Contents
Keyword Index
Using the WDB GUI
Reference Information
Troubleshooting
Using Help
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What Is WDB GUI?
The HP WDB GUI is a graphical user interface
(GUI)designed by Hewlett-Packard for WDB debugger. It
supports debugging of both 32- and 64-bit programs on
HP-UX 11.0, 11i v1, 11i v2, 11i v3 on PA systems, and also runs on HP-UX 11i v2,
11i v3 on Itanium systems and debugs native-compiled HP C, HP
aC++, and Fortran programs.
Using the WDB GUI, you can view your source code and
the corresponding assembly code, edit breakpoints,
watch local and global variables, traverse the call
stack, modify how signals are handled, view
registers, and switch between threads in your
program. You can enter WDB commands directly in the
command view. You can also save your debug session
and later restore it.
The WDB GUI is comparable to PC-based debuggers,
using its similar look, feel, and navigation. In a
multi-platform world, this tool helps you to provide
a seamless transition between your PC development
tools and the HP WDB debugger.
New Features in Version 5.5.2
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This version of HP WDB GUI supports the following features:
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Support for display of memory layout for a given address
WDB-GUI displays memory contents for a given
address. This option is available from the View
menu. The contents can be viewed
in decimal, hexadecimal, octal, unsigned
decimal, binary, float, address, instruction,
character and, string format. For a given display
format, the contents can be viewed in byte,
halfword and word sizes.
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Support for display of a short description for an assembly instruction
WDB-GUI displays a brief description of the assembly instruction, when the mouse
pointer is hovered over an assembly instruction
in the Disassembly view.
For more information on using this feature, see the HP WDB GUI Reference Manual.
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Special key strokes for minimizing and maximizing WDB GUI windows:
WDB-GUI window can be minimized and maximized with the
following hot key combination:
Key Combination | Function |
Control + Shift + < | Minimizes WDB-GUI window |
Control + Shift + > | Maximizes WDB-GUI window |
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Support for heap check string on/off:
WDB GUI supports the heap-check string on/off
feature of GDB. If the check string flag is set to on, it
enables the validation of calls to functions such as strcpy,
strncpy, memcpy, memncpy, memmove, memset,
bzero and bcopy. The heap-check string on/off option is available from
Tools --> Memory Check. When the check string is turned on, memory warnings if any,
will be displayed in the command window of WDB GUI.
(From 3.0 to 5.5.2 on PA-RISC; from 1.4.01 to 5.5.2 on Itanium)
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Support for shared library status:
This feature lists all the libraries loaded by a
program that is being debugged. This feature is
based on the GDB command info shared.
The following information is displayed:
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Library Name
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Library Status
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Text segment Start/End
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Data segment Start/End
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Support for display of current program
information:
WDB GUI displays the following information about
the current program:
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Program Name
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Process ID
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Arguments
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Standard input/output, etc.
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Improved browser selection screen for viewing HP
WDB GUI Online Help
The browser preferences screen has been modified.
The user can select either Netscape or Mozilla as
the browser for viewing the HP WDB GUI Online
Help. Toggle buttons have been placed on the
browser selection screen for the two browsers
supported. If the default browser (in this case
Netscape) is not installed on the machine, then
the user is prompted to select an alternative
browser on the browser selection screen.
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Changed registers displayed in red
The register view of the HP WDB GUI, is updated
everytime the debugged program stops due to some
event.
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Support for viewing array contents added to HP
WDB GUI
The user can view the values for part of an array
by defining the limits. The array contents are
displayed for specific limits only. However, by
default the entire array is displayed.
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Support for specifying printing format in
Watchview
The values of the variables displayed in
Watchview can be viewed in octal,hexadecimal, and
decimal format.
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Support for the -mapshared option:
WDB GUI 5.2 supports the -mapshared
functionality. This option suppresses the mapping
of all shared libraries in a process private. The
-mapshared option can be given as a
command-line option while invoking WDB GUI as:
$ wdb -mapshared
or in the gdb command prompt as:
(gdb) set mapshared on
To allow shared libraries to be loaded after the
current point to be mapped private:
(gdb) set mapshared off
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Enhanced Threadview:
The threadview support has been enhanced to mark
the last-event thread. This feature does the
bookkeeping for the thread that was running before
a ttrace event, which stopped the process
being debugged. In cases when both the current
thread and last-event thread are the same, only the
current thread is flagged.
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Enhanced Registers View :
WDB GUI register view has been enhanced to show
double precision floating-point register values.
For example :
Single precision registers - fr7L = 26.1749401 fr7R = 0
Double precision register - fr7 = 1.5000000000000016
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Enhanced support for debugging TUI based
applications :
WDB GUI supports a new command-line option
-tui to support debugging terminal user
interface based applications (for example
vim).
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Save To File option:
The Save to File option is used to save
the contents of debugger stateview to the file
specified. Right click on the debugger stateview,
to save the view contents, to a file.
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Customized display of Program Console: WDB-GUI
supports a command line option -d to customize WDB
GUI Program Console display to a display specified
.
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Enhanced Dwell feature: The Dwell feature has been
enhanced to display large data.
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Enhanced Source View: WDB GUI will be consistent in
displaying source files in the Source View for
FORTRAN applications.
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No dwelling on Code comments WDB GUI is now able to
distinguish Code comments and will not show the
value when dwelled on it.
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Support for WDB's
Pathmap functionality: WDB GUI supports HP WDB
debugger's Pathmap functionality. The Pathmap
'From' and 'To' dialog box lets you define a list
of substitution rules to be applied to path names
to identify object files and the corresponding
source files. In this dialog box, you can add,
delete, and change the priority order of pathmap.
You can access the Pathmap dialog box from the Edit
menu by clicking Pathmap. Alternately, you may also
set the pathmap from WDB GUI's command view.
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Setting Object File
Paths: This feature allows the user to set
object file paths so that WDB GUI may locate object
files for the current program. The user may enter
object file paths either via WDB GUI's command view
or via the Object File Paths Dialog box. The Object
File Paths dialog box may be accessed on the Edit
menu by clicking Object File Paths.
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Support for Alternate Root Functionality: WDB GUI
supports HP WDB debugger's Alternate root path
functionality. The Alternate Root Path
functionality enables the user to install HP WDB
debugger and its components on an alternate root
rather than the system default root. HP WDB
provides an environment variable, GDB_ROOT
for this purpose. WDB GUI facilitates the setting
of this environment variable. If GDB_ROOT
is not set and the environment variable
WDB_ROOT is set, WDB GUI would set
GDB_ROOT to the WDB_ROOT value.
If GDB_ROOT is set, the value is left as
such.
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Memory Log: The Memory
Usage view reports data that the debugger collects
on your program's memory leaks and heap use. The
Memory Log feature enables you to save these
reports to a file on the disk.
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Enable/Disable thread :
While debugging a multi-threaded application, if
you suspect that a specific thread is causing a
problem, suspend other threads in the debugger and
debug the doubtful thread. This feature in WDB GUI
enables you to disable and enable specific threads.
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Support for Debugging PA-RISC
Applications on Itanium-based Systems: This
feature allows the user to transparently debug
PA-RISC applications and core files on
Itanium-based systems in compatibility mode under
Aries. When a executable is loaded and if the debug
target is a PA-RISC binary then WDB GUI
automatically changes the debugger flavor to
PA-RISC version of HP WDB.
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Memory checking: This
feature in WDB GUI will enable the user to check
for and report heap use, memory leaks and memory
use errors. The Memory Usage view reports data that
the debugger collects on your program's memory
leaks and heap use. You must enable leak and memory
use data collection prior to running your program.
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Support for the steplast
command: The new command, "steplast", allows
users to step into a function call directly without
stepping into the arguments evaluation function
calls. The "steplast" support is currently provided
for C language only.
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Shell commands : WDB
GUI provides a separate popup terminal window for
the user to execute shell commands. Typing exit in
the popup window, will close the popup window and
return the prompt to WDB GUI. If no TERM value is
specified, xterm is taken for popup by default.
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Hexadecimal display in
Dwell : This feature allows you to view the
hexadecimal values of the variables. When you dwell
on a variable its value is displayed in decimal and
hexadecimal format s as a tooltip in the sourceview
of the WDB GUI. If you desire to view onl y
decimal values, you can disable hexadecimal display
by setting the preference in "Display in decimal
& hexadecimal format with dwell feature"
checkbox thr ough Edit > Preference menu.
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WDB GUI allows you to configure the number of
string characters or array elements to be displayed
in the LocalVariables/Watch/ QuickWatch views.
Lower values can mean less memory is consumed while
displaying large data structures. The default value
is 200. You can set the value to a number between 0
and 1700 in the "Maximum Array Elements to be
printed" text box using Edit > Preferences menu.
However, to optimize memory consumption of WDB GUI,
it is recommended that you keep this number as
small as needed for your debugging session .
Supported Features
The WDB GUI supports the following features:
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Creating Buttons
Dynamically: This feature provides the user the
ability to create buttons dynamically from within
the WDB GUI. All operations that are valid at the
debugger prompt (gdb) can be associated with a
button. This dynamically created buttons list can
also be saved and restored across GUI sessions.
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The Print debugger command has now
been added in the source popup menu. You can mask
any variable and right click (click M2) on this
source popup menu item, to get the value of the
highlighted variable in the Command view.
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Enhanced Array
Browsing: This feature lets you view the entire
contents of an expandable expression, with a single
click on the expression's name, in the Name field
of the Local
Variables /Watch
views. The expandable expression can be an array,
structure, union or a Class. The whole content of
the expandable data structure can be listed by,
clicking on the plus sign (+) available to the left
of the data structure's name, or by double clicking
the Name field on the line. To collapse the whole
expansion, click on the minus sign (-) or double
click on the line again.The Quick Watch view, by
default will show the entire contents of the
expandable data structure,if this option is set. To
set this option, check the "Enhanced Array
Browsing" check box in the Edit->Preferences
dialog box. If this option is not set, a single
click on the expression's name will expand the
expression to the next level.
Note: There is a limitation that if
the expression is of pointer data type, it
will be expanded to the next level only.
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Saving Commandline
History: This feature provides the ability to
save commandline history across WDB GUI sessions.
You also have an option of saving and restoring the
sequence of commands in the GUI commandline, along
with the other session contents, while using the
'Save/Restore Session'.
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Function browsing:
Visit the source for a function by clicking on the
function name. Choose from a list of functions that
match a given regular expression.
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Automatic update of source search path when
breakpoint is set: WDB GUI will automatically
update the source search path when a breakpoint is
set in a file which is not in the search path.This
can be set by checking the "Automatically Update
Search Path when breakpoints set" check box in the
Debugger
Preferences.
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Point and click breakpoints and breakpoint editing.
Click M1 to the left of the Source
view or Disassembly view to set or delete a
breakpoint. Click M2 on a breakpoint symbol
to bring up a dialog that lets you modify that
breakpoint's attributes. See Using Breakpoints for
details
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xterm, dtterm, hpterm are supported as
program console
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Debugging an executable file or a core file
produced by an aborted program
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Attaching to a process that is already running
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Viewing a source file and the corresponding
assembly code
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Searching for specific text and regular expressions
in several views
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Setting breakpoints and stepping through your
program
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Viewing and modifying the values of local and
global variables
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Viewing hardware registers
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Traversing the call stack
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Viewing and controlling signal handling
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Traversing threads
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Sending commands directly to WDB using a command
line
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Accessing a history of commands you have executed
during the current debug session
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Customizing the appearance and behavior of the
debugger GUI
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Saving and restoring debugger sessions
The WDB GUI (on Itanium) does NOT support
the following features:
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Fix and continue: Edit
sources and have the debugger compile and patch in
the changes without restarting the debugged
program.
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Steplast support for C and
C++: In general, if a function call has
arguments which makes further function calls, a
simple "step" command will step into argument
evaluation call. This new feature, "steplast", will
step into a function but not into the calls for
evaluating arguments.
About HP WDB
HP WDB is a Hewlett-Packard-supported implementation of
the GDB debugger developed by the Free Software
Foundation. For more information on WDB, refer to the
WDB
documentation.
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