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GDB Frontend with C Pointer Visualization

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Re: GDB Frontend with C Pointer Visualization

#11

Post by lokedhs »

nathell wrote: post #2

This looks like a modern-day ddd [1]. Sorely needed. (Not much by me, since I don't do a lot of C these days, but I'd definitely use this if I did.) [1]: https://www.gnu.org/software/ddd/

That reminds me about that one day in at Sun back in the late 90's when I compiled Solaris in debug mode and set up KGDB.

I was running a full Solaris kernel while anothe rmachine was running GDB and DDD. I was able to visualise all the kernel structures in realtime. It was significantly more usable that I would have imagined it to be.

Can you do something similar these days with Linux?

Re: GDB Frontend with C Pointer Visualization

#12

Post by Razengan »

acqq wrote: post #4
nathell wrote: post #2

This looks like a modern-day ddd [1]. Sorely needed. (Not much by me, since I don't do a lot of C these days, but I'd definitely use this if I did.) [1]: https://www.gnu.org/software/ddd/

What I don't understand with this "modernity" is these "black background shimmery text" themes. Because that's what we had in bad old days before the monitors were able to show pixels -- the text consoles could actually show only text and the technology used was too poor to have nice pale background and black letters. But why would somebody want this on the modern displays, except because he does that instead of prop…

"I don’t like this so nobody else should" is always obnoxious to read.

I like dark mode. If it has options to let you have dark-text-on-bright-backgrounds, why does the option for a dark mode bother you?

Tech should cater to different needs. Nobody should have to defend their preferences against anyone, but for those wondering if there are any objective reasons:

I don’t want intense light constantly blasting my eyes, taking up more energy and reducing the display’s effective lifetime, and I want to be able to work comfortably in dark environments, which may be dark for any reason: Not wanting to wake other people up, or bother anyone in theaters/restaurants/cars/planes/etc. or simply reducing energy usage.

Re: GDB Frontend with C Pointer Visualization

#13

Post by acqq »

Razengan wrote: post #12
acqq wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I don't understand with this "modernity" is these "black background shimmery text" themes. Because that's what we had in bad old days before the monitors were able to show pixels -- the text consoles could actually show only text and the technology used was too poor to have nice pale background and black letters. But why would somebody want this on the modern displays, except because he does that instead of prop…

"I don’t like this so nobody else should" is always obnoxious to read. I like dark mode. If it has options to let you have dark-text-on-bright-backgrounds, why does the option for a dark mode bother you? Tech should cater to different needs. Nobody should have to defend their preferences against anyone, but for those wondering if there are any objective reasons: I don’t want intense light constantly blasting my eyes,…

That “quote” of what I wrote:

> > I don’t like this so nobody else should. > Is always obnoxious.

Is completely fake.

Readers beware.

Re: GDB Frontend with C Pointer Visualization

#14

Post by acqq »

dragonwriter wrote: post #10
acqq wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I don't understand with this "modernity" is these "black background shimmery text" themes. Because that's what we had in bad old days before the monitors were able to show pixels -- the text consoles could actually show only text and the technology used was too poor to have nice pale background and black letters. But why would somebody want this on the modern displays, except because he does that instead of prop…

> What I don't understand with this "modernity" is these "black background shimmery text" themes. Because we're mostly using emissive displays, and it turns out that trying to imitate what works on paper on an emissive display sucks for long term use (though it looks pretty at a glance, and if you are composing things for print WYSIWYG may be more important than what is most comfortable on the screen.) We tried light…

> Because we're mostly using emissive displays, and it turns out that trying to imitate what works on paper on an emissive display sucks for long term use

I claim it’s not true. If one would measure The light flux of my screen I’m sure it wouldn’t be higher than that of the paper when reading in good light conditions. I claim that it’s dependent of how one configures his display.

Re: GDB Frontend with C Pointer Visualization

#15

Post by jmiskovic »

I'm taking it for a spin and sharing my notes as I go:

    * UI has pleasant colors, I could get used to comfort of having all relevant info in side panes
    * The gdb starts in /opt/gdbfrontend directory, would be nice if it changed to dir you executed gdbfrontent in
    * I wish I could collapse Disassembly list - I don't want to see it ever
    * Icons don't have tooltips and some are not so clear
    * "Sources" pane doesn't actually have all the sources, some appear only after I set breakpoint in previously missing file
    * Breakpoints set manually through GDB console don't show up in UI breakpoint list
    * Usual shortcuts F10, F11... for stepping over and into don't work, while gdb commands n and s work only if lower pane has focus, so interface requires more mouse clicking
    * In my specific case it doesn't detect local variables or respond to added watches (fields to right stay blank)
This is where I stopped using it, don't have time to debug the debugger. I appreciate the effort and it looks like it might be extremely handy tool in future.

Re: GDB Frontend with C Pointer Visualization

#16

Post by virgilp »

acqq wrote: post #13
Razengan wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I don’t like this so nobody else should" is always obnoxious to read. I like dark mode. If it has options to let you have dark-text-on-bright-backgrounds, why does the option for a dark mode bother you? Tech should cater to different needs. Nobody should have to defend their preferences against anyone, but for those wondering if there are any objective reasons: I don’t want intense light constantly blasting my eyes,…

That “quote” of what I wrote: > > I don’t like this so nobody else should. > Is always obnoxious. Is completely fake. Readers beware.

It's not "completely fake", it's how your rant reads to a lot of readers - whether you intended it or not. @Razengan was giving you a hand here, helping you understand why that rant is disliked.

Re: GDB Frontend with C Pointer Visualization

#19

Post by gibsjose »

If you’re looking for something more lightweight in between vanilla GDB and a full GUI frontend, I would highly recommend GDB Dashboard: https://github.com/cyrus-and/gdb-dashboard

It’s just a single file (replaces your ~/.gdbinit) that wraps your GDB session with a nice TUI using the Python API. I’ve found it to be a nice middle ground.

Re: GDB Frontend with C Pointer Visualization

#20

Post by agapon »

lokedhs wrote: post #11
nathell wrote: post #2

This looks like a modern-day ddd [1]. Sorely needed. (Not much by me, since I don't do a lot of C these days, but I'd definitely use this if I did.) [1]: https://www.gnu.org/software/ddd/

That reminds me about that one day in at Sun back in the late 90's when I compiled Solaris in debug mode and set up KGDB. I was running a full Solaris kernel while anothe rmachine was running GDB and DDD. I was able to visualise all the kernel structures in realtime. It was significantly more usable that I would have imagined it to be. Can you do something similar these days with Linux?

Of course.
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