Re: [PATCH v2 1/2] Always show locations for breakpoints & show canonical location spec

[Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>]

> Date: Thu, 26 May 2022 20:29:50 +0100
> Cc: gdb-patches@sourceware.org
> From: Pedro Alves <pedro@palves.net>
> 
> I documented all this in the Location Specifications section.  I'll send v4 in a bit.
> 
> I did not go for "source locations", however.  I swear I am not trying to be
> difficult...  The issue is that as I tried to describe things, "source location" read
> awkwardly, and kind of a lie-ish.  Because, you can have usable resolved locations without
> sources, even if they are incomplete.  It depends on command if they are usable.  Instead, I
> noticed something.
> 
> Here:
> 
>   * List::                        Printing source lines
>  -* Specify Location::            How to specify code locations
>  +* Location Specifications::     How to specify code locations
>                                                  ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> 
> And note what the intro paragraph of that node currently says:
> 
>   "Several GDB commands accept arguments that specify a location or locations of your program’s code."
> 
> Clearly the arguments specify something, and that something is ... "locations of your program’s code."
> 
> So I went with "code locations" instead.

I could agree with this, but note that you are contradicting yourself:
"code" can and is sometimes interpreted as "machine code", and thus
"code location" can be interpreted as "address", something you didn't
want.  By contrast, "source location" is unequivocally a source-level
concept, and reflects the fact that it refers to a certain line of
source code in a certain file.  Moreover, it follows the example of
that C++ page you yourself used as an argument.  Why now you deviate
from all that is a mystery for me.

But if you don't care about all these inconsistencies, "code location"
is fine with me, as it qualifies the overly-general "location" enough
to solve the potential ambiguity, which was what bothered me.

> Anyhow, you'll see in v4 in a bit.
> 
> I hope you will be happy with this one.

Thanks.