B.2 Invoking the No value for GDBN ‘configure’ Script

No value for GDBN comes with a ‘configure’ script that automates the process of preparing No value for GDBN for installation; you can then use make to build the gdb program.

The No value for GDBN distribution includes all the source code you need for No value for GDBN in a single directory, whose name is usually composed by appending the version number to ‘gdb’.

For example, the No value for GDBN version No value for GDBVN distribution is in the ‘gdb-No value for GDBVN’ directory. That directory contains:

gdb-No value for GDBVN/configure (and supporting files)

script for configuring No value for GDBN and all its supporting libraries

gdb-No value for GDBVN/gdb

the source specific to No value for GDBN itself

gdb-No value for GDBVN/bfd

source for the Binary File Descriptor library

gdb-No value for GDBVN/include

GNU include files

gdb-No value for GDBVN/libiberty

source for the ‘-liberty’ free software library

gdb-No value for GDBVN/opcodes

source for the library of opcode tables and disassemblers

gdb-No value for GDBVN/readline

source for the GNU command-line interface

gdb-No value for GDBVN/glob

source for the GNU filename pattern-matching subroutine

gdb-No value for GDBVN/mmalloc

source for the GNU memory-mapped malloc package

The simplest way to configure and build No value for GDBN is to run ‘configure’ from the ‘gdb-version-number’ source directory, which in this example is the ‘gdb-No value for GDBVN’ directory.

First switch to the ‘gdb-version-number’ source directory if you are not already in it; then run ‘configure’. Pass the identifier for the platform on which No value for GDBN will run as an argument.

For example:

cd gdb-No value for GDBVN
./configure host
make

where host is an identifier such as ‘sun4’ or ‘decstation’, that identifies the platform where No value for GDBN will run. (You can often leave off host; ‘configure’ tries to guess the correct value by examining your system.)

Running ‘configure host’ and then running make builds the ‘bfd’, ‘readline’, ‘mmalloc’, and ‘libiberty’ libraries, then gdb itself. The configured source files, and the binaries, are left in the corresponding source directories.

‘configure’ is a Bourne-shell (/bin/sh) script; if your system does not recognize this automatically when you run a different shell, you may need to run sh on it explicitly:

sh configure host

If you run ‘configure’ from a directory that contains source directories for multiple libraries or programs, such as the ‘gdb-No value for GDBVN’ source directory for version No value for GDBVN, ‘configure’ creates configuration files for every directory level underneath (unless you tell it not to, with the ‘--norecursion’ option).

You should run the ‘configure’ script from the top directory in the source tree, the ‘gdb-version-number’ directory. If you run ‘configure’ from one of the subdirectories, you will configure only that subdirectory. That is usually not what you want. In particular, if you run the first ‘configure’ from the ‘gdb’ subdirectory of the ‘gdb-version-number’ directory, you will omit the configuration of ‘bfd’, ‘readline’, and other sibling directories of the ‘gdb’ subdirectory. This leads to build errors about missing include files such as ‘bfd/bfd.h’.

You can install No value for GDBP anywhere; it has no hardwired paths. However, you should make sure that the shell on your path (named by the ‘SHELL’ environment variable) is publicly readable. Remember that No value for GDBN uses the shell to start your program—some systems refuse to let No value for GDBN debug child processes whose programs are not readable.