[ARROW-12735] [C++][Dev] Write gdb plugin

• Type: Wish
• Status: Resolved
• Priority: Major
• Resolution: Fixed
• Fix Version/s: 7.0.0
• Component/s: C++, Developer Tools
• Labels: pull-request-available
• External issue URL: https://github.com/apache/arrow/issues/28477
• Assignee: Antoine Pitrou
• Reporter: Antoine Pitrou
• Created: 11/May/21 12:26
• Updated: 11/Jan/23 08:28
• Resolved: 20/Jan/22 17:49

Description

One common issue when using gdb with Arrow is that it's non-trivial to explore and display Arrow data and metadata using built-in gdb functionality. One usually needs lots of hand typing of expressions.

One way to alleviate this would be to write a gdb plugin giving a higher-level view of Arrow C++ objects. This should be possible using the gdb Python API (though not trivial):
https://sourceware.org/gdb/current/onlinedocs/gdb/Python.html#Python

A simple example:
https://github.com/nlohmann/json/tree/develop/third_party/gdb_pretty_printer

A sophisticated example of this is the gdb plugin for Python itself:
https://github.com/python/cpython/blob/main/Tools/gdb/libpython.py

Related:
https://interrupt.memfault.com/blog/gdbundle-plugin-manager
https://github.com/memfault/gdbundle

Issue Links

• is depended upon by: ARROW-15389 [C++][Dev] Improve Array preview in GDB plugin
• is depended upon by: ARROW-15390 [Doc][C++] Write documentation about the GDB plugin
• is related to: ARROW-11348 [C++] Add pretty printing support for gdb
• supercedes: ARROW-11348 [C++] Add pretty printing support for gdb
• links to: GitHub Pull Request #12092