[vbox-dev] GDB stub for VirtualBox debugger

[Klaus Espenlaub]

Hi Ivan,

On 04.09.2012 21:04, Ivan Shcherbakov wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> I  have  developed  an  open-source  GDB  stub  to use with VirtualBox
> debugger.  It  connects  to  the VirtualBox debugger over TCP and then
> accepts  incoming  connections  from  GDB.
>
> You can download it from here: http://sysprogs.com/VBoxGDB/
>
> A step-by-step tutorial on debugging Linux kernel with it is here:
>    http://sysprogs.com/VBoxGDB/tutorial/
>
> The  stub currently uses a relatively dirty hack to be able to set the
> target  registers.  In  August  I  have submited a patch that adds the
> missing  implementation  for  register setting to VirtualBox. Is there
> any  chance  that the patch can be included in one of the next release
> candidates  of VirtualBox 4.2.0 so that gdb debugging can work without
> the dirty hack?

It's a great contribution (we started a similar effort quite a while ago 
but didn't get far due to lack of resources), and unfortunately getting 
the 4.2.0 release out kept everyone so busy that you didn't actually get 
feedback in time.

The same applies to the implementation of register setting.

We don't know yet when we can start on integrating this contribution, 
but it's definitely very interesting to have it in the product.

Some issues need to be sorted out, e.g. the licensing conditions are not 
really compatible with what we accept as contributions, see 
https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Contributor_information )

Thanks a lot for helping to improve VirtualBox!

Klaus