[lug] At last! A graphical debugger.
rm at fabula.de
rm at fabula.de
Fri Feb 22 05:23:30 MST 2002
On Thu, Feb 21, 2002 at 09:33:46PM -0700, Tom Tromey wrote:
> >>>>> "Scott" == Scott A Herod <herod at interact-tv.com> writes:
>
> Scott> [herod at torries bin]$ ./gdb --version
> Scott> GNU gdb 5.0
>
> Thanks. That's actually fairly old in Insight terms.
>
> Scott> The reasons that I now prefer DDD include; motif ( makes it
> Scott> peppier ), mouse-over a variable can show its value
>
> Insight can do this these days.
>
> Scott> it has a graphical method of displaying watch variables,
> Scott> displaying classes in tables with arrows linking to other
> Scott> structures, and graphical display of arrays.
>
> Yeah, those are definite advantages.
>
> I tend not to use variable watches at all any more. gdb has a
> tendency to crash when I use them, and that negative reinforcement has
> made me stop using them. The problem is most acute when you're doing
> a lot of debugging in a shared library, so I suspect it isn't a
> failure mode most people see. (Too bad, if it were it would get
> fixed.)
>
> Scott> On a related note, I wonder how hard it would be to make some
> Scott> of the display tools work with jdb. I know you work on gcj,
> Scott> Tom, have you done anything with Insight in that direction?
>
> Nope. A long time ago Per modified gdb to work with gcj-compiled
> code. This support has bit-rotted a little but is still functional
> enough for simple debugging. libgcj doesn't implement JVMDI (or
> whatever it is these days -- the interpreter debugging interface), so
> jdb doesn't work with it (and so I've never used jdb). Also, Insight
> is linked to gdb, it isn't like DDD or Emacs or any other program that
> interprets gdb's output.
>
> My favorite Insight feature is that it lets you save your debugging
> state. So my complicated breakpoint commands and conditions are
> saved, and I can easily start debugging on an old session again. I
> use this feature heavily.
>
>
> There's another gdb wrapper written in Ada that uses Gtk+. I think it
> can also wrap jdb and some other debuggers. I haven't tried it
> though. Have you?
I have, and since then it's my (graphical) debugger of coice. What i really
liked about DDD is it's excellent documentation (hmm, the suff i read was
probbly in german :-/) but i do prefer gvd's GTK look-n-feel. Also it interacts
nicely with (x)emacs (you can even use emacs as the embeded editor) and
GNU nana (i use nana to instrument code - GVD let's me both save a session and
come back later after code modifications or replay sessions with different program
input, something i often need during parser construction).
I'm actually quite shure that on an 'objective' level there's probably little
DDD or insight couldn't do as well or better. I guess Look and feel do play an
important role sometimes. Oh, one thing i sometimes miss in GVD: i tend to
alter and extend my tools and that's a bit hard with GVD (no intention to get
into ADA programming :-)
Ralf Mattes
need
> Tom
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