This adds two new attributes and three new methods to gdb.Inferior.
The attributes let Python code see the command-line arguments and the
name of "main". Argument setting is also supported.
The methods let Python code manipulate the inferior's environment
variables.
Reviewed-By: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
This adds a 'global_context' parse_and_eval to gdb.parse_and_eval.
This lets users request a parse that is done at "global scope".
I considered letting callers pass in a block instead, with None
meaning "global" -- but then there didn't seem to be a clean way to
express the default for this parameter.
Reviewed-By: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
This adds a new Python function, gdb.execute_mi, that can be used to
invoke an MI command but get the output as a Python object, rather
than a string. This is done by implementing a new ui_out subclass
that builds a Python object.
Bug: https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=11688
Reviewed-By: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
I noticed that Frame.older and Frame.newer don't document that they
return None at the ends of the stack. This patch updates the
documentation, and also fixes a somewhat related typo in a comment
that I noticed while digging into this.
Approved-By: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
Eli pointed out that @sc only produces small caps for lower case
letters in its argument, so it's weird to write it using upper-case
letters. This patch fixes the instances I found.
Approved-By: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
This commit extends the Python Disassembler API to allow for styling
of the instructions.
Before this commit the Python Disassembler API allowed the user to do
two things:
- They could intercept instruction disassembly requests and return a
string of their choosing, this string then became the disassembled
instruction, or
- They could call builtin_disassemble, which would call back into
libopcode to perform the disassembly. As libopcode printed the
instruction GDB would collect these print requests and build a
string. This string was then returned from the builtin_disassemble
call, and the user could modify or extend this string as needed.
Neither of these approaches allowed for, or preserved, disassembler
styling, which is now available within libopcodes for many of the more
popular architectures GDB supports.
This commit aims to fill this gap. After this commit a user will be
able to do the following things:
- Implement a custom instruction disassembler entirely in Python
without calling back into libopcodes, the custom disassembler will
be able to return styling information such that GDB will display
the instruction fully styled. All of GDB's existing style
settings will affect how instructions coming from the Python
disassembler are displayed in the expected manner.
- Call builtin_disassemble and receive a result that represents how
libopcode would like the instruction styled. The user can then
adjust or extend the disassembled instruction before returning the
result to GDB. Again, the instruction will be styled as expected.
To achieve this I will add two new classes to GDB,
DisassemblerTextPart and DisassemblerAddressPart.
Within builtin_disassemble, instead of capturing the print calls from
libopcodes and building a single string, we will now create either a
text part or address part and store these parts in a vector.
The DisassemblerTextPart will capture a small piece of text along with
the associated style that should be used to display the text. This
corresponds to the disassembler calling
disassemble_info::fprintf_styled_func, or for disassemblers that don't
support styling disassemble_info::fprintf_func.
The DisassemblerAddressPart is used when libopcodes requests that an
address be printed, and takes care of printing the address and
associated symbol, this corresponds to the disassembler calling
disassemble_info::print_address_func.
These parts are then placed within the DisassemblerResult when
builtin_disassemble returns.
Alternatively, the user can directly create parts by calling two new
methods on the DisassembleInfo class: DisassembleInfo.text_part and
DisassembleInfo.address_part.
Having created these parts the user can then pass these parts when
initializing a new DisassemblerResult object.
Finally, when we return from Python to gdbpy_print_insn, one way or
another, the result being returned will have a list of parts. Back in
GDB's C++ code we walk the list of parts and call back into GDB's core
to display the disassembled instruction with the correct styling.
The new API lives in parallel with the old API. Any existing code
that creates a DisassemblerResult using a single string immediately
creates a single DisassemblerTextPart containing the entire
instruction and gives this part the default text style. This is also
what happens if the user calls builtin_disassemble for an architecture
that doesn't (yet) support libopcode styling.
This matches up with what happens when the Python API is not involved,
an architecture without disassembler styling support uses the old
libopcodes printing API (the API that doesn't pass style info), and
GDB just prints everything using the default text style.
The reason that parts are created by calling methods on
DisassembleInfo, rather than calling the class constructor directly,
is DisassemblerAddressPart. Ideally this part would only hold the
address which the part represents, but in order to support backwards
compatibility we need to be able to convert the
DisassemblerAddressPart into a string. To do that we need to call
GDB's internal print_address function, and to do that we need an
gdbarch.
What this means is that the DisassemblerAddressPart needs to take a
gdb.Architecture object at creation time. The only valid place a user
can pull this from is from the DisassembleInfo object, so having the
DisassembleInfo act as a factory ensures that the correct gdbarch is
passed over each time. I implemented both solutions (the one
presented here, and an alternative where parts could be constructed
directly), and this felt like the cleanest solution.
Reviewed-By: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
Reviewed-By: Tom Tromey <tom@tromey.com>
This commit is a refactor ahead of the next change which will make
disassembler styling available through the Python API.
Unfortunately, in order to make the styling support available, I think
the easiest solution is to make a very small change to the existing
API.
The current API relies on returning a DisassemblerResult object to
represent each disassembled instruction. Currently GDB allows the
DisassemblerResult class to be sub-classed, which could mean that a
user tries to override the various attributes that exist on the
DisassemblerResult object.
This commit removes this ability, effectively making the
DisassemblerResult class final.
Though this is a change to the existing API, I'm hoping this isn't
going to cause too many issues:
- The Python disassembler API was only added in the previous release
of GDB, so I don't expect it to be widely used yet, and
- It's not clear to me why a user would need to sub-class the
DisassemblerResult type, I allowed it in the original patch
because at the time I couldn't see any reason to NOT allow it.
Having prevented sub-classing I can now rework the tail end of the
gdbpy_print_insn function; instead of pulling the results out of the
DisassemblerResult object by calling back into Python, I now cast the
Python object back to its C++ type (disasm_result_object), and access
the fields directly from there. In later commits I will be reworking
the disasm_result_object type in order to hold information about the
styled disassembler output.
The tests that dealt with sub-classing DisassemblerResult have been
removed, and a new test that confirms that DisassemblerResult can't be
sub-classed has been added.
Reviewed-By: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
Reviewed-By: Tom Tromey <tom@tromey.com>
Some small improvements to the Python Disassembler API documentation:
* Be consistent about using the package scope in the @deftp lines,
* Rework the description of the DisassemblerResult class to include
mention of builtin_disassemble.
Eli pointed out that @var isn't needed in @defun in Texinfo. This
patch removes the cases I found in python.texi. I also renamed some
variables in one spot, because "-" isn't valid in a Python variable
name.
Update the two gdb.PendingFrame methods gdb.PendingFrame.read_register
and gdb.PendingFrame.create_unwind_info to accept keyword arguments.
There's no huge benefit for making this change, both of these methods
only take a single argument, so it is (maybe) less likely that a user
will take advantage of the keyword arguments in these cases, but I
think it's nice to be consistent, and I don't see any particular draw
backs to making this change.
For PendingFrame.read_register I've changed the argument name from
'reg' to 'register' in the documentation and used 'register' as the
argument name in GDB. My preference for APIs is to use full words
where possible, and given we didn't support named arguments before
this change should not break any existing code.
There should be no user visible changes (for existing code) after this
commit.
Reviewed-By: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
Reviewed-By: Tom Tromey <tom@tromey.com>
Update gdb.UnwindInfo.add_saved_register to accept named keyword
arguments.
As part of this update we now use gdb_PyArg_ParseTupleAndKeywords
instead of PyArg_UnpackTuple to parse the function arguments.
By switching to gdb_PyArg_ParseTupleAndKeywords, we can now use 'O!'
as the argument format for the function's value argument. This means
that we can check the argument type (is gdb.Value) as part of the
argument processing rather than manually performing the check later in
the function. One result of this is that we now get a better error
message (at least, I think so). Previously we would get something
like:
ValueError: Bad register value
Now we get:
TypeError: argument 2 must be gdb.Value, not XXXX
It's unfortunate that the exception type changed, but I think the new
exception type actually makes more sense.
My preference for argument names is to use full words where that's not
too excessive. As such, I've updated the name of the argument from
'reg' to 'register' in the documentation, which is the argument name
I've made GDB look for here.
For existing unwinder code that doesn't throw any exceptions nothing
should change with this commit. It is possible that a user has some
code that throws and catches the ValueError, and this code will break
after this commit, but I think this is going to be sufficiently rare
that we can take the risk here.
Reviewed-By: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
Reviewed-By: Tom Tromey <tom@tromey.com>
When writing an unwinder it is necessary to create a new class to act
as a frame-id. This new class is almost certainly just going to set a
'sp' and 'pc' attribute within the instance.
This commit adds a little helper class gdb.unwinder.FrameId that does
this job. Users can make use of this to avoid having to write out
standard boilerplate code any time they write an unwinder.
Of course, if the user wants their FrameId class to be more
complicated in some way, then they can still write their own class,
just like they could before.
I've simplified the example code in the documentation to now use the
new helper class, and I've also made use of this helper within the
testsuite.
Any existing user code will continue to work just as it did before
after this change.
Reviewed-By: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
Reviewed-By: Tom Tromey <tom@tromey.com>
Currently when creating a gdb.UnwindInfo object a user must call
gdb.PendingFrame.create_unwind_info and pass a frame-id object.
The frame-id object should have at least a 'sp' attribute, and
probably a 'pc' attribute too (it can also, in some cases have a
'special' attribute).
Currently all of these frame-id attributes need to be gdb.Value
objects, but the only reason for that requirement is that we have some
code in py-unwind.c that only handles gdb.Value objects.
If instead we switch to using get_addr_from_python in py-utils.c then
we will support both gdb.Value objects and also raw numbers, which
might make things simpler in some cases.
So, I started rewriting pyuw_object_attribute_to_pointer (in
py-unwind.c) to use get_addr_from_python. However, while looking at
the code I noticed a problem.
The pyuw_object_attribute_to_pointer function returns a boolean flag,
if everything goes OK we return true, but we return false in two
cases, (1) when the attribute is not present, which might be
acceptable, or might be an error, and (2) when we get an error trying
to extract the attribute value, in which case a Python error will have
been set.
Now in pending_framepy_create_unwind_info we have this code:
if (!pyuw_object_attribute_to_pointer (pyo_frame_id, "sp", &sp))
{
PyErr_SetString (PyExc_ValueError,
_("frame_id should have 'sp' attribute."));
return NULL;
}
Notice how we always set an error. This will override any error that
is already set.
So, if you create a frame-id object that has an 'sp' attribute, but
the attribute is not a gdb.Value, then currently we fail to extract
the attribute value (it's not a gdb.Value) and set this error in
pyuw_object_attribute_to_pointer:
rc = pyuw_value_obj_to_pointer (pyo_value.get (), addr);
if (!rc)
PyErr_Format (
PyExc_ValueError,
_("The value of the '%s' attribute is not a pointer."),
attr_name);
Then we return to pending_framepy_create_unwind_info and immediately
override this error with the error about 'sp' being missing.
This all feels very confused.
Here's my proposed solution: pyuw_object_attribute_to_pointer will now
return a tri-state enum, with states OK, MISSING, or ERROR. The
meanings of these states are:
OK - Attribute exists and was extracted fine,
MISSING - Attribute doesn't exist, no Python error was set.
ERROR - Attribute does exist, but there was an error while
extracting it, a Python error was set.
We need to update pending_framepy_create_unwind_info, the only user of
pyuw_object_attribute_to_pointer, but now I think things are much
clearer. Errors from lower levels are not blindly overridden with the
generic meaningless error message, but we still get the "missing 'sp'
attribute" error when appropriate.
This change also includes the switch to get_addr_from_python which was
what started this whole journey.
For well behaving user code there should be no visible changes after
this commit.
For user code that hits an error, hopefully the new errors should be
more helpful in figuring out what's gone wrong.
Additionally, users can now use integers for the 'sp' and 'pc'
attributes in their frame-id objects if that is useful.
Reviewed-By: Tom Tromey <tom@tromey.com>
The gdb.Frame class has far more methods than gdb.PendingFrame. Given
that a PendingFrame hasn't yet been claimed by an unwinder, there is a
limit to which methods we can add to it, but many of the methods that
the Frame class has, the PendingFrame class could also support.
In this commit I've added those methods to PendingFrame that I believe
are safe.
In terms of implementation: if I was starting from scratch then I
would implement many of these (or most of these) as attributes rather
than methods. However, given both Frame and PendingFrame are just
different representation of a frame, I think there is value in keeping
the interface for the two classes the same. For this reason
everything here is a method -- that's what the Frame class does.
The new methods I've added are:
- gdb.PendingFrame.is_valid: Return True if the pending frame
object is valid.
- gdb.PendingFrame.name: Return the name for the frame's function,
or None.
- gdb.PendingFrame.pc: Return the $pc register value for this
frame.
- gdb.PendingFrame.language: Return a string containing the
language for this frame, or None.
- gdb.PendingFrame.find_sal: Return a gdb.Symtab_and_line object
for the current location within the pending frame, or None.
- gdb.PendingFrame.block: Return a gdb.Block for the current
pending frame, or None.
- gdb.PendingFrame.function: Return a gdb.Symbol for the current
pending frame, or None.
In every case I've just copied the implementation over from gdb.Frame
and cleaned the code slightly e.g. NULL to nullptr. Additionally each
function required a small update to reflect the PendingFrame type, but
that's pretty minor.
There are tests for all the new methods.
For more extensive testing, I added the following code to the file
gdb/python/lib/command/unwinders.py:
from gdb.unwinder import Unwinder
class TestUnwinder(Unwinder):
def __init__(self):
super().__init__("XXX_TestUnwinder_XXX")
def __call__(self,pending_frame):
lang = pending_frame.language()
try:
block = pending_frame.block()
assert isinstance(block, gdb.Block)
except RuntimeError as rte:
assert str(rte) == "Cannot locate block for frame."
function = pending_frame.function()
arch = pending_frame.architecture()
assert arch is None or isinstance(arch, gdb.Architecture)
name = pending_frame.name()
assert name is None or isinstance(name, str)
valid = pending_frame.is_valid()
pc = pending_frame.pc()
sal = pending_frame.find_sal()
assert sal is None or isinstance(sal, gdb.Symtab_and_line)
return None
gdb.unwinder.register_unwinder(None, TestUnwinder())
This registers a global unwinder that calls each of the new
PendingFrame methods and checks the result is of an acceptable type.
The unwinder never claims any frames though, so shouldn't change how
GDB actually behaves.
I then ran the testsuite. There was only a single regression, a test
that uses 'disable unwinder' and expects a single unwinder to be
disabled -- the extra unwinder is now disabled too, which changes the
test output. So I'm reasonably confident that the new methods are not
going to crash GDB.
Reviewed-By: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
Reviewed-By: Tom Tromey <tom@tromey.com>
This commit makes a few related changes to the gdb.unwinder.Unwinder
class attributes:
1. The 'name' attribute is now a read-only attribute. This prevents
user code from changing the name after registering the unwinder. It
seems very unlikely that any user is actually trying to do this in
the wild, so I'm not very worried that this will upset anyone,
2. We now validate that the name is a string in the
Unwinder.__init__ method, and throw an error if this is not the
case. Hopefully nobody was doing this in the wild. This should
make it easier to ensure the 'info unwinder' command shows sane
output (how to display a non-string name for an unwinder?),
3. The 'enabled' attribute is now implemented with a getter and
setter. In the setter we ensure that the new value is a boolean,
but the real important change is that we call
'gdb.invalidate_cached_frames()'. This means that the backtrace
will be updated if a user manually disables an unwinder (rather than
calling the 'disable unwinder' command). It is not unreasonable to
think that a user might register multiple unwinders (relating to
some project) and have one command that disables/enables all the
related unwinders. This command might operate by poking the enabled
attribute of each unwinder object directly, after this commit, this
would now work correctly.
There's tests for all the changes, and lots of documentation updates
that both cover the new changes, but also further improve (I think)
the general documentation for GDB's Unwinder API.
Reviewed-By: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
Reviewed-By: Tom Tromey <tom@tromey.com>
The documentation for the Python Unwinders API could do with some
improvement. The 'Unwinder Skeleton Code' has an error: it says
'unwinders' when it should say 'unwinder' in one case.
Additionally, by placing the 'Unwinder Skeleton Code' before the
section 'Registering an Unwinder' we have skipping including the
registration line in the skeleton code. But this is confusion for
users (I think) as the skeleton code is almost complete, except for
one missing line which the user has to figure out for themselves. By
reordering the sections, it is now obvious that the registration
should be included in the skeleton code, and the example is therefore
almost complete.
Additionally, in the example skeleton code the way in which the
frame-id was being built (using the current stack point and program
counter is (a) not correct, and (b) counter to what is laid out in the
'Unwinder Input' section when describing building a frame-id.
I've removed the incorrect code and replaced it with more generic
comments indicating what needs to be done. As the actual actions that
need to be performed are both architecture specific, and dependent on
the function being unwound, it's almost impossible to include more
exact code here, but I think what I'm proposing is less misleading
than what we had before.
I've also added more cross references.
Reviewed-By: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
This commit splits the `set/show print elements' option into two. We
retain `set/show print elements' for controlling how many elements of an
array we print, but a new `set/show print characters' setting is added
which is used for controlling how many characters of a string are
printed.
The motivation behind this change is to allow users a finer level of
control over how data is printed, reflecting that, although strings can
be thought of as arrays of characters, users often want to treat these
two things differently.
For compatibility reasons by default the `set/show print characters'
option is set to `elements', which makes the limit for character strings
follow the setting of the `set/show print elements' option, as it used
to. Using `set print characters' with any other value makes the limit
independent from the `set/show print elements' setting, however it can
be restored to the default with the `set print characters elements'
command at any time.
A corresponding `-characters' option for the `print' command is added,
with the same semantics, i.e. one can use `elements' to make a given
`print' invocation follow the limit of elements, be it set with the
`-elements' option also given with the same invocation or taken from the
`set/show print elements' setting, for characters as well regardless of
the current setting of the `set/show print characters' option.
The GDB changes are all pretty straightforward, just changing references
to the old 'print_max' to use a new `get_print_max_chars' helper which
figures out which of the two of `print_max' and `print_max_chars' values
to use.
Likewise, the documentation is just updated to reference the new setting
where appropriate.
To make people's life easier the message shown by `show print elements'
now indicates if the setting also applies to character strings:
(gdb) set print characters elements
(gdb) show print elements
Limit on string chars or array elements to print is 200.
(gdb) set print characters unlimited
(gdb) show print elements
Limit on array elements to print is 200.
(gdb)
and the help text shows the dependency as well:
(gdb) help set print elements
Set limit on array elements to print.
"unlimited" causes there to be no limit.
This setting also applies to string chars when "print characters"
is set to "elements".
(gdb)
In the testsuite there are two minor updates, one to add `-characters'
to the list of completions now shown for the `print' command, and a bare
minimum pair of checks for the right handling of `set print characters'
and `show print characters', copied from the corresponding checks for
`set print elements' and `show print elements' respectively.
Co-Authored-By: Maciej W. Rozycki <macro@embecosm.com>
Approved-By: Simon Marchi <simon.marchi@efficios.com>
Rather than just `unlimited' allow the integer set commands (or command
options) to define arbitrary keywords for the user to use, removing
hardcoded arrangements for the `unlimited' keyword.
Remove the confusingly named `var_zinteger', `var_zuinteger' and
`var_zuinteger_unlimited' `set'/`show' command variable types redefining
them in terms of `var_uinteger', `var_integer' and `var_pinteger', which
have the range of [0;UINT_MAX], [INT_MIN;INT_MAX], and [0;INT_MAX] each.
Following existing practice `var_pinteger' allows extra negative values
to be used, however unlike `var_zuinteger_unlimited' any number of such
values can be defined rather than just `-1'.
The "p" in `var_pinteger' stands for "positive", for the lack of a more
appropriate unambiguous letter, even though 0 obviously is not positive;
"n" would be confusing as to whether it stands for "non-negative" or
"negative".
Add a new structure, `literal_def', the entries of which define extra
keywords allowed for a command and numerical values they correspond to.
Those values are not verified against the basic range supported by the
underlying variable type, allowing extra values to be allowed outside
that range, which may or may not be individually made visible to the
user. An optional value translation is possible with the structure to
follow the existing practice for some commands where user-entered 0 is
internally translated to UINT_MAX or INT_MAX. Such translation can now
be arbitrary. Literals defined by this structure are automatically used
for completion as necessary.
So for example:
const literal_def integer_unlimited_literals[] =
{
{ "unlimited", INT_MAX, 0 },
{ nullptr }
};
defines an extra `unlimited' keyword and a user-visible 0 value, both of
which get translated to INT_MAX for the setting to be used with.
Similarly:
const literal_def zuinteger_unlimited_literals[] =
{
{ "unlimited", -1, -1 },
{ nullptr }
};
defines the same keyword and a corresponding user-visible -1 value that
is used for the requested setting. If the last member were omitted (or
set to `{}') here, then only the keyword would be allowed for the user
to enter and while -1 would still be used internally trying to enter it
as a part of a command would result in an "integer -1 out of range"
error.
Use said error message in all cases (citing the invalid value requested)
replacing "only -1 is allowed to set as unlimited" previously used for
`var_zuinteger_unlimited' settings only rather than propagating it to
`var_pinteger' type. It could only be used for the specific case where
a single extra `unlimited' keyword was defined standing for -1 and the
use of numeric equivalents is discouraged anyway as it is for historical
reasons only that they expose GDB internals, confusingly different
across variable types. Similarly update the "must be >= -1" Guile error
message.
Redefine Guile and Python parameter types in terms of the new variable
types and interpret extra keywords as Scheme keywords and Python strings
used to communicate corresponding parameter values. Do not add a new
PARAM_INTEGER Guile parameter type, however do handle the `var_integer'
variable type now, permitting existing parameters defined by GDB proper,
such as `listsize', to be accessed from Scheme code.
With these changes in place it should be trivial for a Scheme or Python
programmer to expand the syntax of the `make-parameter' command and the
`gdb.Parameter' class initializer to have arbitrary extra literals along
with their internal representation supplied.
Update the testsuite accordingly.
Approved-By: Simon Marchi <simon.marchi@efficios.com>
This commit is the result of running the gdb/copyright.py script,
which automated the update of the copyright year range for all
source files managed by the GDB project to be updated to include
year 2023.
A user noticed that TYPE_CODE_FIXED_POINT was not exported by the gdb
Python layer. This patch fixes the bug, and prevents future
occurences of this type of bug.
- avoid "GDB proper" to refer to global locus, as object files and
program spaces are also GDB proper.
- gdb.register_unwinder does not accept locus=gdb.
- "a unwinder" -> "an unwinder"
Approved-by: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
Change-Id: I98c1b1000e1063815238e945ca71ec6f37b5702e
I noticed that, from Python, I could register a new TUI window that
had whitespace in its name, like this:
gdb.register_window_type('my window', MyWindowType)
however, it is not possible to then use this window in a new TUI
layout, e.g.:
(gdb) tui new-layout foo my window 1 cmd 1
Unknown window "my"
(gdb) tui new-layout foo "my window" 1 cmd 1
Unknown window ""my"
(gdb) tui new-layout foo my\ window 1 cmd 1
Unknown window "my\"
GDB clearly uses the whitespace to split the incoming command line.
I could fix this by trying to add a mechanism by which we can use
whitespace within a window name, but it seems like an easier solution
if we just forbid whitespace within a window name. Not only is this
easier, but I think this is probably the better solution, identifier
names with spaces in would mean we'd need to audit all the places a
window name could be printed and ensure that the use of a space didn't
make the output ambiguous.
So, having decided to disallow whitespace, I then thought about other
special characters. We currently accept anything as a window name,
and I wondered if this was a good idea.
My concerns were about how special characters used in a window name
might cause confusion, for example, we allow '$' in window names,
which is maybe fine now, but what if one day we wanted to allow
variable expansion when creating new layouts? Or what about starting
a window name with '-'? We already support a '-horizontal' option,
what if we want to add more in the future? Or use of the special
character '{' which has special meaning within a new layout?
In the end I figured it might make sense to place some restrictive
rules in place, and then relax the rules later if/when users complain,
we can consider each relaxation as its requested.
So, I propose that window names should match this regular expression:
[a-zA-Z][-_.a-zA-Z0-9]*
There is a chance that there is user code in the wild which will break
with the addition of this change, but hopefully adapting to the new
restrictions shouldn't be too difficult.
PR python/18385
v7:
This version addresses the issues pointed out by Tom.
Added nullchecks for Python object creations.
Changed from using PyLong_FromLong to the gdb_py-versions.
Re-factored some code to make it look more cohesive.
Also added the more safe Python reference count decrement PY_XDECREF,
even though the BreakpointLocation type is never instantiated by the
user (explicitly documented in the docs) decrementing < 0 is made
impossible with the safe call.
Tom pointed out that using the policy class explicitly to decrement a
reference counted object was not the way to go, so this has instead been
wrapped in a ref_ptr that handles that for us in blocpy_dealloc.
Moved macro from py-internal to py-breakpoint.c.
Renamed section at the bottom of commit message "Patch Description".
v6:
This version addresses the points Pedro gave in review to this patch.
Added the attributes `function`, `fullname` and `thread_groups`
as per request by Pedro with the argument that it more resembles the
output of the MI-command "-break-list". Added documentation for these attributes.
Cleaned up left overs from copy+paste in test suite, removed hard coding
of line numbers where possible.
Refactored some code to use more c++-y style range for loops
wrt to breakpoint locations.
Changed terminology, naming was very inconsistent. Used a variety of "parent",
"owner". Now "owner" is the only term used, and the field in the
gdb_breakpoint_location_object now also called "owner".
v5:
Changes in response to review by Tom Tromey:
- Replaced manual INCREF/DECREF calls with
gdbpy_ref ptrs in places where possible.
- Fixed non-gdb style conforming formatting
- Get parent of bploc increases ref count of parent.
- moved bploc Python definition to py-breakpoint.c
The INCREF of self in bppy_get_locations is due
to the individual locations holding a reference to
it's owner. This is decremented at de-alloc time.
The reason why this needs to be here is, if the user writes
for instance;
py loc = gdb.breakpoints()[X].locations[Y]
The breakpoint owner object is immediately going
out of scope (GC'd/dealloced), and the location
object requires it to be alive for as long as it is alive.
Thanks for your review, Tom!
v4:
Fixed remaining doc issues as per request
by Eli.
v3:
Rewritten commit message, shortened + reworded,
added tests.
Patch Description
Currently, the Python API lacks the ability to
query breakpoints for their installed locations,
and subsequently, can't query any information about them, or
enable/disable individual locations.
This patch solves this by adding Python type gdb.BreakpointLocation.
The type is never instantiated by the user of the Python API directly,
but is produced by the gdb.Breakpoint.locations attribute returning
a list of gdb.BreakpointLocation.
gdb.Breakpoint.locations:
The attribute for retrieving the currently installed breakpoint
locations for gdb.Breakpoint. Matches behavior of
the "info breakpoints" command in that it only
returns the last known or currently inserted breakpoint locations.
BreakpointLocation contains 7 attributes
6 read-only attributes:
owner: location owner's Python companion object
source: file path and line number tuple: (string, long) / None
address: installed address of the location
function: function name where location was set
fullname: fullname where location was set
thread_groups: thread groups (inferiors) where location was set.
1 writeable attribute:
enabled: get/set enable/disable this location (bool)
Access/calls to these, can all throw Python exceptions (documented in
the online documentation), and that's due to the nature
of how breakpoint locations can be invalidated
"behind the scenes", either by them being removed
from the original breakpoint or changed,
like for instance when a new symbol file is loaded, at
which point all breakpoint locations are re-created by GDB.
Therefore this patch has chosen to be non-intrusive:
it's up to the Python user to re-request the locations if
they become invalid.
Also there's event handlers that handle new object files etc, if a Python
user is storing breakpoint locations in some larger state they've
built up, refreshing the locations is easy and it only comes
with runtime overhead when the Python user wants to use them.
gdb.BreakpointLocation Python type
struct "gdbpy_breakpoint_location_object" is found in python-internal.h
Its definition, layout, methods and functions
are found in the same file as gdb.Breakpoint (py-breakpoint.c)
1 change was also made to breakpoint.h/c to make it possible
to enable and disable a bp_location* specifically,
without having its LOC_NUM, as this number
also can change arbitrarily behind the scenes.
Updated docs & news file as per request.
Testsuite: tests the .source attribute and the disabling of
individual locations.
Bug: https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=18385
Change-Id: I302c1c50a557ad59d5d18c88ca19014731d736b0
GDB uses the environment variable PYTHONDONTWRITEBYTECODE to
determine whether or not to write the result of byte-compiling
python modules when the "python dont-write-bytecode" setting
is "auto". Simon noticed that GDB's implementation doesn't
follow the Python documentation.
At present, GDB only checks for the existence of this environment
variable. That is not sufficient though. Regarding
PYTHONDONTWRITEBYTECODE, this document...
https://docs.python.org/3/using/cmdline.html
...says:
If this is set to a non-empty string, Python won't try to write
.pyc files on the import of source modules.
This commit fixes GDB's handling of PYTHONDONTWRITEBYTECODE by adding
an empty string check.
This commit also corrects the set/show command documentation for
"python dont-write-bytecode". The current doc was just a copy
of that for set/show python ignore-environment.
During his review of an earlier version of this patch, Eli Zaretskii
asked that the help text that I proposed for "set/show python
dont-write-bytecode" be expanded. I've done that in addition to
clarifying the documentation of this option in the GDB manual.
Currently, Python code can use event registries to detect when gdb
loads a new objfile, and when gdb clears the objfile list. However,
there's no way to detect the removal of an objfile, say when the
inferior calls dlclose.
This patch adds a gdb.free_objfile event registry and arranges for an
event to be emitted in this case.
This adds a 'summary' mode to Value.format_string and to
gdb.print_options. For the former, it lets Python code format values
using this mode. For the latter, it lets a printer potentially detect
if it is being called in a backtrace with 'set print frame-arguments'
set to 'scalars'.
I considered adding a new mode here to let a pretty-printer see
whether it was being called in a 'backtrace' context at all, but I'm
not sure if this is really desirable.
PR python/17291 asks for access to the current print options. While I
think this need is largely satisfied by the existence of
Value.format_string, it seemed to me that a bit more could be done.
First, while Value.format_string uses the user's settings, it does not
react to temporary settings such as "print/x". This patch changes
this.
Second, there is no good way to examine the current settings (in
particular the temporary ones in effect for just a single "print").
This patch adds this as well.
Bug: https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=17291
Sometimes an objfile comes from memory and not from a file. It can be
useful to be able to check this from Python, so this patch adds a new
"is_file" attribute.
This patch makes it possible to allow Value.format_string() to return
nibbles output.
When we set the parameter of nibbles to True, we can achieve the
displaying binary values in groups of every four bits.
Here's an example:
(gdb) py print (gdb.Value (1230).format_string (format='t', nibbles=True))
0100 1100 1110
(gdb)
Note that the parameter nibbles is only useful if format='t' is also used.
This patch also includes update to the relevant testcase and
documentation.
Tested on x86_64 openSUSE Tumbleweed.
PR python/28533 points out that the Python 'dont_repeat' documentation
is a bit ambiguous about when the method ought to be called. This
patch spells it out.
This commit extends the Python API to include disassembler support.
The motivation for this commit was to provide an API by which the user
could write Python scripts that would augment the output of the
disassembler.
To achieve this I have followed the model of the existing libopcodes
disassembler, that is, instructions are disassembled one by one. This
does restrict the type of things that it is possible to do from a
Python script, i.e. all additional output has to fit on a single line,
but this was all I needed, and creating something more complex would,
I think, require greater changes to how GDB's internal disassembler
operates.
The disassembler API is contained in the new gdb.disassembler module,
which defines the following classes:
DisassembleInfo
Similar to libopcodes disassemble_info structure, has read-only
properties: address, architecture, and progspace. And has methods:
__init__, read_memory, and is_valid.
Each time GDB wants an instruction disassembled, an instance of
this class is passed to a user written disassembler function, by
reading the properties, and calling the methods (and other support
methods in the gdb.disassembler module) the user can perform and
return the disassembly.
Disassembler
This is a base-class which user written disassemblers should
inherit from. This base class provides base implementations of
__init__ and __call__ which the user written disassembler should
override.
DisassemblerResult
This class can be used to hold the result of a call to the
disassembler, it's really just a wrapper around a string (the text
of the disassembled instruction) and a length (in bytes). The user
can return an instance of this class from Disassembler.__call__ to
represent the newly disassembled instruction.
The gdb.disassembler module also provides the following functions:
register_disassembler
This function registers an instance of a Disassembler sub-class
as a disassembler, either for one specific architecture, or, as a
global disassembler for all architectures.
builtin_disassemble
This provides access to GDB's builtin disassembler. A common
use case that I see is augmenting the existing disassembler output.
The user code can call this function to have GDB disassemble the
instruction in the normal way. The user gets back a
DisassemblerResult object, which they can then read in order to
augment the disassembler output in any way they wish.
This function also provides a mechanism to intercept the
disassemblers reads of memory, thus the user can adjust what GDB
sees when it is disassembling.
The included documentation provides a more detailed description of the
API.
There is also a new CLI command added:
maint info python-disassemblers
This command is defined in the Python gdb.disassemblers module, and
can be used to list the currently registered Python disassemblers.
I noticed that the Python event documentation referred to the event's
"breakpoint" field as a function, whereas it is actually an attribute.
This patch fixes the error.
This adds the gdb.current_language function, which can be used to find
the current language without (1) ever having the value "auto" or (2)
having to parse the output of "show language".
It also adds the gdb.Frame.language, which can be used to find the
language of a given frame. This is normally preferable if one has a
Frame object handy.
The current "Specify Location" section of the GDB manual starts with:
"Several @value{GDBN} commands accept arguments that specify a location
of your program's code."
And then, such commands are documented as taking a "location"
argument. For example, here's a representative subset:
@item break @var{location}
@item clear @var{location}
@item until @var{location}
@item list @var{location}
@item edit @var{location}
@itemx info line @var{location}
@item info macros @var{location}
@item trace @var{location}
@item info scope @var{location}
@item maint agent @r{[}-at @var{location}@r{,}@r{]} @var{expression}
The issue here is that "location" isn't really correct for most of
these commands. Instead, the "location" argument is really a
placeholder that represent an umbrella term for all of the
"linespecs", "explicit location", and "address location" input
formats. GDB parses these and then finds the actual code locations
(plural) in the program that match. For example, a "location"
specified like "-function func" will actually match all the code
locations in the program that correspond to the address/file/lineno of
all the functions named "func" in all the loaded programs and shared
libraries of all the inferiors. A location specified like "-function
func -label lab" matches all the addresses of C labels named "lab" in
all functions named "func". Etc.
This means that several of the commands that claim they accept a
"location", actually end up working with multiple locations, and the
manual doesn't explain that all that well. In some cases, the command
will work with all the resolved locations. In other cases, the
command aborts with an error if the location specification resolves to
multiple locations in the program. In other cases, GDB just
arbitrarily and silently picks whatever is the first resolved code
location (which sounds like should be improved).
To clarify this, I propose we use the term "Location Specification",
with shorthand "locaction spec", when we're talking about the user
input, the argument or arguments that is/are passed to commands to
instruct GDB how to find locations of interest. This is distinct from
the actual code locations in the program, which are what GDB finds
based on the user-specified location spec. Then use "location
specification or the shorter "location spec" thoughout instead of
"location" when we're talking about the user input.
Thus, this commit does the following:
- renames the "Specify Location" section of the manual to "Location
Specifications".
- It then introduces the term "Location Specification", with
corresponding shorthand "location spec", as something distinct from
an actual code location in the program. It explains what a concrete
code location is. It explains that a location specification may be
incomplete, and that may match multiple code locations in the
program, or no code location at all. It gives examples. Some
pre-existing examples were moved from the "Set Breaks" section, and
a few new ones that didn't exist yet were added. I think it is
better to have these centralized in this "Location Specification"
section, since all the other commands that accept a location spec
have an xref that points there.
- Goes through the manual, and where "@var{location}" was used for a
command argument, updated it to say "@var{locspec}" instead. At the
same time, tweaks the description of the affected commands to
describe what happens when the location spec resolves to more than
one location. Most commands just did not say anything about that.
One command -- "maint agent -at @var{location}" -- currently says it
accepts a "location", suggesting it can accept address and explicit
locations too, but that's incorrect. In reality, it only accepts
linespecs, so fix it accordingly.
One MI command -- "-trace-find line" -- currently says it accepts a
"line specification", but it can accept address and explicit
locations too, so fix it accordingly.
Special thanks goes to Eli Zaretskii for reviews and rewording
suggestions.
Change-Id: Ic42ad8565e79ca67bfebb22cbb4794ea816fd08b
This slightly reorganizes the Python events documentation. It hoists
the "ThreadEvent" text out of the list of events, where it seemed to
be misplaced. It tidies the formatting a little bit (adding some
vertical space for easier reading in info), fixes a typo, adds some
missing commas, and fixes an incorrect reference to NewInferiorEvent.
New in this version:
- Add a PY_MAJOR_VERSION check in configure.ac / AC_TRY_LIBPYTHON. If
the user passes --with-python=python2, this will cause a configure
failure saying that GDB only supports Python 3.
Support for Python 2 is a maintenance burden for any patches touching
Python support. Among others, the differences between Python 2 and 3
string and integer types are subtle. It requires a lot of effort and
thinking to get something that behaves correctly on both. And that's if
the author and reviewer of the patch even remember to test with Python
2.
See this thread for an example:
https://sourceware.org/pipermail/gdb-patches/2021-December/184260.html
So, remove Python 2 support. Update the documentation to state that GDB
can be built against Python 3 (as opposed to Python 2 or 3).
Update all the spots that use:
- sys.version_info
- IS_PY3K
- PY_MAJOR_VERSION
- gdb_py_is_py3k
... to only keep the Python 3 portions and drop the use of some
now-removed compatibility macros.
I did not update the configure script more than just removing the
explicit references to Python 2. We could maybe do more there, like
check the Python version and reject it if that version is not
supported. Otherwise (with this patch), things will only fail at
compile time, so it won't really be clear to the user that they are
trying to use an unsupported Python version. But I'm a bit lost in the
configure code that checks for Python, so I kept that for later.
Change-Id: I75b0f79c148afbe3c07ac664cfa9cade052c0c62
Add a new function, gdb.format_address, which is a wrapper around
GDB's print_address function.
This method takes an address, and returns a string with the format:
ADDRESS <SYMBOL+OFFSET>
Where, ADDRESS is the original address, formatted as hexadecimal,
SYMBOL is a symbol with an address lower than ADDRESS, and OFFSET is
the offset from SYMBOL to ADDRESS in decimal.
If there's no SYMBOL suitably close to ADDRESS then the
<SYMBOL+OFFSET> part is not included.
This is useful if a user wants to write a Python script that
pretty-prints addresses, the user no longer needs to do manual symbol
lookup, or worry about correctly formatting addresses.
Additionally, there are some settings that effect how GDB picks
SYMBOL, and whether the file name and line number should be included
with the SYMBOL name, the gdb.format_address function ensures that the
users Python script also benefits from these settings.
The gdb.format_address by default selects SYMBOL from the current
inferiors program space, and address is formatted using the
architecture for the current inferior. However, a user can also
explicitly pass a program space and architecture like this:
gdb.format_address(ADDRESS, PROGRAM_SPACE, ARCHITECTURE)
In order to format an address for a different inferior.
Notes on the implementation:
In py-arch.c I extended arch_object_to_gdbarch to add an assertion for
the type of the PyObject being worked on. Prior to this commit all
uses of arch_object_to_gdbarch were guaranteed to pass this function a
gdb.Architecture object, but, with this commit, this might not be the
case.
So, with this commit I've made it a requirement that the PyObject be a
gdb.Architecture, and this is checked with the assert. And in order
that callers from other files can check if they have a
gdb.Architecture object, I've added the new function
gdbpy_is_architecture.
In py-progspace.c I've added two new function, the first
progspace_object_to_program_space, converts a PyObject of type
gdb.Progspace to the associated program_space pointer, and
gdbpy_is_progspace checks if a PyObject is a gdb.Progspace or not.
This commit allows a user to create custom MI commands using Python
similarly to what is possible for Python CLI commands.
A new subclass of mi_command is defined for Python MI commands,
mi_command_py. A new file, gdb/python/py-micmd.c contains the logic
for Python MI commands.
This commit is based on work linked too from this mailing list thread:
https://sourceware.org/pipermail/gdb/2021-November/049774.html
Which has also been previously posted to the mailing list here:
https://sourceware.org/pipermail/gdb-patches/2019-May/158010.html
And was recently reposted here:
https://sourceware.org/pipermail/gdb-patches/2022-January/185190.html
The version in this patch takes some core code from the previously
posted patches, but also has some significant differences, especially
after the feedback given here:
https://sourceware.org/pipermail/gdb-patches/2022-February/185767.html
A new MI command can be implemented in Python like this:
class echo_args(gdb.MICommand):
def invoke(self, args):
return { 'args': args }
echo_args("-echo-args")
The 'args' parameter (to the invoke method) is a list
containing (almost) all command line arguments passed to the MI
command (--thread and --frame are handled before the Python code is
called, and removed from the args list). This list can be empty if
the MI command was passed no arguments.
When used within gdb the above command produced output like this:
(gdb)
-echo-args a b c
^done,args=["a","b","c"]
(gdb)
The 'invoke' method of the new command must return a dictionary. The
keys of this dictionary are then used as the field names in the mi
command output (e.g. 'args' in the above).
The values of the result returned by invoke can be dictionaries,
lists, iterators, or an object that can be converted to a string.
These are processed recursively to create the mi output. And so, this
is valid:
class new_command(gdb.MICommand):
def invoke(self,args):
return { 'result_one': { 'abc': 123, 'def': 'Hello' },
'result_two': [ { 'a': 1, 'b': 2 },
{ 'c': 3, 'd': 4 } ] }
Which produces output like:
(gdb)
-new-command
^done,result_one={abc="123",def="Hello"},result_two=[{a="1",b="2"},{c="3",d="4"}]
(gdb)
I have required that the fields names used in mi result output must
match the regexp: "^[a-zA-Z][-_a-zA-Z0-9]*$" (without the quotes).
This restriction was never written down anywhere before, but seems
sensible to me, and we can always loosen this rule later if it proves
to be a problem. Much harder to try and add a restriction later, once
people are already using the API.
What follows are some details about how this implementation differs
from the original patch that was posted to the mailing list.
In this patch, I have changed how the lifetime of the Python
gdb.MICommand objects is managed. In the original patch, these object
were kept alive by an owned reference within the mi_command_py object.
As such, the Python object would not be deleted until the
mi_command_py object itself was deleted.
This caused a problem, the mi_command_py were held in the global mi
command table (in mi/mi-cmds.c), which, as a global, was not cleared
until program shutdown. By this point the Python interpreter has
already been shutdown. Attempting to delete the mi_command_py object
at this point was causing GDB to try and invoke Python code after
finalising the Python interpreter, and we would crash.
To work around this problem, the original patch added code in
python/python.c that would search the mi command table, and delete the
mi_command_py objects before the Python environment was finalised.
In contrast, in this patch, I have added a new global dictionary to
the gdb module, gdb._mi_commands. We already have several such global
data stores related to pretty printers, and frame unwinders.
The MICommand objects are placed into the new gdb.mi_commands
dictionary, and it is this reference that keeps the objects alive.
When GDB's Python interpreter is shut down gdb._mi_commands is deleted,
and any MICommand objects within it are deleted at this point.
This change avoids having to make the mi_cmd_table global, and walk
over it from within GDB's python related code.
This patch handles command redefinition entirely within GDB's python
code, though this does impose one small restriction which is not
present in the original code (detailed below), I don't think this is a
big issue. However, the original patch relied on being able to
finish executing the mi_command::do_invoke member function after the
mi_command object had been deleted. Though continuing to execute a
member function after an object is deleted is well defined, it is
also (IMHO) risky, its too easy for someone to later add a use of the
object without realising that the object might sometimes, have been
deleted. The new patch avoids this issue.
The one restriction that is added to avoid this, is that an MICommand
object can't be reinitialised with a different command name, so:
(gdb) python cmd = MyMICommand("-abc")
(gdb) python cmd.__init__("-def")
can't reinitialize object with a different command name
This feels like a pretty weird edge case, and I'm happy to live with
this restriction.
I have also changed how the memory is managed for the command name.
In the most recently posted patch series, the command name is moved
into a subclass of mi_command, the python mi_command_py, which
inherits from mi_command is then free to use a smart pointer to manage
the memory for the name.
In this patch, I leave the mi_command class unchanged, and instead
hold the memory for the name within the Python object, as the lifetime
of the Python object always exceeds the c++ object stored in the
mi_cmd_table. This adds a little more complexity in py-micmd.c, but
leaves the mi_command class nice and simple.
Next, this patch adds some extra functionality, there's a
MICommand.name read-only attribute containing the name of the command,
and a read-write MICommand.installed attribute that can be used to
install (make the command available for use) and uninstall (remove the
command from the mi_cmd_table so it can't be used) the command. This
attribute will be automatically updated if a second command replaces
an earlier command.
This patch adds additional error handling, and makes more use the
gdbpy_handle_exception function.
Co-Authored-By: Jan Vrany <jan.vrany@labware.com>
Add a new read-only property, Type.is_signed, which is True for signed
types, and False otherwise.
This property should only be read on types for which Type.is_scalar is
true, attempting to read this property for non-scalar types will raise
a ValueError.
I chose 'is_signed' rather than 'is_unsigned' in order to match the
existing Architecture.integer_type method, which takes a 'signed'
parameter. As far as I could find, that was the only existing
signed/unsigned selector in the Python API, so it seemed reasonable to
stay consistent.
This adds a new read-only attribute gdb.InferiorThread.details, this
attribute contains a string, the results of target_extra_thread_info
for the thread, or None, if target_extra_thread_info returns nullptr.
As the string returned by target_extra_thread_info is unstructured,
this attribute is only really useful for echoing straight through to
the user, but, if a user wants to write a command that displays the
same, or a similar 'Thread Id' to the one seen in 'info threads', then
they need access to this string.
Given that the string produced by target_extra_thread_info varies by
target, there's only minimal testing of this attribute, I check that
the attribute can be accessed, and that the return value is either
None, or a string.
Add a new argument to the gdb.Value.format_string method, 'styling'.
This argument is False by default.
When this argument is True, then the returned string can contain output
styling escape sequences.
When this argument is False, then the returned string will not contain
any styling escape sequences.
If the returned string is going to be printed to the user, then it is
often nice to retain the GDB styling.
For the testing, we need to adjust the TERM environment variable, as
we do for all the styling tests. I'm now running all of the C tests
in gdb.python/py-format-string.exp in an environment where styling
could be generated, but only my new test should actually produce
styled output, hopefully this will catch the case where a bug might
cause format_string to always produce styled output.
This commit attempts to improve the help text that is generated for
gdb.Parameter objects when the user fails to provide their own
documentation.
Documentation for a gdb.Parameter is currently pulled from two
sources: the class documentation string, and the set_doc/show_doc
class attributes. Thus, a fully documented parameter might look like
this:
class Param_All (gdb.Parameter):
"""This is the class documentation string."""
show_doc = "Show the state of this parameter"
set_doc = "Set the state of this parameter"
def get_set_string (self):
val = "on"
if (self.value == False):
val = "off"
return "Test Parameter has been set to " + val
def __init__ (self, name):
super (Param_All, self).__init__ (name, gdb.COMMAND_DATA, gdb.PARAM_BOOLEAN)
self._value = True
Param_All ('param-all')
Then in GDB we see this:
(gdb) help set param-all
Set the state of this parameter
This is the class documentation string.
Which is fine. But, if the user skips both of the documentation parts
like this:
class Param_None (gdb.Parameter):
def get_set_string (self):
val = "on"
if (self.value == False):
val = "off"
return "Test Parameter has been set to " + val
def __init__ (self, name):
super (Param_None, self).__init__ (name, gdb.COMMAND_DATA, gdb.PARAM_BOOLEAN)
self._value = True
Param_None ('param-none')
Now in GDB we see this:
(gdb) help set param-none
This command is not documented.
This command is not documented.
That's not great, the duplicated text looks a bit weird. If we drop
different parts we get different results. Here's what we get if the
user drops the set_doc and show_doc attributes:
(gdb) help set param-doc
This command is not documented.
This is the class documentation string.
That kind of sucks, we say it's undocumented, then proceed to print
the documentation. Finally, if we drop the class documentation but
keep the set_doc and show_doc:
(gdb) help set param-set-show
Set the state of this parameter
This command is not documented.
That seems OK.
So, I think there's room for improvement.
With this patch, for the four cases above we now see this:
# All values provided by the user, no change in this case:
(gdb) help set param-all
Set the state of this parameter
This is the class documentation string.
# Nothing provided by the user, the first string is now different:
(gdb) help set param-none
Set the current value of 'param-none'.
This command is not documented.
# Only the class documentation is provided, the first string is
# changed as in the previous case:
(gdb) help set param-doc
Set the current value of 'param-doc'.
This is the class documentation string.
# Only the set_doc and show_doc are provided, this case is unchanged
# from before the patch:
(gdb) help set param-set-show
Set the state of this parameter
This command is not documented.
The one place where this change might be considered a negative is when
dealing with prefix commands. If we create a prefix command but don't
supply the set_doc / show_doc strings, then this is what we saw before
my patch:
(gdb) python Param_None ('print param-none')
(gdb) help set print
set print, set pr, set p
Generic command for setting how things print.
List of set print subcommands:
... snip ...
set print param-none -- This command is not documented.
... snip ...
And after my patch:
(gdb) python Param_None ('print param-none')
(gdb) help set print
set print, set pr, set p
Generic command for setting how things print.
List of set print subcommands:
... snip ...
set print param-none -- Set the current value of 'print param-none'.
... snip ...
This seems slightly less helpful than before, but I don't think its
terrible.
Additionally, I've changed what we print when the get_show_string
method is not provided in Python.
Back when gdb.Parameter was first added to GDB, we didn't provide a
show function when registering the internal command object within
GDB. As a result, GDB would make use of its "magic" mangling of the
show_doc string to create a sentence that would display the current
value (see deprecated_show_value_hack in cli/cli-setshow.c).
However, when we added support for the get_show_string method to
gdb.Parameter, there was an attempt to maintain backward compatibility
by displaying the show_doc string with the current value appended, see
get_show_value in py-param.c. Unfortunately, this isn't anywhere
close to what deprecated_show_value_hack does, and the results are
pretty poor, for example, this is GDB before my patch:
(gdb) show param-none
This command is not documented. off
I think we can all agree that this is pretty bad.
After my patch, we how show this:
(gdb) show param-none
The current value of 'param-none' is "off".
Which at least is a real sentence, even if it's not very informative.
This patch does change the way that the Python API behaves slightly,
but only in the cases when the user has missed providing GDB with some
information. In most cases I think the new behaviour is a lot better,
there's the one case (noted above) which is a bit iffy, but I think is
still OK.
I've updated the existing gdb.python/py-parameter.exp test to cover
the modified behaviour.
Finally, I've updated the documentation to (I hope) make it clearer
how the various bits of help text come together.
Add a new function gdb.history_count to the Python api, this function
returns an integer, the number of items in GDB's value history.
This is useful if you want to pull items from the history by their
absolute number, for example, if you wanted to show a complete history
list. Previously we could figure out how many items are in the
history list by trying to fetch the items, and then catching the
exception when the item is not available, but having this function
seems nicer.
It's sometimes useful to temporarily set some gdb parameter from
Python. Now that the 'endian' crash is fixed, and now that the
current language is no longer captured by the Python layer, it seems
reasonable to add a helper function for this situation.
This adds a new gdb.with_parameter function. This creates a context
manager which temporarily sets some parameter to a specified value.
The old value is restored when the context is exited. This is most
useful with the Python "with" statement:
with gdb.with_parameter('language', 'ada'):
... do Ada stuff
This also adds a simple function to set a parameter,
gdb.set_parameter, as suggested by Andrew.
This is PR python/10790.
Bug: https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=10790
