Mr. Dunlap, --- "Randy.Dunlap" wrote: > On Sun, 2 Nov 2003 09:00:29 -0800 (PST) Bradley Chapman > wrote: > > | What exactly is the purpose of a frame pointer? As far back as I can remember, > 2.4 > | and 2.6 kernels have supported something called a frame pointer, which slows > down > | the kernel slightly but supposedly outputs 'very useful debugging information.' > | Unfortunately, it doesn't really explain what they are, and for the past few > months, > | I haven't seen any hacker gods asking for CONFIG_FRAME_POINTER=y, except for > Russell > | King, who wants them compiled for ARM processors for some reason (I grepped the > | kernel source looking for answers and found a comment which implied this). > | > | Does anyone know where I can find a good explanation of what they are and what > they > | do? > > Frame pointers enable more deterministic back tracing of the stack, > which can be helpful for tracking down bugs. I build with > CONFIG_FRAME_POINTER enabled all of the time. > > Note, however, that current 2.6.x Makefile does not allow frame pointers > to be used with gcc 2.96 since it has some known problems with code generation > when using frame pointers. > > There is a little discussion of frame pointers in the Intel > IA-32 Intel® Architecture Software Developer;s Manual Volume 1: > Basic Architecture > and > IA-32 Intel® Architecture Software Developer's Manual Volume 2: > Instruction Set Reference, > which are downloadable as .pdf files from developer.intel.com. OK, thanks for explaining it to me. > > -- > ~Randy Brad ===== Brad Chapman Permanent e-mail: kakadu_croc@yahoo.com __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Exclusive Video Premiere - Britney Spears http://launch.yahoo.com/promos/britneyspears/