I want to debug. 4. Select a line in that file and use the Debug, Toggle Breakpoint menu to set a breakpoint. 5. Run the debugger using the Debu…

So... just like every IDE that integrates GDB then ?

Exactly. gdb is just like gcc. I can see the point of having a command line version of a compiler for toying and for automation/build scripts etc, but I rarely see the need to type out compiler commands. Same with a debugger.
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