possible gdb agent expression extension
David Taylor <[email protected]>
| Newsgroups | gmane.comp.gdb.devel |
|---|---|
| Message-ID | <20426.1406558341@usendtaylorx2l> |
We're thinking of extending gdb agent expreswions by adding additional bytecodes. Before doing this I'd like to determine whether the idea of doing this would be looked upon favorably and what form it should take. [One of our current goals with regard to GDB is to use stock GDB sources as much as possible and to only make changes that are either bug fixes or extensions that when contributed back are likely to be looked upon favorably in concept and hopefully in implementation.] We would like to be able to set variables using byte code expressions. In practice this means being able to set memory and being able to set registers. There are no byte code for either of these. For setting registers, a new opcode 'setreg'. Like 'reg' the next two bytes of the bytecode stream are the register number. Top of expression stack is the value to set it to. And the top of the expression stack is popped. For setting memory, two possibilities come to mind: . either, one opcode 'set' or 'setmem' with next byte in byte code stream saying how big a chunk of memory to set, with top two values on expression stack being the address to set and the value to set it to. . or, four new opcodes (similar to 'ref' and 'const') -- set8, set16, set32, and set64 with, again, top two values on expression stack being the address to set and the value to set it to. Is this something people would like to see added? Which approach do people feel is better? Which should be top of stack? Address? Or value? And should they be popped? As I have other, higher priority, items to work on, it will likely be awhile before I start on this.