RTEMS GNU Tools On-Line Library

Debugging with GDB

Appendix B: Installing GDB

GDB comes with a configure script that automates the process of preparing GDB for installation; you can then use make to build the gdb program.

The GDB distribution includes all the source code you need for GDB in a single directory, whose name is usually composed by appending the version number to `gdb'.

For example, the GDB version 5.0 distribution is in the `gdb-5.0' directory. That directory contains:

gdb-5.0/configure (and supporting files)

script for configuring GDB and all its supporting libraries

gdb-5.0/gdb

the source specific to GDB itself

gdb-5.0/bfd

source for the Binary File Descriptor library

gdb-5.0/include

GNU include files

gdb-5.0/libiberty

source for the `-liberty' free software library

gdb-5.0/opcodes

source for the library of opcode tables and disassemblers

gdb-5.0/readline

source for the GNU command-line interface

gdb-5.0/glob

source for the GNU filename pattern-matching subroutine

gdb-5.0/mmalloc

source for the GNU memory-mapped malloc package

The simplest way to configure and build GDB is to run configure from the `gdb-version-number' source directory, which in this example is the `gdb-5.0' directory.

First switch to the `gdb-version-number' source directory if you are not already in it; then run configure. Pass the identifier for the platform on which GDB will run as an argument.

For example:

cd gdb-5.0
./configure host
make

where host is an identifier such as `sun4' or `decstation', that identifies the platform where GDB will run. (You can often leave off host; configure tries to guess the correct value by examining your system.)

Running `configure host' and then running make builds the `bfd', `readline', `mmalloc', and `libiberty' libraries, then gdb itself. The configured source files, and the binaries, are left in the corresponding source directories.

configure is a Bourne-shell (/bin/sh) script; if your system does not recognize this automatically when you run a different shell, you may need to run sh on it explicitly:

sh configure host

If you run configure from a directory that contains source directories for multiple libraries or programs, such as the `gdb-5.0' source directory for version 5.0, configure creates configuration files for every directory level underneath (unless you tell it not to, with the `--norecursion' option).

You can run the configure script from any of the subordinate directories in the GDB distribution if you only want to configure that subdirectory, but be sure to specify a path to it.

For example, with version 5.0, type the following to configure only the bfd subdirectory:

cd gdb-5.0/bfd
../configure host

You can install gdb anywhere; it has no hardwired paths. However, you should make sure that the shell on your path (named by the `SHELL' environment variable) is publicly readable. Remember that GDB uses the shell to start your program---some systems refuse to let GDB debug child processes whose programs are not readable.

Debugging with GDB

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