Re: GDB's command qualifier character is `/'

[Daniel Jacobowitz <drow at mvista dot com>]

On Sun, Oct 19, 2003 at 12:50:26PM -0400, Andrew Cagney wrote:
> This seems to keep comming up, sigh!
> 
> GDB's CLI, long ago established `/' as its command qualifier character vis:
> 
> 	x/i
> 	display/i
> 	print/x
> 
> GDB's user base is very familar with this syntax(1) so adding new 
> qualfiers using this syntax would provide a consistent user experience 
> (if there is x/i, how come there isn't "info break/l"?).
> 
> In fact, in the case of all these specific commands (including "info 
> break/l") trying to switch to UNIX's option syntax vis:
> 
> 	x --i
> 
> would be a disaster!

I stand by my previous disagreement with this position.

All of the currently accepted / options that I can find are output
format qualifiers.  I find nothing strange or inconsistent about using
a different syntax for options and for output qualifiers.  GDB doesn't
have any examples of
  break /shlib libc.so.6 round
or
  break /shlib:libc.so.6 round

only
  print/x round

I don't think x/i is prior art for break /shlib.

> What's unfortunate in all this is that the current CLI code doesn't 
> directly parse the qualifier convention.  For instance:
> 
> 	(gdb) x<TAB>
> 	x/i x/b x/8 x/4
> and
> 	(gdb) load/vma /lma
> (load, using vma addresses, the file "/lma").

Yes, this is unfortunate - at least in the minor bit that it generates
some strange error messages.  Almost nothing is centrally parsed in the
CLI and that's a shame.

> (1) Personally, I'm always using the `/' qualifier, but I can't remember 
> when, if ever, I used one of the UNIX style command options.

That's because there are very few commands in all of GDB's CLI which
_take_ options.  /, -, or otherwise.

-- 
Daniel Jacobowitz
MontaVista Software                         Debian GNU/Linux Developer