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.\" Copyright (C) 1991, 1999, 2010 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
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.\" See section COPYING for conditions for redistribution
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.\" $Id: gdb.1,v 1.4 1999/01/05 00:50:50 jsm Exp $
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.TH gdb 1 "22may2002" "GNU Tools" "GNU Tools"
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gdb \- The GNU Debugger
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.RB "[\|" \-help "\|]"
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.RB "[\|" \-batch "\|]"
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.IR core \||\| procID\c
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The purpose of a debugger such as GDB is to allow you to see what is
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going on ``inside'' another program while it executes\(em\&or what another
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program was doing at the moment it crashed.
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GDB can do four main kinds of things (plus other things in support of
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these) to help you catch bugs in the act:
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Start your program, specifying anything that might affect its behavior.
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Make your program stop on specified conditions.
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Examine what has happened, when your program has stopped.
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Change things in your program, so you can experiment with correcting the
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effects of one bug and go on to learn about another.
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You can use GDB to debug programs written in C, C++, and Modula-2.
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Fortran support will be added when a GNU Fortran compiler is ready.
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GDB is invoked with the shell command \c
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\&. Once started, it reads
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commands from the terminal until you tell it to exit with the GDB
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\&. You can get online help from \c
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by using the command \c
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\& with no arguments or options; but the most
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usual way to start GDB is with one argument or two, specifying an
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executable program as the argument:
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You can also start with both an executable program and a core file specified:
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You can, instead, specify a process ID as a second argument, if you want
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to debug a running process:
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would attach GDB to process \c
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\& (unless you also have a file
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\&\|'; GDB does check for a core file first).
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Here are some of the most frequently needed GDB commands:
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.B break \fR[\|\fIfile\fB:\fR\|]\fIfunction
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Set a breakpoint at \c
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.B run \fR[\|\fIarglist\fR\|]
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Start your program (with \c
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Backtrace: display the program stack.
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Display the value of an expression.
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Continue running your program (after stopping, e.g. at a breakpoint).
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Execute next program line (after stopping); step \c
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function calls in the line.
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.B edit \fR[\|\fIfile\fB:\fR\|]\fIfunction
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look at the program line where it is presently stopped.
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.B list \fR[\|\fIfile\fB:\fR\|]\fIfunction
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type the text of the program in the vicinity of where it is presently stopped.
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Execute next program line (after stopping); step \c
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function calls in the line.
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.B help \fR[\|\fIname\fR\|]
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Show information about GDB command \c
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\&, or general information
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For full details on GDB, see \c
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Using GDB: A Guide to the GNU Source-Level Debugger\c
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\&, by Richard M. Stallman and Roland H. Pesch. The same text is available online
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Any arguments other than options specify an executable
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file and core file (or process ID); that is, the first argument
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associated option flag is equivalent to a `\|\c
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\&\|' option, and the
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second, if any, is equivalent to a `\|\c
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\&\|' option if it's the name of a file. Many options have
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both long and short forms; both are shown here. The long forms are also
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recognized if you truncate them, so long as enough of the option is
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present to be unambiguous. (If you prefer, you can flag option
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\&\|' rather than `\|\c
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\&\|', though we illustrate the
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more usual convention.)
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All the options and command line arguments you give are processed
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in sequential order. The order makes a difference when the
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\&\|' option is used.
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List all options, with brief explanations.
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.BI "\-symbols=" "file"\c
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Read symbol table from file \c
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Enable writing into executable and core files.
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.BI "\-exec=" "file"\c
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\& as the executable file to execute when
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appropriate, and for examining pure data in conjunction with a core
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Read symbol table from file \c
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\& and use it as the executable
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.BI "\-core=" "file"\c
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\& as a core dump to examine.
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.BI "\-command=" "file"\c
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Execute GDB commands from file \c
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.BI "\-directory=" "directory"\c
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.BI "\-d " "directory"\c
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\& to the path to search for source files.
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Do not execute commands from any `\|\c
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\&\|' initialization files.
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Normally, the commands in these files are executed after all the
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command options and arguments have been processed.
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``Quiet''. Do not print the introductory and copyright messages. These
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messages are also suppressed in batch mode.
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Run in batch mode. Exit with status \c
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\& after processing all the command
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files specified with `\|\c
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\&\|', if not inhibited).
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Exit with nonzero status if an error occurs in executing the GDB
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commands in the command files.
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Batch mode may be useful for running GDB as a filter, for example to
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download and run a program on another computer; in order to make this
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more useful, the message
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Program\ exited\ normally.
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(which is ordinarily issued whenever a program running under GDB control
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terminates) is not issued when running in batch mode.
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.BI "\-cd=" "directory"\c
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\& as its working directory,
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instead of the current directory.
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Emacs sets this option when it runs GDB as a subprocess. It tells GDB
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to output the full file name and line number in a standard,
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recognizable fashion each time a stack frame is displayed (which
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includes each time the program stops). This recognizable format looks
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\&\|' characters, followed by the file name, line number
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and character position separated by colons, and a newline. The
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Emacs-to-GDB interface program uses the two `\|\c
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a signal to display the source code for the frame.
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Set the line speed (baud rate or bits per second) of any serial
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interface used by GDB for remote debugging.
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.BI "\-tty=" "device"\c
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\& for your program's standard input and output.
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Using GDB: A Guide to the GNU Source-Level Debugger\c
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, Richard M. Stallman and Roland H. Pesch, July 1991.
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Copyright (c) 1991, 2010 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
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Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of
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this manual provided the copyright notice and this permission notice
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are preserved on all copies.
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Permission is granted to copy and distribute modified versions of this
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manual under the conditions for verbatim copying, provided that the
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entire resulting derived work is distributed under the terms of a
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permission notice identical to this one.
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Permission is granted to copy and distribute translations of this
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manual into another language, under the above conditions for modified
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versions, except that this permission notice may be included in
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translations approved by the Free Software Foundation instead of in
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the original English.
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.pc/man-page-args.patch/gdb/gdb.1
