Ubuntu Manpage: gdb — external kernel debugger

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NAME

     gdb — external kernel debugger

SYNOPSIS

     makeoptions DEBUG=-g
     options DDB

DESCRIPTION

     The gdb kernel debugger is a variation of gdb(1) which understands some aspects of the FreeBSD kernel
     environment.  It can be used in a number of ways:

     •   It can be used to examine the memory of the processor on which it runs.

     •   It can be used to analyse a processor dump after a panic.

     •   It can be used to debug another system interactively via a serial or firewire link.  In this mode, the
         processor can be stopped and single stepped.

     •   With a firewire link, it can be used to examine the memory of a remote system without the participation
         of that system.  In this mode, the processor cannot be stopped and single stepped, but it can be of use
         when the remote system has crashed and is no longer responding.

     When used for remote debugging, gdb requires the presence of the ddb(4) kernel debugger.  Commands exist to
     switch between gdb and ddb(4).

PREPARING FOR DEBUGGING

When debugging kernels, it is practically essential to have built a kernel with debugging symbols
(makeoptions DEBUG=-g). It is easiest to perform operations from the kernel build directory, by default
/usr/obj/usr/src/sys/GENERIC.

First, ensure you have a copy of the debug macros in the directory:

make gdbinit

This command performs some transformations on the macros installed in /usr/src/tools/debugscripts to adapt
them to the local environment.

Inspecting the environment of the local machine
To look at and change the contents of the memory of the system you are running on,

gdb -k -wcore kernel.debug /dev/mem

In this mode, you need the -k flag to indicate to gdb(1) that the “dump file” /dev/mem is a kernel data
file. You can look at live data, and if you include the -wcore option, you can change it at your peril.
The system does not stop (obviously), so a number of things will not work. You can set breakpoints, but
you cannot “continue” execution, so they will not work.

Debugging a crash dump
By default, crash dumps are stored in the directory /var/crash. Investigate them from the kernel build
directory with:

gdb -k kernel.debug /var/crash/vmcore.29

In this mode, the system is obviously stopped, so you can only look at it.

Debugging a live system with a remote link
In the following discussion, the term “local system” refers to the system running the debugger, and “remote
system” refers to the live system being debugged.

To debug a live system with a remote link, the kernel must be compiled with the option options DDB. The
option options BREAK_TO_DEBUGGER enables the debugging machine stop the debugged machine once a connection
has been established by pressing ‘^C’.

Debugging a live system with a remote serial link
When using a serial port for the remote link on the i386 platform, the serial port must be identified by
setting the flag bit 0x80 for the specified interface. Generally, this port will also be used as a serial
console (flag bit 0x10), so the entry in /boot/device.hints should be:

hint.sio.0.flags="0x90"

Debugging a live system with a remote firewire link
As with serial debugging, to debug a live system with a firewire link, the kernel must be compiled with the
option options DDB.

A number of steps must be performed to set up a firewire link:

• Ensure that both systems have firewire(4) support, and that the kernel of the remote system includes
the dcons(4) and dcons_crom(4) drivers. If they are not compiled into the kernel, load the KLDs:

kldload firewire

On the remote system only:

kldload dcons
kldload dcons_crom

You should see something like this in the dmesg(8) output of the remote system:

fwohci0: BUS reset
fwohci0: node_id=0x8800ffc0, gen=2, non CYCLEMASTER mode
firewire0: 2 nodes, maxhop <= 1, cable IRM = 1
firewire0: bus manager 1
firewire0: New S400 device ID:00c04f3226e88061
dcons_crom0: <dcons configuration ROM> on firewire0
dcons_crom0: bus_addr 0x22a000

It is a good idea to load these modules at boot time with the following entry in /boot/loader.conf:

dcons_crom_enable="YES"

This ensures that all three modules are loaded. There is no harm in loading dcons(4) and dcons_crom(4)
on the local system, but if you only want to load the firewire(4) module, include the following in
/boot/loader.conf:

firewire_enable="YES"

• Next, use fwcontrol(8) to find the firewire node corresponding to the remote machine. On the local
machine you might see:

# fwcontrol
2 devices (info_len=2)
node EUI64 status
1 0x00c04f3226e88061 0
0 0x000199000003622b 1

The first node is always the local system, so in this case, node 0 is the remote system. If there are
more than two systems, check from the other end to find which node corresponds to the remote system.
On the remote machine, it looks like this:

# fwcontrol
2 devices (info_len=2)
node EUI64 status
0 0x000199000003622b 0
1 0x00c04f3226e88061 1

• Next, establish a firewire connection with dconschat(8):

dconschat -br -G 5556 -t 0x000199000003622b

0x000199000003622b is the EUI64 address of the remote node, as determined from the output of
fwcontrol(8) above. When started in this manner, dconschat(8) establishes a local tunnel connection
from port localhost:5556 to the remote debugger. You can also establish a console port connection with
the -C option to the same invocation dconschat(8). See the dconschat(8) manpage for further details.

The dconschat(8) utility does not return control to the user. It displays error messages and console
output for the remote system, so it is a good idea to start it in its own window.

• Finally, establish connection:

# gdb kernel.debug
GNU gdb 5.2.1 (FreeBSD)
(political statements omitted)
Ready to go. Enter 'tr' to connect to the remote target
with /dev/cuau0, 'tr /dev/cuau1' to connect to a different port
or 'trf portno' to connect to the remote target with the firewire
interface. portno defaults to 5556.

Type 'getsyms' after connection to load kld symbols.

If you are debugging a local system, you can use 'kldsyms' instead
to load the kld symbols. That is a less obnoxious interface.
(gdb) trf
0xc21bd378 in ?? ()

The trf macro assumes a connection on port 5556. If you want to use a different port (by changing the
invocation of dconschat(8) above), use the tr macro instead. For example, if you want to use port
4711, run dconschat(8) like this:

dconschat -br -G 4711 -t 0x000199000003622b

Then establish connection with:

(gdb) tr localhost:4711
0xc21bd378 in ?? ()

Non-cooperative debugging a live system with a remote firewire link
In addition to the conventional debugging via firewire described in the previous section, it is possible to
debug a remote system without its cooperation, once an initial connection has been established. This
corresponds to debugging a local machine using /dev/mem. It can be very useful if a system crashes and the
debugger no longer responds. To use this method, set the sysctl(8) variables hw.firewire.fwmem.eui64_hi
and hw.firewire.fwmem.eui64_lo to the upper and lower halves of the EUI64 ID of the remote system,
respectively. From the previous example, the remote machine shows:

# fwcontrol
2 devices (info_len=2)
node EUI64 status
0 0x000199000003622b 0
1 0x00c04f3226e88061 1

Enter:

# sysctl -w hw.firewire.fwmem.eui64_hi=0x00019900
hw.firewire.fwmem.eui64_hi: 0 -> 104704
# sysctl -w hw.firewire.fwmem.eui64_lo=0x0003622b
hw.firewire.fwmem.eui64_lo: 0 -> 221739

Note that the variables must be explicitly stated in hexadecimal. After this, you can examine the remote
machine's state with the following input:

# gdb -k kernel.debug /dev/fwmem0.0
GNU gdb 5.2.1 (FreeBSD)
(messages omitted)
Reading symbols from /boot/kernel/dcons.ko...done.
Loaded symbols for /boot/kernel/dcons.ko
Reading symbols from /boot/kernel/dcons_crom.ko...done.
Loaded symbols for /boot/kernel/dcons_crom.ko
#0 sched_switch (td=0xc0922fe0) at /usr/src/sys/kern/sched_4bsd.c:621
0xc21bd378 in ?? ()

In this case, it is not necessary to load the symbols explicitly. The remote system continues to run.

COMMANDS

The user interface to gdb is via gdb(1), so gdb(1) commands also work. This section discusses only the
extensions for kernel debugging that get installed in the kernel build directory.

Debugging environment
The following macros manipulate the debugging environment:

ddb Switch back to ddb(4). This command is only meaningful when performing remote debugging.

getsyms
Display kldstat information for the target machine and invite user to paste it back in. This is
required because gdb does not allow data to be passed to shell scripts. It is necessary for remote
debugging and crash dumps; for local memory debugging use kldsyms instead.

kldsyms
Read in the symbol tables for the debugging machine. This does not work for remote debugging and
crash dumps; use getsyms instead.

tr interface
Debug a remote system via the specified serial or firewire interface.

tr0 Debug a remote system via serial interface /dev/cuau0.

tr1 Debug a remote system via serial interface /dev/cuau1.

trf Debug a remote system via firewire interface at default port 5556.

The commands tr0, tr1 and trf are convenience commands which invoke tr.

The current process environment
The following macros are convenience functions intended to make things easier than the standard gdb(1)
commands.

f0 Select stack frame 0 and show assembler-level details.

f1 Select stack frame 1 and show assembler-level details.

f2 Select stack frame 2 and show assembler-level details.

f3 Select stack frame 3 and show assembler-level details.

f4 Select stack frame 4 and show assembler-level details.

f5 Select stack frame 5 and show assembler-level details.

xb Show 12 words in hex, starting at current ebp value.

xi List the next 10 instructions from the current eip value.

xp Show the register contents and the first four parameters of the current stack frame.

xp0 Show the first parameter of current stack frame in various formats.

xp1 Show the second parameter of current stack frame in various formats.

xp2 Show the third parameter of current stack frame in various formats.

xp3 Show the fourth parameter of current stack frame in various formats.

xp4 Show the fifth parameter of current stack frame in various formats.

xs Show the last 12 words on stack in hexadecimal.

xxp Show the register contents and the first ten parameters.

z Single step 1 instruction (over calls) and show next instruction.

zs Single step 1 instruction (through calls) and show next instruction.

Examining other processes
The following macros access other processes. The gdb debugger does not understand the concept of multiple
processes, so they effectively bypass the entire gdb environment.

btp pid
Show a backtrace for the process pid.

btpa Show backtraces for all processes in the system.

btpp Show a backtrace for the process previously selected with defproc.

btr ebp
Show a backtrace from the ebp address specified.

defproc pid
Specify the PID of the process for some other commands in this section.

fr frame
Show frame frame of the stack of the process previously selected with defproc.

pcb proc
Show some PCB contents of the process proc.

Examining data structures
You can use standard gdb(1) commands to look at most data structures. The macros in this section are
convenience functions which typically display the data in a more readable format, or which omit less
interesting parts of the structure.

bp Show information about the buffer header pointed to by the variable bp in the current frame.

bpd Show the contents (char *) of bp->data in the current frame.

bpl Show detailed information about the buffer header (struct bp) pointed at by the local variable bp.

bpp bp Show summary information about the buffer header (struct bp) pointed at by the parameter bp.

bx Print a number of fields from the buffer header pointed at in by the pointer bp in the current
environment.

vdev Show some information of the vnode pointed to by the local variable vp.

Miscellaneous macros
checkmem
Check unallocated memory for modifications. This assumes that the kernel has been compiled with
options DIAGNOSTIC. This causes the contents of free memory to be set to 0xdeadc0de.

dmesg Print the system message buffer. This corresponds to the dmesg(8) utility. This macro used to be
called msgbuf. It can take a very long time over a serial line, and it is even slower via firewire
or local memory due to inefficiencies in gdb. When debugging a crash dump or over firewire, it is
not necessary to start gdb to access the message buffer: instead, use an appropriate variation of

dmesg -M /var/crash/vmcore.0 -N kernel.debug
dmesg -M /dev/fwmem0.0 -N kernel.debug

kldstat
Equivalent of the kldstat(8) utility without options.

pname Print the command name of the current process.

ps Show process status. This corresponds in concept, but not in appearance, to the ps(1) utility.
When debugging a crash dump or over firewire, it is not necessary to start gdb to display the ps(1)
output: instead, use an appropriate variation of

ps -M /var/crash/vmcore.0 -N kernel.debug
ps -M /dev/fwmem0.0 -N kernel.debug

y Kludge for writing macros. When writing macros, it is convenient to paste them back into the gdb
window. Unfortunately, if the macro is already defined, gdb insists on asking

Redefine foo?

It will not give up until you answer ‘y’. This command is that answer. It does nothing else
except to print a warning message to remind you to remove it again.

AUTHORS

     This man page was written by Greg Lehey <grog@FreeBSD.org>.

BUGS

     The gdb(1) debugger was never designed to debug kernels, and it is not a very good match.  Many problems
     exist.

     The gdb implementation is very inefficient, and many operations are slow.

     Serial debugging is even slower, and race conditions can make it difficult to run the link at more than
     9600 bps.  Firewire connections do not have this problem.

     The debugging macros “just grew.” In general, the person who wrote them did so while looking for a specific
     problem, so they may not be general enough, and they may behave badly when used in ways for which they were
     not intended, even if those ways make sense.

     Many of these commands only work on the ia32 architecture.