Learning C with gdb • Hacker News Board

Re: Learning C with gdb

#11

Post by octopus » Mon, Aug 27, 2012, 6:27 PM UTC

Create wrote: post #5

m_eiman wrote: post #3

Here's a more full-featured C++ REPL: http://root.cern.ch/drupal/content/what-cling

...except, that it isn't C++ standard compliant, and you are worse off than when you started out. "full-featured C++" is misleading. http://www.insectnation.org/howto/living-without-root https://linuxfr.org/nodes/18919/comments/632920 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.lang.c%2B%2B.root/5924

You are making a confusion here, CINT != CLING.

Re: Learning C with gdb

#12

Post by stonefroot » Mon, Aug 27, 2012, 6:39 PM UTC

I want to be able to do this with assembly, e.g., see what is in each register as I step through the program.

Re: Learning C with gdb

#13

Post by 16s » Mon, Aug 27, 2012, 6:44 PM UTC

gdb is very nice. I use it with C++ too. Watch sizeof on char arrays. Why is my string's sizeof always 8? That confuses some when starting out.

Re: Learning C with gdb

#14

Post by Derbasti » Mon, Aug 27, 2012, 6:45 PM UTC

While graphical debuggers are great overall, there are times when I prefer to get down to the command line and do my debugging there. And quite surprisingly, I don't lose much efficiency there, either.

But then, this could be the story of most command line utilities: Seems fiddly at first, but actually it is quite usable and often times more convenient than all those whiz-bang graphical tools.

Re: Learning C with gdb

#15

Post by digitalinfinity » Mon, Aug 27, 2012, 6:46 PM UTC

stonefroot wrote: post #12

I want to be able to do this with assembly, e.g., see what is in each register as I step through the program.

Doesn't info registers in gdb do this for you?

Re: Learning C with gdb

#16

Post by Create » Mon, Aug 27, 2012, 6:48 PM UTC

octopus wrote: post #11

Create wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...except, that it isn't C++ standard compliant, and you are worse off than when you started out. "full-featured C++" is misleading. http://www.insectnation.org/howto/living-without-root https://linuxfr.org/nodes/18919/comments/632920 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.lang.c%2B%2B.root/5924

You are making a confusion here, CINT != CLING.

CINT referenced, because CLING hasn't seen deployment and real tests. Maybe in a few years.

Re: Learning C with gdb

#17

Post by joeld42 » Mon, Aug 27, 2012, 6:48 PM UTC

This looks really great, but I'd call it "Learning GDB with C"

Re: Learning C with gdb

#18

Post by jfaucett » Mon, Aug 27, 2012, 6:49 PM UTC

Does anyone else think debuggers are awesome for learning how programs/languages work? Its pretty much always the first thing I do, even before reading docs, build and debug.

Re: Learning C with gdb

#19

Post by geoka9 » Mon, Aug 27, 2012, 6:50 PM UTC

There's also CINT (a C interpreter), which can be used as a REPL:

http://root.cern.ch/drupal/content/cint

Re: Learning C with gdb

#20

Post by duaneb » Mon, Aug 27, 2012, 6:52 PM UTC

stcredzero wrote: post #6

There was a debugger posted here to HN awhile back that actually displayed structs and pointers graphically. What was the name of that project, and is it still around? I was trying to find it the other day. I thought that was a dynamite tool for students. With LLVM, we should be able to have a REPL for C. as a pedagogical tool.

Perhaps cling? http://root.cern.ch/drupal/content/cling