Specifying a Debugging Target
A target is the execution environment occupied by your program.
Often, GDB runs in the same host environment as your program;
in that case, the debugging target is specified as a side effect when
you use the file
or core
commands. When you need more
flexibility--for example, running GDB on a physically separate
host, or controlling a standalone system over a serial port or a
realtime system over a TCP/IP connection--you can use the target
command to specify one of the target types configured for GDB
(see section Commands for managing targets).
It is possible to build GDB for several different target architectures. When GDB is built like that, you can choose one of the available architectures with the set architecture command.
set architecture arch
-
This command sets the current target architecture to arch. The
value of arch can be
"auto"
, in addition to one of the supported architectures. show architecture
- Show the current target architecture.
set processor
processor
-
These are alias commands for, respectively,
set architecture
andshow architecture
.
Active targets
There are three classes of targets: processes, core files, and executable files. GDB can work concurrently on up to three active targets, one in each class. This allows you to (for example) start a process and inspect its activity without abandoning your work on a core file.
For example, if you execute `gdb a.out', then the executable file
a.out
is the only active target. If you designate a core file as
well--presumably from a prior run that crashed and coredumped--then
GDB has two active targets and uses them in tandem, looking
first in the corefile target, then in the executable file, to satisfy
requests for memory addresses. (Typically, these two classes of target
are complementary, since core files contain only a program's
read-write memory--variables and so on--plus machine status, while
executable files contain only the program text and initialized data.)
When you type run
, your executable file becomes an active process
target as well. When a process target is active, all GDB
commands requesting memory addresses refer to that target; addresses in
an active core file or executable file target are obscured while the
process target is active.
Use the core-file
and exec-file
commands to select a new
core file or executable target (see section Commands to specify files). To specify as a target a process that is already running, use
the attach
command (see section Debugging an already-running process).
Commands for managing targets
target type parameters
-
Connects the GDB host environment to a target machine or
process. A target is typically a protocol for talking to debugging
facilities. You use the argument type to specify the type or
protocol of the target machine.
Further parameters are interpreted by the target protocol, but
typically include things like device names or host names to connect
with, process numbers, and baud rates.
The
target
command does not repeat if you press RET again after executing the command. help target
-
Displays the names of all targets available. To display targets
currently selected, use either
info target
orinfo files
(see section Commands to specify files). help target name
- Describe a particular target, including any parameters necessary to select it.
set gnutarget args
-
GDB uses its own library BFD to read your files. GDB
knows whether it is reading an executable,
a core, or a .o file; however, you can specify the file format
with the
set gnutarget
command. Unlike mosttarget
commands, withgnutarget
thetarget
refers to a program, not a machine.Warning: To specify a file format with
set gnutarget
, you must know the actual BFD name. show gnutarget
-
Use the
show gnutarget
command to display what file formatgnutarget
is set to read. If you have not setgnutarget
, GDB will determine the file format for each file automatically, andshow gnutarget
displays `The current BDF target is "auto"'.
Here are some common targets (available, or not, depending on the GDB configuration):
target exec program
- An executable file. `target exec program' is the same as `exec-file program'.
target core filename
- A core dump file. `target core filename' is the same as `core-file filename'.
target remote dev
-
Remote serial target in GDB-specific protocol. The argument dev
specifies what serial device to use for the connection (e.g.
`/dev/ttya'). See section Remote debugging.
target remote
supports theload
command. This is only useful if you have some other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download. target sim
-
Builtin CPU simulator. GDB includes simulators for most architectures.
In general,
target sim load run
works; however, you cannot assume that a specific memory map, device drivers, or even basic I/O is available, although some simulators do provide these. For info about any processor-specific simulator details, see the appropriate section in section Embedded Processors.
Some configurations may include these targets as well:
target nrom dev
- NetROM ROM emulator. This target only supports downloading.
Different targets are available on different configurations of GDB; your configuration may have more or fewer targets.
Many remote targets require you to download the executable's code once you've successfully established a connection. You may wish to control various aspects of this process, such as the size of the data chunks used by GDB to download program parts to the remote target.
set download-write-size size
- Set the write size used when downloading a program. Only used when downloading a program onto a remote target. Specify zero or a negative value to disable blocked writes. The actual size of each transfer is also limited by the size of the target packet and the memory cache.
show download-write-size
- Show the current value of the write size.
set hash
- This command controls whether a hash mark `#' is displayed while downloading a file to the remote monitor. If on, a hash mark is displayed after each S-record is successfully downloaded to the monitor.
show hash
- Show the current status of displaying the hash mark.
set debug monitor
- Enable or disable display of communications messages between GDB and the remote monitor.
show debug monitor
- Show the current status of displaying communications between GDB and the remote monitor.
load filename
-
Depending on what remote debugging facilities are configured into
GDB, the
load
command may be available. Where it exists, it is meant to make filename (an executable) available for debugging on the remote system--by downloading, or dynamic linking, for example.load
also records the filename symbol table in GDB, like theadd-symbol-file
command. If your GDB does not have aload
command, attempting to execute it gets the error message "You can't do that when your target is ...
" The file is loaded at whatever address is specified in the executable. For some object file formats, you can specify the load address when you link the program; for other formats, like a.out, the object file format specifies a fixed address.load
does not repeat if you press RET again after using it.
Choosing target byte order
Some types of processors, such as the MIPS, PowerPC, and Renesas SH, offer the ability to run either big-endian or little-endian byte orders. Usually the executable or symbol will include a bit to designate the endian-ness, and you will not need to worry about which to use. However, you may still find it useful to adjust GDB's idea of processor endian-ness manually.
set endian big
- Instruct GDB to assume the target is big-endian.
set endian little
- Instruct GDB to assume the target is little-endian.
set endian auto
- Instruct GDB to use the byte order associated with the executable.
show endian
- Display GDB's current idea of the target byte order.
Note that these commands merely adjust interpretation of symbolic data on the host, and that they have absolutely no effect on the target system.
Remote debugging
If you are trying to debug a program running on a machine that cannot run GDB in the usual way, it is often useful to use remote debugging. For example, you might use remote debugging on an operating system kernel, or on a small system which does not have a general purpose operating system powerful enough to run a full-featured debugger.
Some configurations of GDB have special serial or TCP/IP interfaces to make this work with particular debugging targets. In addition, GDB comes with a generic serial protocol (specific to GDB, but not specific to any particular target system) which you can use if you write the remote stubs--the code that runs on the remote system to communicate with GDB.
Other remote targets may be available in your
configuration of GDB; use help target
to list them.
Once you've connected to the remote target, GDB allows you to send arbitrary commands to the remote monitor:
remote command
- Send an arbitrary command string to the remote monitor.
Kernel Object Display
Some targets support kernel object display. Using this facility, GDB communicates specially with the underlying operating system and can display information about operating system-level objects such as mutexes and other synchronization objects. Exactly which objects can be displayed is determined on a per-OS basis.
Use the set os
command to set the operating system. This tells
GDB which kernel object display module to initialize:
(gdb) set os cisco
The associated command show os
displays the operating system
set with the set os
command; if no operating system has been
set, show os
will display an empty string `""'.
If set os
succeeds, GDB will display some information
about the operating system, and will create a new info
command
which can be used to query the target. The info
command is named
after the operating system:
(gdb) info cisco List of Cisco Kernel Objects Object Description any Any and all objects
Further subcommands can be used to query about particular objects known by the kernel.
There is currently no way to determine whether a given operating system is supported other than to try setting it with set os name, where name is the name of the operating system you want to try.
Go to the first, previous, next, last section, table of contents.