18.1.5 Features for Debugging MS Windows PE Executables

No value for GDBN supports native debugging of MS Windows programs, including DLLs with and without symbolic debugging information. There are various additional Cygwin-specific commands, described in this section. Working with DLLs that have no debugging symbols is described in Support for DLLs without Debugging Symbols.

info w32

This is a prefix of MS Windows-specific commands which print information about the target system and important OS structures.

info w32 selector

This command displays information returned by the Win32 API GetThreadSelectorEntry function. It takes an optional argument that is evaluated to a long value to give the information about this given selector. Without argument, this command displays information about the six segment registers.

info dll

This is a Cygwin-specific alias of info shared.

dll-symbols

This command loads symbols from a dll similarly to add-sym command but without the need to specify a base address.

set cygwin-exceptions mode

If mode is on, No value for GDBN will break on exceptions that happen inside the Cygwin DLL. If mode is off, No value for GDBN will delay recognition of exceptions, and may ignore some exceptions which seem to be caused by internal Cygwin DLL “bookkeeping”. This option is meant primarily for debugging the Cygwin DLL itself; the default value is off to avoid annoying No value for GDBN users with false SIGSEGV signals.

show cygwin-exceptions

Displays whether No value for GDBN will break on exceptions that happen inside the Cygwin DLL itself.

set new-console mode

If mode is on the debuggee will be started in a new console on next start. If mode is offi, the debuggee will be started in the same console as the debugger.

show new-console

Displays whether a new console is used when the debuggee is started.

set new-group mode

This boolean value controls whether the debuggee should start a new group or stay in the same group as the debugger. This affects the way the Windows OS handles ‘Ctrl-C’.

show new-group

Displays current value of new-group boolean.

set debugevents

This boolean value adds debug output concerning kernel events related to the debuggee seen by the debugger. This includes events that signal thread and process creation and exit, DLL loading and unloading, console interrupts, and debugging messages produced by the Windows OutputDebugString API call.

set debugexec

This boolean value adds debug output concerning execute events (such as resume thread) seen by the debugger.

set debugexceptions

This boolean value adds debug output concerning exceptions in the debuggee seen by the debugger.

set debugmemory

This boolean value adds debug output concerning debuggee memory reads and writes by the debugger.

set shell

This boolean values specifies whether the debuggee is called via a shell or directly (default value is on).

show shell

Displays if the debuggee will be started with a shell.