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Date:      Mon, 25 Mar 96 16:41:37 MET
From:      Greg Lehey <lehey.pad@sni.de>
To:        jkh@time.cdrom.com (Jordan K. Hubbard)
Cc:        lehey.pad@sni.de, pst@Shockwave.COM, hackers@freebsd.org, bde@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: kgdb / remote gdb of the kernel?
Message-ID:  <199603251544.QAA20473@nixpbe.pdb.sni.de>
In-Reply-To: <27135.827768356@time.cdrom.com>; from "Jordan K. Hubbard" at Mar 25, 96 7:39 am

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>>>> I'm planning to rework kernel debugging in about a month's time.  If
>>>> you have any opinions about what should go in, please let me know.  In
>>>> particular, do you want debugging over Ethernet?
>>>
>>> gdb-remote!  gdb-remote!
>>
>> Serial or Ethernet?
>
> Serial.  I'm not aware of any IP based method of talking to a remote
> gdb,

I don't know of anything involving gdb, but when I was with Tandem
about 5 years ago, they had something similar for the Integrity
series.

> and frankly I'm not even sure how it would work while
> single-stepping a kernel - getting a packet off the wire and
> delivering it to a usermode process takes quite a few steps, after
> all, and you'd probably be left with a rather difficult debugging
> scenario! :-)

Yes, I had my doubts, too, but at least one manufacturer has managed
it, and the question isn't "is it easy", but rather "is it desirable"?
One obvious approach would be to leave interrupts enabled but change
all the vectors on entering the debugger, such that most interrupts
get ignored, and the ethernet interrupt goes to a special,
stripped-down driver.  Note also that the remote debug interface is in
the kernel, and not a user process.

Greg




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