Re: [Nemiver-list] global variables support patch

["A. Gordon" <agordon88 domain hid>]

Hello!


Dodji Seketeli wrote:

> I was wondering if I should not apply the low level parts of your patch
> to svn (parts that add global variables querying to IDebugger) and work
> on porting the UI part over the work I did recently with the new
> IVarWalker interface.
>   
You can merge the low level parts without any worries. As long as nobody
calls "IDebugger::list_global_variables()",
there shouldn't be any problem, as nothing new will be executed.

However...
> The other alternative is that I work on making variables dereferencing
> work first, and then apply your patches.
>   
I Like this alternative better - no use of merging half work now, which
will probably need modifying in the future.
Better complete your changes, and I'll catch up with them, hopefully
with an improved global variables support.
> In both cases, it will take some profiling work to see where we are
> spending time and try to speedup things.
>   
For the global variables, the first (major) improvement is that they
should only be listed once (when the program loads) and not on every
"stop" signal (inside "LocalVarsInspector::on_stopped_signal"). Once
listed, they should be stored in a list, and only re-queried about their
values every "stop" signal.

I'll try to do so soon and send an update.

> Any thoughts ? if anyone has an idea about this topic, please do no
> hesitate to jump in and comment :-)
>   
Let me explain my original need for viewing global variables: I needed a
simple GUI debugging solution for a very basic course in unix
programming for a local college. The programs written on that course are
very simple (mostly a single "c" file, with some global variables) - To
debug these programs, the global-variables patch was sufficient.
But obviously, as you have shown with "fooprog", the current patch isn't
suitable for large real-world applications.

At the moment, I'm thinking about maybe turning the global variables
into an optional thing (Edit->Preferences?) so the user can choose
whether he/she wants to see the global variables.


-Gordon.