Unable to step through ARM code using insgiht-5.0

Unable to step through ARM code using insgiht-5.0

[Ahmed Agbabiaka]

Hello,

I have successfully built insight-5.0 for an ARM target (arm-riscix-coff). My
ARM development board is running version 1.04 of the Angel debugger. Using my
version of insight-5.0, I can successfully connect to my ARM target (ARM
Angel/Serial), load an application (built using gcc for the same target), view
memory locations and registers as well as set my desired break point(s) within
the code.  However, when I attempt to debug the loaded application, insight-5.0
seems to hang. Single stepping the code (although not causing insight-5.0 to
hang) does not seem to have any effect on the loaded application as the program
counter remains unchanged.

Below is my configuration:

Host: Windows NT (i686-pc-cygwin)

GNU tools
	binutils-2.9.1
	gcc-2.95.2
	newlib-1.8.2

I have looked at the communication between the host and the target and there
seems to be some hand shaking going on when the "Step" and "Next" commands are
sent to the target.

I also have an ARM Remote debugger (part of ARM SDT 2.11a) which works fine when
used to build and load the same application that fails with insight-5.0.

I have been through the mailing list to see if there are others who have
experienced similar problems. The closest was msg00157 from Jens-Christian on
Wed, 15 Nov 2000 (Debugging with ANGEL). However, it appears he got a bit
further than I am currently getting and as expected, the fix by Fernando Nasser
did not work for me.

Any suggestions on how to resolve this problem will be most appreciated.

Thank you
Ahmed A. Agbabiaka



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Re: Unable to step through ARM code using insgiht-5.0

[Keith Seitz]

On Thu, 19 Apr 2001, Ahmed A. Agbabiaka wrote:

> Are there any reasons why GDB should not work on a WIN 95 platform? Is this a
> known problem, or just a one-off? I am yet to try it on a WIN 98 platform to see
> if the same problems occur.

FWIW, I've never had luck using gdb on Win95. However (the light at 
the end of the tunnel), I've also had NO problems using (and building, 
actually) on Win98, WinNT, or Win2000.

Keith

Re: Unable to step through ARM code using insgiht-5.0

[Ahmed A. Agbabiaka]

Hello,

Thank you all, for your suggestions regarding my GDB problem. I now have a
working version of GDB, "insight+dejagnu-20010205", which I have been using for
over one month now. However, I still have a few more queries:

My build of the snapshot (even though built using cygwin-1.1.18-2, on a WIN 95
platform) only works on Window NT. Attempts to use it on any WIN 95 machines
have failed miserably:
	- Downloading seems to hang half-way
	- When a download is successful, "step"ing crashes the debugger.

Are there any reasons why GDB should not work on a WIN 95 platform? Is this a
known problem, or just a one-off? I am yet to try it on a WIN 98 platform to see
if the same problems occur.

Thanks once again,
Ahmed

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Re: Unable to step through ARM code using insgiht-5.0

[Grant Edwards]

On Thu, Feb 15, 2001 at 04:01:14PM -0500, Fernando Nasser wrote:

> With the current versions of Cygwin it should work fine.
> 
> 
> But if you are using a b.20 or some other old version of Cygwin
> you may encounter problems with serial lines.  It gets worse
> the higher the speed you use. In this case, just grab the
> latest Cygwin and everything will be fine.

Or switch to Linux, and everything will be even finer.  ;)

-- 
Grant Edwards
grante@visi.com

Re: Unable to step through ARM code using insgiht-5.0

[Grant Edwards]

On Thu, Feb 15, 2001 at 11:30:10AM -0800, Keith Seitz wrote:

> [insight-related]
> > (Note: The "Continue to here" command" ignores ALL break points).
> 
> As discussed in the online help (select "Help->Help Topics..",
> then Source Window and Source Window Pop-up Menus), this is the
> intended behavior.
> 
> I'll leave to others more familiar with ARM support in gdb to
> address your other concerns. I will add, though, that I have
> never had any luck using ARM's rdi implementation (which they
> gave to gdb, no longer maintain, and are no longer interested
> in seeing kept up to date) at anything but 9600 baud.

I use RDI at 19200 (EmbeddedICE) and 38400 (Jeeni) with no
problems under Linux.  The serial/parallel combination also
works well under Linux, though Ethernet (Jeeni) is really the
way to go.

> What host/target are you using? I assume it's probably
> windows-hosted using rdi?

I've heard that serial RDI support under Widows/Cygwin has been
flakey in the past (and not worked at all under some versions
of Cygwin).

-- 
Grant Edwards
grante@visi.com

Re: Unable to step through ARM code using insgiht-5.0

[Fernando Nasser]

Keith Seitz wrote:
> 
> I'll leave to others more familiar with ARM support in gdb to address
> your other concerns. I will add, though, that I have never had any luck
> using ARM's rdi implementation (which they gave to gdb, no longer
> maintain, and are no longer interested in seeing kept up to date) at
> anything but 9600 baud.
> 

Yes, it works at 115200.  I have done it and other have as well.

The ARM AEB board (the $150 board they used to sell) has a bug in it and it would not follow the protocol so switching to a higher speed fails (thus it only works at 9600).
We tried to ask ARM about this and the answer was that we should buy the new $250 development board.


> What host/target are you using? I assume it's probably windows-hosted
> using rdi?
> 

With the current versions of Cygwin it should work fine.


But if you are using a b.20 or some other old version of Cygwin you may encounter problems with serial lines.  It gets worse the higher the speed you use.
In this case, just grab the latest Cygwin and everything will be fine.



-- 
Fernando Nasser
Red Hat - Toronto                       E-Mail:  fnasser@redhat.com
2323 Yonge Street, Suite #300
Toronto, Ontario   M4P 2C9

Re: Unable to step through ARM code using insgiht-5.0

[Keith Seitz]

On Thu, 15 Feb 2001, Ahmed A. Agbabiaka wrote:

[insight-related]
> (Note: The "Continue to here" command" ignores ALL break points).

As discussed in the online help (select "Help->Help Topics..", then 
Source Window and Source Window Pop-up Menus), this is the intended 
behavior.

I'll leave to others more familiar with ARM support in gdb to address 
your other concerns. I will add, though, that I have never had any luck 
using ARM's rdi implementation (which they gave to gdb, no longer 
maintain, and are no longer interested in seeing kept up to date) at 
anything but 9600 baud.

What host/target are you using? I assume it's probably windows-hosted 
using rdi?

Keith

Re: Unable to step through ARM code using insgiht-5.0

[Ahmed A. Agbabiaka]

Hello,

After my last correspondence, I obtained and built a GDB snapshot
(insight+dejagnu-20010205) for my ARM target - arm-riscix-coff. Although this
version gets me further than V5.0 ever did, I still have a few concerns...

Whenever I attempt to "step" through my code, DGB seems to hang. The only way
for me to run through my code is to use the "Continue to here" command that is
only selectable from a pop-up dialog whenever I "right-click", in the source
window,  on the line I would have had a break point on (Note: The "Continue to
here" command" ignores ALL break points).

GDB only seems to work (as described above) on my build machine. Copying the
installed GBD binaries onto other machines, GDB seems to be even more
unreliable. On some of my other machines I can connect at my desired baud rate
but when I attempt do download my application, GDB hangs. On a particular
machine I can only download at up to 19200. Any baud rate above that and...
...GDB hangs again.

Question, am I missing a very crucial step?

Any information to help me resolve these problems would be most appreciated.

Thanks,
Ahmed A. Agbabiaka


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Re: Unable to step through ARM code using insgiht-5.0

[Fernando Nasser]

John Hughes wrote:
> 
> > Ahmed, I seem to remember that there was something broken in gdb 5.0
> >
> > That GDB is way old.  All people I know that debug using RDI targets
> > have long since got a newer version of GDB.
> 
> Huh?  That's the newest gdb there is!
> 

That is an official release and, yes, it is the latest one. 
It is old nevertheless.

I am suggesting him to get one of the development snapshots from the FSF
repository at sources.redhat.com.  In the case of ARM RDI targets it is
probably way better than 5.0, despite being a development version.


-- 
Fernando Nasser
Red Hat Canada Ltd.                     E-Mail:  fnasser@redhat.com
2323 Yonge Street, Suite #300
Toronto, Ontario   M4P 2C9

RE: Unable to step through ARM code using insgiht-5.0

[John Hughes]

> Ahmed, I seem to remember that there was something broken in gdb 5.0
> 
> That GDB is way old.  All people I know that debug using RDI targets
> have long since got a newer version of GDB.

Huh?  That's the newest gdb there is!

-- 
John Hughes <john@Calva.COM>, 
        CalvaEDI SA.                            Tel: +33-1-4313-3131
        66 rue du Moulin de la Pointe,          Fax: +33-1-4313-3139
        75013 PARIS.

Re: Unable to step through ARM code using insgiht-5.0

[Fernando Nasser]

Ahmed, I seem to remember that there was something broken in gdb 5.0

That GDB is way old.  All people I know that debug using RDI targets
have long since got a newer version of GDB.  If I was you I would do the
same: get the latest snapshot (or some that you see a message reporting
success)
and build it for your target.

Of course, it may not be a GDB problem at all.  Besides GCC, a program
to run 
on an Angel board requires some run time support code, so it end up
being linked
with libraries specially built for your environment, an appropriate
crt0.o, a linker
script etc.

Your newlib may not be functioning properly, your linker script may not
be correct,
there are several things that can go wrong besides GDB.

However, too many of us are using RDI targets successfully, so I believe
you can
achieve the same.

Try the new GDB first (it is faster to download/build than GCC) and let
us know
how it go.

Regards,
Fernando


Ahmed Agbabiaka wrote:
> 
> Hello,
> 
> I have a favour to ask...
> If there is anyone out-there who has a working version of gcc and insight-5.0
> for the ARM target (see my previous mail for specifics) could you possibly build
> the code below and send me a copy of the executable debug file so I can test my
> set-up.
> 
> void main(void)
> {
>         return (0);
> }
> 


-- 
Fernando Nasser
Red Hat Canada Ltd.                     E-Mail:  fnasser@redhat.com
2323 Yonge Street, Suite #300
Toronto, Ontario   M4P 2C9

Re: Unable to step through ARM code using insgiht-5.0

[Ahmed Agbabiaka]

Hello,

I have a favour to ask...
If there is anyone out-there who has a working version of gcc and insight-5.0
for the ARM target (see my previous mail for specifics) could you possibly build
the code below and send me a copy of the executable debug file so I can test my
set-up.

void main(void)
{
	return (0);
}

Many thanks,
Ahmed A. Agbabiaka.

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