kernel debugging

[Steve Iribarne (GMail)]

On 5/4/06, David H. Lynch Jr. <dhlii at dlasys.net> wrote:
>     Everyone has their own debugging style.
>
>     Engineers seem to like hardware debugging tools. I have used some
> very fancy debugging hardware, but except for extremely rare instances
> it is more work to get setup
>     and figure out what you are trying to do than inserting some
> debugging and rebuilding.
>
>     My idea of debugging hardware is a port with an LED on it I can try
> to blink.
>
>     I also only rarely use software debuggers.
>
>     Most of the time when things go off the rails the critical question
> for me is Where did things go wrong. Once I know that usually the
> problem is obvious and I do nto need dumps of variables or memory.
>
>     I also do development across numerous platforms, OS's and languages.
> I need debugging tools and techniques that are broadly portable. A
> hardware debugging tool might help with board bringup, but it would be
> of little use
>     for web or perl programming. Investing time and capitol in highly
> specialized tools or knowledge requires being narrowly focused to get a
> worthwhile payback.
>
>     Regardless, I think debugging is a sort of religious preference. You
> need to know who you are and what you need. Other peoples experience is
> useful but should not be determinative.
>

Yes I am finding this out.  It's a long journey!  :)

Most of the issues I have to deal with are systems that are already up
and running in the PPC world and I come in afterwords to clean up.  So
for example, right now I think I have a DMA problem that is crashing
my PPC and rebooting the system.

To be sure, I would love to step over a few instructions and slow the
world down a bit.  That's why I was going to setup kgdb or something
like that.

Thanks.

-stv


> Steve Iribarne (GMail) wrote:
> > Hello.
> >
> > This is more a general question to see what others do out here.  I am
> > begining to get sick of printk debugging.  I work on two different PPC
> > boards.  An 860 and 8260.
> >
> > I want to get some feedback on the best kernel debugger to use.  I
> > have been looking at three.
> >
> > 1.  kgdb
> > 2.  kdb
> > 3.  UML
> >
> > I am leaning towards kgdb, but before I jump in I thought I'd put this
> > out to the best group I could think of linuxppc.  Because I am sure
> > most of you are using something!  :)
> >
> > Thanks.
> >
> > -stv
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> >
>
>
> --
> Dave Lynch                                              DLA Systems
> Software Development:                                Embedded Linux
> 717.627.3770         dhlii at dlasys.net         http://www.dlasys.net
> fax: 1.253.369.9244                            Cell: 1.717.587.7774
> Over 25 years' experience in platforms, languages, and technologies too numerous to list.
>
>