HP 3000 Manuals HP 3000 Manuals
HP Symbolic Debugger (xdb) Enhancements
by Nadia Jadvar
Systems Technology Division
Support of Hierarchical File System (HFS)
With MPE/iX 5.0, xdb supports using either hierarchical filenames or the
traditional MPE filenames for source files and program files.
By default, xdb treats filenames that start with a slash (/) or a period
(.) as HFS filenames, and all others as MPE filenames.
This also applies to pathnames given to the D command. If a pathname
starts with a slash or a period, it is considered an HFS filename in
resolving the locations of source files. If the pathname is an MPE group
or group.account name, it is considered an MPE filename in resolving the
locations of source files.
For example, if your program is named /PROGS/JIM/test.c (an HFS name),
and is compiled using the POSIX c89 command, then the pathname that xdb
tries to access would be /PROGS/JIM/test.c. If test.c were moved to
another group, say group RON, then the xdb command D "/PROGS/RON" would
allow the debugger to find the source. However, if you specified an MPE
name, D "RON" for example, xdb would not find the source. Since the
program was compiled with an HFS pathname, you must supply an HFS
pathname to the debugger.
New Command Line Switch: -h
The -h option causes the debugger to interpret source and program
filenames as HFS filenames.
There are times when the type of file being specified is ambiguous. For
instance, test.c could be the HFS filename, ./test.c, if referenced in a
POSIX shell. It could also be the file TEST in the group C in the MPE
command interpreter. By default (for backwards compatibility), xdb
assumes it is an MPE filename. If it is actually an HFS filename, xdb
cannot locate the file. Therefore, you must
use -h.
Specifying Command Line Options From POSIX Shells
For backward compatibility with the MPE command interpreter and file
system, xdb is not built with the necessary POSIX libraries that allow a
program to see its command line options when invoked from a POSIX shell.
In other words, if you specify the following command from a POSIX shell:
shell/iX> /SYS/PUB/XDB -L myprog
xdb does not see the -L myprog.
To allow use of POSIX shells, xdb now prompts for the program file and
for other command line options.
To use the command line shown in the previous example, you would do the
following:
shell/iX> /SYS/PUB/XDB
XDB arguments and program file? -L myprog
Improved Support for COBOL LINKAGE SECTION Data Items
In previous releases, xdb had trouble locating all but the first data
item in a COBOL linkage section. This has been corrected for this
release.
Improved Support for Pascal Strings
xdb now properly handles the printing of Pascal STRING type variables,
and correctly handles assignments to STRING variables.
Support for Printing FORTRAN Array Elements
Prior to MPE/iX 5.0, xdb would issue an error message if a user tried to
print the value of a FORTRAN array element. This syntax is now accepted.