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6  <title>Source Level Debugging with LLVM</title>
7  <link rel="stylesheet" href="llvm.css" type="text/css">
8</head>
9<body>
10
11<h1>Source Level Debugging with LLVM</h1>
12
13<table class="layout" style="width:100%">
14  <tr class="layout">
15    <td class="left">
16<ul>
17  <li><a href="#introduction">Introduction</a>
18  <ol>
19    <li><a href="#phil">Philosophy behind LLVM debugging information</a></li>
20    <li><a href="#consumers">Debug information consumers</a></li>
21    <li><a href="#debugopt">Debugging optimized code</a></li>
22  </ol></li>
23  <li><a href="#format">Debugging information format</a>
24  <ol>
25    <li><a href="#debug_info_descriptors">Debug information descriptors</a>
26    <ul>
27      <li><a href="#format_compile_units">Compile unit descriptors</a></li>
28      <li><a href="#format_files">File descriptors</a></li>
29      <li><a href="#format_global_variables">Global variable descriptors</a></li>
30      <li><a href="#format_subprograms">Subprogram descriptors</a></li>
31      <li><a href="#format_blocks">Block descriptors</a></li>
32      <li><a href="#format_basic_type">Basic type descriptors</a></li>
33      <li><a href="#format_derived_type">Derived type descriptors</a></li>
34      <li><a href="#format_composite_type">Composite type descriptors</a></li>
35      <li><a href="#format_subrange">Subrange descriptors</a></li>
36      <li><a href="#format_enumeration">Enumerator descriptors</a></li>
37      <li><a href="#format_variables">Local variables</a></li>
38    </ul></li>
39    <li><a href="#format_common_intrinsics">Debugger intrinsic functions</a>
40      <ul>
41      <li><a href="#format_common_declare">llvm.dbg.declare</a></li>
42      <li><a href="#format_common_value">llvm.dbg.value</a></li>
43    </ul></li>
44  </ol></li>
45  <li><a href="#format_common_lifetime">Object lifetimes and scoping</a></li>
46  <li><a href="#ccxx_frontend">C/C++ front-end specific debug information</a>
47  <ol>
48    <li><a href="#ccxx_compile_units">C/C++ source file information</a></li>
49    <li><a href="#ccxx_global_variable">C/C++ global variable information</a></li>
50    <li><a href="#ccxx_subprogram">C/C++ function information</a></li>
51    <li><a href="#ccxx_basic_types">C/C++ basic types</a></li>
52    <li><a href="#ccxx_derived_types">C/C++ derived types</a></li>
53    <li><a href="#ccxx_composite_types">C/C++ struct/union types</a></li>
54    <li><a href="#ccxx_enumeration_types">C/C++ enumeration types</a></li>
55  </ol></li>
56  <li><a href="#llvmdwarfextension">LLVM Dwarf Extensions</a>
57    <ol>
58      <li><a href="#objcproperty">Debugging Information Extension
59	  for Objective C Properties</a>
60        <ul>
61	  <li><a href="#objcpropertyintroduction">Introduction</a></li>
62	  <li><a href="#objcpropertyproposal">Proposal</a></li>
63	  <li><a href="#objcpropertynewattributes">New DWARF Attributes</a></li>
64	  <li><a href="#objcpropertynewconstants">New DWARF Constants</a></li>
65        </ul>
66      </li>
67      <li><a href="#acceltable">Name Accelerator Tables</a>
68        <ul>
69          <li><a href="#acceltableintroduction">Introduction</a></li>
70          <li><a href="#acceltablehashes">Hash Tables</a></li>
71          <li><a href="#acceltabledetails">Details</a></li>
72          <li><a href="#acceltablecontents">Contents</a></li>
73          <li><a href="#acceltableextensions">Language Extensions and File Format Changes</a></li>
74        </ul>
75      </li>
76    </ol>
77  </li>
78</ul>
79</td>
80<td class="right">
81<img src="img/venusflytrap.jpg" alt="A leafy and green bug eater" width="247"
82height="369">
83</td>
84</tr></table>
85
86<div class="doc_author">
87  <p>Written by <a href="mailto:sabre@nondot.org">Chris Lattner</a>
88            and <a href="mailto:jlaskey@mac.com">Jim Laskey</a></p>
89</div>
90
91
92<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
93<h2><a name="introduction">Introduction</a></h2>
94<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
95
96<div>
97
98<p>This document is the central repository for all information pertaining to
99   debug information in LLVM.  It describes the <a href="#format">actual format
100   that the LLVM debug information</a> takes, which is useful for those
101   interested in creating front-ends or dealing directly with the information.
102   Further, this document provides specific examples of what debug information
103   for C/C++ looks like.</p>
104
105<!-- ======================================================================= -->
106<h3>
107  <a name="phil">Philosophy behind LLVM debugging information</a>
108</h3>
109
110<div>
111
112<p>The idea of the LLVM debugging information is to capture how the important
113   pieces of the source-language's Abstract Syntax Tree map onto LLVM code.
114   Several design aspects have shaped the solution that appears here.  The
115   important ones are:</p>
116
117<ul>
118  <li>Debugging information should have very little impact on the rest of the
119      compiler.  No transformations, analyses, or code generators should need to
120      be modified because of debugging information.</li>
121
122  <li>LLVM optimizations should interact in <a href="#debugopt">well-defined and
123      easily described ways</a> with the debugging information.</li>
124
125  <li>Because LLVM is designed to support arbitrary programming languages,
126      LLVM-to-LLVM tools should not need to know anything about the semantics of
127      the source-level-language.</li>
128
129  <li>Source-level languages are often <b>widely</b> different from one another.
130      LLVM should not put any restrictions of the flavor of the source-language,
131      and the debugging information should work with any language.</li>
132
133  <li>With code generator support, it should be possible to use an LLVM compiler
134      to compile a program to native machine code and standard debugging
135      formats.  This allows compatibility with traditional machine-code level
136      debuggers, like GDB or DBX.</li>
137</ul>
138
139<p>The approach used by the LLVM implementation is to use a small set
140   of <a href="#format_common_intrinsics">intrinsic functions</a> to define a
141   mapping between LLVM program objects and the source-level objects.  The
142   description of the source-level program is maintained in LLVM metadata
143   in an <a href="#ccxx_frontend">implementation-defined format</a>
144   (the C/C++ front-end currently uses working draft 7 of
145   the <a href="http://www.eagercon.com/dwarf/dwarf3std.htm">DWARF 3
146   standard</a>).</p>
147
148<p>When a program is being debugged, a debugger interacts with the user and
149   turns the stored debug information into source-language specific information.
150   As such, a debugger must be aware of the source-language, and is thus tied to
151   a specific language or family of languages.</p>
152
153</div>
154
155<!-- ======================================================================= -->
156<h3>
157  <a name="consumers">Debug information consumers</a>
158</h3>
159
160<div>
161
162<p>The role of debug information is to provide meta information normally
163   stripped away during the compilation process.  This meta information provides
164   an LLVM user a relationship between generated code and the original program
165   source code.</p>
166
167<p>Currently, debug information is consumed by DwarfDebug to produce dwarf
168   information used by the gdb debugger.  Other targets could use the same
169   information to produce stabs or other debug forms.</p>
170
171<p>It would also be reasonable to use debug information to feed profiling tools
172   for analysis of generated code, or, tools for reconstructing the original
173   source from generated code.</p>
174
175<p>TODO - expound a bit more.</p>
176
177</div>
178
179<!-- ======================================================================= -->
180<h3>
181  <a name="debugopt">Debugging optimized code</a>
182</h3>
183
184<div>
185
186<p>An extremely high priority of LLVM debugging information is to make it
187   interact well with optimizations and analysis.  In particular, the LLVM debug
188   information provides the following guarantees:</p>
189
190<ul>
191  <li>LLVM debug information <b>always provides information to accurately read
192      the source-level state of the program</b>, regardless of which LLVM
193      optimizations have been run, and without any modification to the
194      optimizations themselves.  However, some optimizations may impact the
195      ability to modify the current state of the program with a debugger, such
196      as setting program variables, or calling functions that have been
197      deleted.</li>
198
199  <li>As desired, LLVM optimizations can be upgraded to be aware of the LLVM
200      debugging information, allowing them to update the debugging information
201      as they perform aggressive optimizations.  This means that, with effort,
202      the LLVM optimizers could optimize debug code just as well as non-debug
203      code.</li>
204
205  <li>LLVM debug information does not prevent optimizations from
206      happening (for example inlining, basic block reordering/merging/cleanup,
207      tail duplication, etc).</li>
208
209  <li>LLVM debug information is automatically optimized along with the rest of
210      the program, using existing facilities.  For example, duplicate
211      information is automatically merged by the linker, and unused information
212      is automatically removed.</li>
213</ul>
214
215<p>Basically, the debug information allows you to compile a program with
216   "<tt>-O0 -g</tt>" and get full debug information, allowing you to arbitrarily
217   modify the program as it executes from a debugger.  Compiling a program with
218   "<tt>-O3 -g</tt>" gives you full debug information that is always available
219   and accurate for reading (e.g., you get accurate stack traces despite tail
220   call elimination and inlining), but you might lose the ability to modify the
221   program and call functions where were optimized out of the program, or
222   inlined away completely.</p>
223
224<p><a href="TestingGuide.html#quicktestsuite">LLVM test suite</a> provides a
225   framework to test optimizer's handling of debugging information. It can be
226   run like this:</p>
227
228<div class="doc_code">
229<pre>
230% cd llvm/projects/test-suite/MultiSource/Benchmarks  # or some other level
231% make TEST=dbgopt
232</pre>
233</div>
234
235<p>This will test impact of debugging information on optimization passes. If
236   debugging information influences optimization passes then it will be reported
237   as a failure. See <a href="TestingGuide.html">TestingGuide</a> for more
238   information on LLVM test infrastructure and how to run various tests.</p>
239
240</div>
241
242</div>
243
244<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
245<h2>
246  <a name="format">Debugging information format</a>
247</h2>
248<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
249
250<div>
251
252<p>LLVM debugging information has been carefully designed to make it possible
253   for the optimizer to optimize the program and debugging information without
254   necessarily having to know anything about debugging information.  In
255   particular, the use of metadata avoids duplicated debugging information from
256   the beginning, and the global dead code elimination pass automatically
257   deletes debugging information for a function if it decides to delete the
258   function. </p>
259
260<p>To do this, most of the debugging information (descriptors for types,
261   variables, functions, source files, etc) is inserted by the language
262   front-end in the form of LLVM metadata. </p>
263
264<p>Debug information is designed to be agnostic about the target debugger and
265   debugging information representation (e.g. DWARF/Stabs/etc).  It uses a
266   generic pass to decode the information that represents variables, types,
267   functions, namespaces, etc: this allows for arbitrary source-language
268   semantics and type-systems to be used, as long as there is a module
269   written for the target debugger to interpret the information. </p>
270
271<p>To provide basic functionality, the LLVM debugger does have to make some
272   assumptions about the source-level language being debugged, though it keeps
273   these to a minimum.  The only common features that the LLVM debugger assumes
274   exist are <a href="#format_files">source files</a>,
275   and <a href="#format_global_variables">program objects</a>.  These abstract
276   objects are used by a debugger to form stack traces, show information about
277   local variables, etc.</p>
278
279<p>This section of the documentation first describes the representation aspects
280   common to any source-language.  The <a href="#ccxx_frontend">next section</a>
281   describes the data layout conventions used by the C and C++ front-ends.</p>
282
283<!-- ======================================================================= -->
284<h3>
285  <a name="debug_info_descriptors">Debug information descriptors</a>
286</h3>
287
288<div>
289
290<p>In consideration of the complexity and volume of debug information, LLVM
291   provides a specification for well formed debug descriptors. </p>
292
293<p>Consumers of LLVM debug information expect the descriptors for program
294   objects to start in a canonical format, but the descriptors can include
295   additional information appended at the end that is source-language
296   specific. All LLVM debugging information is versioned, allowing backwards
297   compatibility in the case that the core structures need to change in some
298   way.  Also, all debugging information objects start with a tag to indicate
299   what type of object it is.  The source-language is allowed to define its own
300   objects, by using unreserved tag numbers.  We recommend using with tags in
301   the range 0x1000 through 0x2000 (there is a defined enum DW_TAG_user_base =
302   0x1000.)</p>
303
304<p>The fields of debug descriptors used internally by LLVM
305   are restricted to only the simple data types <tt>i32</tt>, <tt>i1</tt>,
306   <tt>float</tt>, <tt>double</tt>, <tt>mdstring</tt> and <tt>mdnode</tt>. </p>
307
308<div class="doc_code">
309<pre>
310!1 = metadata !{
311  i32,   ;; A tag
312  ...
313}
314</pre>
315</div>
316
317<p><a name="LLVMDebugVersion">The first field of a descriptor is always an
318   <tt>i32</tt> containing a tag value identifying the content of the
319   descriptor.  The remaining fields are specific to the descriptor.  The values
320   of tags are loosely bound to the tag values of DWARF information entries.
321   However, that does not restrict the use of the information supplied to DWARF
322   targets.  To facilitate versioning of debug information, the tag is augmented
323   with the current debug version (LLVMDebugVersion = 8 &lt;&lt; 16 or
324   0x80000 or 524288.)</a></p>
325
326<p>The details of the various descriptors follow.</p>
327
328<!-- ======================================================================= -->
329<h4>
330  <a name="format_compile_units">Compile unit descriptors</a>
331</h4>
332
333<div>
334
335<div class="doc_code">
336<pre>
337!0 = metadata !{
338  i32,       ;; Tag = 17 + <a href="#LLVMDebugVersion">LLVMDebugVersion</a>
339             ;; (DW_TAG_compile_unit)
340  i32,       ;; Unused field.
341  i32,       ;; DWARF language identifier (ex. DW_LANG_C89)
342  metadata,  ;; Source file name
343  metadata,  ;; Source file directory (includes trailing slash)
344  metadata   ;; Producer (ex. "4.0.1 LLVM (LLVM research group)")
345  i1,        ;; True if this is a main compile unit.
346  i1,        ;; True if this is optimized.
347  metadata,  ;; Flags
348  i32        ;; Runtime version
349  metadata   ;; List of enums types
350  metadata   ;; List of retained types
351  metadata   ;; List of subprograms
352  metadata   ;; List of global variables
353}
354</pre>
355</div>
356
357<p>These descriptors contain a source language ID for the file (we use the DWARF
358   3.0 ID numbers, such as <tt>DW_LANG_C89</tt>, <tt>DW_LANG_C_plus_plus</tt>,
359   <tt>DW_LANG_Cobol74</tt>, etc), three strings describing the filename,
360   working directory of the compiler, and an identifier string for the compiler
361   that produced it.</p>
362
363<p>Compile unit descriptors provide the root context for objects declared in a
364   specific compilation unit. File descriptors are defined using this context.
365   These descriptors are collected by a named metadata
366   <tt>!llvm.dbg.cu</tt>. Compile unit descriptor keeps track of subprograms,
367   global variables and type information.
368
369</div>
370
371<!-- ======================================================================= -->
372<h4>
373  <a name="format_files">File descriptors</a>
374</h4>
375
376<div>
377
378<div class="doc_code">
379<pre>
380!0 = metadata !{
381  i32,       ;; Tag = 41 + <a href="#LLVMDebugVersion">LLVMDebugVersion</a>
382             ;; (DW_TAG_file_type)
383  metadata,  ;; Source file name
384  metadata,  ;; Source file directory (includes trailing slash)
385  metadata   ;; Unused
386}
387</pre>
388</div>
389
390<p>These descriptors contain information for a file. Global variables and top
391   level functions would be defined using this context.k File descriptors also
392   provide context for source line correspondence. </p>
393
394<p>Each input file is encoded as a separate file descriptor in LLVM debugging
395   information output. </p>
396
397</div>
398
399<!-- ======================================================================= -->
400<h4>
401  <a name="format_global_variables">Global variable descriptors</a>
402</h4>
403
404<div>
405
406<div class="doc_code">
407<pre>
408!1 = metadata !{
409  i32,      ;; Tag = 52 + <a href="#LLVMDebugVersion">LLVMDebugVersion</a>
410            ;; (DW_TAG_variable)
411  i32,      ;; Unused field.
412  metadata, ;; Reference to context descriptor
413  metadata, ;; Name
414  metadata, ;; Display name (fully qualified C++ name)
415  metadata, ;; MIPS linkage name (for C++)
416  metadata, ;; Reference to file where defined
417  i32,      ;; Line number where defined
418  metadata, ;; Reference to type descriptor
419  i1,       ;; True if the global is local to compile unit (static)
420  i1,       ;; True if the global is defined in the compile unit (not extern)
421  {}*       ;; Reference to the global variable
422}
423</pre>
424</div>
425
426<p>These descriptors provide debug information about globals variables.  The
427provide details such as name, type and where the variable is defined. All
428global variables are collected inside the named metadata
429<tt>!llvm.dbg.cu</tt>.</p>
430
431</div>
432
433<!-- ======================================================================= -->
434<h4>
435  <a name="format_subprograms">Subprogram descriptors</a>
436</h4>
437
438<div>
439
440<div class="doc_code">
441<pre>
442!2 = metadata !{
443  i32,      ;; Tag = 46 + <a href="#LLVMDebugVersion">LLVMDebugVersion</a>
444            ;; (DW_TAG_subprogram)
445  i32,      ;; Unused field.
446  metadata, ;; Reference to context descriptor
447  metadata, ;; Name
448  metadata, ;; Display name (fully qualified C++ name)
449  metadata, ;; MIPS linkage name (for C++)
450  metadata, ;; Reference to file where defined
451  i32,      ;; Line number where defined
452  metadata, ;; Reference to type descriptor
453  i1,       ;; True if the global is local to compile unit (static)
454  i1,       ;; True if the global is defined in the compile unit (not extern)
455  i32,      ;; Line number where the scope of the subprogram begins
456  i32,      ;; Virtuality, e.g. dwarf::DW_VIRTUALITY__virtual
457  i32,      ;; Index into a virtual function
458  metadata, ;; indicates which base type contains the vtable pointer for the
459            ;; derived class
460  i32,      ;; Flags - Artifical, Private, Protected, Explicit, Prototyped.
461  i1,       ;; isOptimized
462  Function *,;; Pointer to LLVM function
463  metadata, ;; Lists function template parameters
464  metadata  ;; Function declaration descriptor
465  metadata  ;; List of function variables
466}
467</pre>
468</div>
469
470<p>These descriptors provide debug information about functions, methods and
471   subprograms.  They provide details such as name, return types and the source
472   location where the subprogram is defined.
473</p>
474
475</div>
476
477<!-- ======================================================================= -->
478<h4>
479  <a name="format_blocks">Block descriptors</a>
480</h4>
481
482<div>
483
484<div class="doc_code">
485<pre>
486!3 = metadata !{
487  i32,     ;; Tag = 11 + <a href="#LLVMDebugVersion">LLVMDebugVersion</a> (DW_TAG_lexical_block)
488  metadata,;; Reference to context descriptor
489  i32,     ;; Line number
490  i32,     ;; Column number
491  metadata,;; Reference to source file
492  i32      ;; Unique ID to identify blocks from a template function
493}
494</pre>
495</div>
496
497<p>This descriptor provides debug information about nested blocks within a
498   subprogram. The line number and column numbers are used to dinstinguish
499   two lexical blocks at same depth. </p>
500
501<div class="doc_code">
502<pre>
503!3 = metadata !{
504  i32,     ;; Tag = 11 + <a href="#LLVMDebugVersion">LLVMDebugVersion</a> (DW_TAG_lexical_block)
505  metadata ;; Reference to the scope we're annotating with a file change
506  metadata,;; Reference to the file the scope is enclosed in.
507}
508</pre>
509</div>
510
511<p>This descriptor provides a wrapper around a lexical scope to handle file
512   changes in the middle of a lexical block.</p>
513
514</div>
515
516<!-- ======================================================================= -->
517<h4>
518  <a name="format_basic_type">Basic type descriptors</a>
519</h4>
520
521<div>
522
523<div class="doc_code">
524<pre>
525!4 = metadata !{
526  i32,      ;; Tag = 36 + <a href="#LLVMDebugVersion">LLVMDebugVersion</a>
527            ;; (DW_TAG_base_type)
528  metadata, ;; Reference to context
529  metadata, ;; Name (may be "" for anonymous types)
530  metadata, ;; Reference to file where defined (may be NULL)
531  i32,      ;; Line number where defined (may be 0)
532  i64,      ;; Size in bits
533  i64,      ;; Alignment in bits
534  i64,      ;; Offset in bits
535  i32,      ;; Flags
536  i32       ;; DWARF type encoding
537}
538</pre>
539</div>
540
541<p>These descriptors define primitive types used in the code. Example int, bool
542   and float.  The context provides the scope of the type, which is usually the
543   top level.  Since basic types are not usually user defined the context
544   and line number can be left as NULL and 0.  The size, alignment and offset
545   are expressed in bits and can be 64 bit values.  The alignment is used to
546   round the offset when embedded in a
547   <a href="#format_composite_type">composite type</a> (example to keep float
548   doubles on 64 bit boundaries.) The offset is the bit offset if embedded in
549   a <a href="#format_composite_type">composite type</a>.</p>
550
551<p>The type encoding provides the details of the type.  The values are typically
552   one of the following:</p>
553
554<div class="doc_code">
555<pre>
556DW_ATE_address       = 1
557DW_ATE_boolean       = 2
558DW_ATE_float         = 4
559DW_ATE_signed        = 5
560DW_ATE_signed_char   = 6
561DW_ATE_unsigned      = 7
562DW_ATE_unsigned_char = 8
563</pre>
564</div>
565
566</div>
567
568<!-- ======================================================================= -->
569<h4>
570  <a name="format_derived_type">Derived type descriptors</a>
571</h4>
572
573<div>
574
575<div class="doc_code">
576<pre>
577!5 = metadata !{
578  i32,      ;; Tag (see below)
579  metadata, ;; Reference to context
580  metadata, ;; Name (may be "" for anonymous types)
581  metadata, ;; Reference to file where defined (may be NULL)
582  i32,      ;; Line number where defined (may be 0)
583  i64,      ;; Size in bits
584  i64,      ;; Alignment in bits
585  i64,      ;; Offset in bits
586  i32,      ;; Flags to encode attributes, e.g. private
587  metadata, ;; Reference to type derived from
588  metadata, ;; (optional) Name of the Objective C property associated with
589            ;; Objective-C an ivar
590  metadata, ;; (optional) Name of the Objective C property getter selector.
591  metadata, ;; (optional) Name of the Objective C property setter selector.
592  i32       ;; (optional) Objective C property attributes.
593}
594</pre>
595</div>
596
597<p>These descriptors are used to define types derived from other types.  The
598value of the tag varies depending on the meaning.  The following are possible
599tag values:</p>
600
601<div class="doc_code">
602<pre>
603DW_TAG_formal_parameter = 5
604DW_TAG_member           = 13
605DW_TAG_pointer_type     = 15
606DW_TAG_reference_type   = 16
607DW_TAG_typedef          = 22
608DW_TAG_const_type       = 38
609DW_TAG_volatile_type    = 53
610DW_TAG_restrict_type    = 55
611</pre>
612</div>
613
614<p><tt>DW_TAG_member</tt> is used to define a member of
615   a <a href="#format_composite_type">composite type</a>
616   or <a href="#format_subprograms">subprogram</a>.  The type of the member is
617   the <a href="#format_derived_type">derived
618   type</a>. <tt>DW_TAG_formal_parameter</tt> is used to define a member which
619   is a formal argument of a subprogram.</p>
620
621<p><tt>DW_TAG_typedef</tt> is used to provide a name for the derived type.</p>
622
623<p><tt>DW_TAG_pointer_type</tt>, <tt>DW_TAG_reference_type</tt>,
624   <tt>DW_TAG_const_type</tt>, <tt>DW_TAG_volatile_type</tt> and
625   <tt>DW_TAG_restrict_type</tt> are used to qualify
626   the <a href="#format_derived_type">derived type</a>. </p>
627
628<p><a href="#format_derived_type">Derived type</a> location can be determined
629   from the context and line number.  The size, alignment and offset are
630   expressed in bits and can be 64 bit values.  The alignment is used to round
631   the offset when embedded in a <a href="#format_composite_type">composite
632   type</a> (example to keep float doubles on 64 bit boundaries.) The offset is
633   the bit offset if embedded in a <a href="#format_composite_type">composite
634   type</a>.</p>
635
636<p>Note that the <tt>void *</tt> type is expressed as a type derived from NULL.
637</p>
638
639</div>
640
641<!-- ======================================================================= -->
642<h4>
643  <a name="format_composite_type">Composite type descriptors</a>
644</h4>
645
646<div>
647
648<div class="doc_code">
649<pre>
650!6 = metadata !{
651  i32,      ;; Tag (see below)
652  metadata, ;; Reference to context
653  metadata, ;; Name (may be "" for anonymous types)
654  metadata, ;; Reference to file where defined (may be NULL)
655  i32,      ;; Line number where defined (may be 0)
656  i64,      ;; Size in bits
657  i64,      ;; Alignment in bits
658  i64,      ;; Offset in bits
659  i32,      ;; Flags
660  metadata, ;; Reference to type derived from
661  metadata, ;; Reference to array of member descriptors
662  i32       ;; Runtime languages
663}
664</pre>
665</div>
666
667<p>These descriptors are used to define types that are composed of 0 or more
668elements.  The value of the tag varies depending on the meaning.  The following
669are possible tag values:</p>
670
671<div class="doc_code">
672<pre>
673DW_TAG_array_type       = 1
674DW_TAG_enumeration_type = 4
675DW_TAG_structure_type   = 19
676DW_TAG_union_type       = 23
677DW_TAG_vector_type      = 259
678DW_TAG_subroutine_type  = 21
679DW_TAG_inheritance      = 28
680</pre>
681</div>
682
683<p>The vector flag indicates that an array type is a native packed vector.</p>
684
685<p>The members of array types (tag = <tt>DW_TAG_array_type</tt>) or vector types
686   (tag = <tt>DW_TAG_vector_type</tt>) are <a href="#format_subrange">subrange
687   descriptors</a>, each representing the range of subscripts at that level of
688   indexing.</p>
689
690<p>The members of enumeration types (tag = <tt>DW_TAG_enumeration_type</tt>) are
691   <a href="#format_enumeration">enumerator descriptors</a>, each representing
692   the definition of enumeration value for the set. All enumeration type
693   descriptors are collected inside the named metadata
694   <tt>!llvm.dbg.cu</tt>.</p>
695
696<p>The members of structure (tag = <tt>DW_TAG_structure_type</tt>) or union (tag
697   = <tt>DW_TAG_union_type</tt>) types are any one of
698   the <a href="#format_basic_type">basic</a>,
699   <a href="#format_derived_type">derived</a>
700   or <a href="#format_composite_type">composite</a> type descriptors, each
701   representing a field member of the structure or union.</p>
702
703<p>For C++ classes (tag = <tt>DW_TAG_structure_type</tt>), member descriptors
704   provide information about base classes, static members and member
705   functions. If a member is a <a href="#format_derived_type">derived type
706   descriptor</a> and has a tag of <tt>DW_TAG_inheritance</tt>, then the type
707   represents a base class. If the member of is
708   a <a href="#format_global_variables">global variable descriptor</a> then it
709   represents a static member.  And, if the member is
710   a <a href="#format_subprograms">subprogram descriptor</a> then it represents
711   a member function.  For static members and member
712   functions, <tt>getName()</tt> returns the members link or the C++ mangled
713   name.  <tt>getDisplayName()</tt> the simplied version of the name.</p>
714
715<p>The first member of subroutine (tag = <tt>DW_TAG_subroutine_type</tt>) type
716   elements is the return type for the subroutine.  The remaining elements are
717   the formal arguments to the subroutine.</p>
718
719<p><a href="#format_composite_type">Composite type</a> location can be
720   determined from the context and line number.  The size, alignment and
721   offset are expressed in bits and can be 64 bit values.  The alignment is used
722   to round the offset when embedded in
723   a <a href="#format_composite_type">composite type</a> (as an example, to keep
724   float doubles on 64 bit boundaries.) The offset is the bit offset if embedded
725   in a <a href="#format_composite_type">composite type</a>.</p>
726
727</div>
728
729<!-- ======================================================================= -->
730<h4>
731  <a name="format_subrange">Subrange descriptors</a>
732</h4>
733
734<div>
735
736<div class="doc_code">
737<pre>
738!42 = metadata !{
739  i32,    ;; Tag = 33 + <a href="#LLVMDebugVersion">LLVMDebugVersion</a> (DW_TAG_subrange_type)
740  i64,    ;; Low value
741  i64     ;; High value
742}
743</pre>
744</div>
745
746<p>These descriptors are used to define ranges of array subscripts for an array
747   <a href="#format_composite_type">composite type</a>.  The low value defines
748   the lower bounds typically zero for C/C++.  The high value is the upper
749   bounds.  Values are 64 bit.  High - low + 1 is the size of the array.  If low
750   > high the array bounds are not included in generated debugging information.
751</p>
752
753</div>
754
755<!-- ======================================================================= -->
756<h4>
757  <a name="format_enumeration">Enumerator descriptors</a>
758</h4>
759
760<div>
761
762<div class="doc_code">
763<pre>
764!6 = metadata !{
765  i32,      ;; Tag = 40 + <a href="#LLVMDebugVersion">LLVMDebugVersion</a>
766            ;; (DW_TAG_enumerator)
767  metadata, ;; Name
768  i64       ;; Value
769}
770</pre>
771</div>
772
773<p>These descriptors are used to define members of an
774   enumeration <a href="#format_composite_type">composite type</a>, it
775   associates the name to the value.</p>
776
777</div>
778
779<!-- ======================================================================= -->
780<h4>
781  <a name="format_variables">Local variables</a>
782</h4>
783
784<div>
785
786<div class="doc_code">
787<pre>
788!7 = metadata !{
789  i32,      ;; Tag (see below)
790  metadata, ;; Context
791  metadata, ;; Name
792  metadata, ;; Reference to file where defined
793  i32,      ;; 24 bit - Line number where defined
794            ;; 8 bit - Argument number. 1 indicates 1st argument.
795  metadata, ;; Type descriptor
796  i32,      ;; flags
797  metadata  ;; (optional) Reference to inline location
798}
799</pre>
800</div>
801
802<p>These descriptors are used to define variables local to a sub program.  The
803   value of the tag depends on the usage of the variable:</p>
804
805<div class="doc_code">
806<pre>
807DW_TAG_auto_variable   = 256
808DW_TAG_arg_variable    = 257
809DW_TAG_return_variable = 258
810</pre>
811</div>
812
813<p>An auto variable is any variable declared in the body of the function.  An
814   argument variable is any variable that appears as a formal argument to the
815   function.  A return variable is used to track the result of a function and
816   has no source correspondent.</p>
817
818<p>The context is either the subprogram or block where the variable is defined.
819   Name the source variable name.  Context and line indicate where the
820   variable was defined. Type descriptor defines the declared type of the
821   variable.</p>
822
823</div>
824
825</div>
826
827<!-- ======================================================================= -->
828<h3>
829  <a name="format_common_intrinsics">Debugger intrinsic functions</a>
830</h3>
831
832<div>
833
834<p>LLVM uses several intrinsic functions (name prefixed with "llvm.dbg") to
835   provide debug information at various points in generated code.</p>
836
837<!-- ======================================================================= -->
838<h4>
839  <a name="format_common_declare">llvm.dbg.declare</a>
840</h4>
841
842<div>
843<pre>
844  void %<a href="#format_common_declare">llvm.dbg.declare</a>(metadata, metadata)
845</pre>
846
847<p>This intrinsic provides information about a local element (e.g., variable). The
848   first argument is metadata holding the alloca for the variable. The
849   second argument is metadata containing a description of the variable.</p>
850</div>
851
852<!-- ======================================================================= -->
853<h4>
854  <a name="format_common_value">llvm.dbg.value</a>
855</h4>
856
857<div>
858<pre>
859  void %<a href="#format_common_value">llvm.dbg.value</a>(metadata, i64, metadata)
860</pre>
861
862<p>This intrinsic provides information when a user source variable is set to a
863   new value.  The first argument is the new value (wrapped as metadata).  The
864   second argument is the offset in the user source variable where the new value
865   is written.  The third argument is metadata containing a description of the
866   user source variable.</p>
867</div>
868
869</div>
870
871<!-- ======================================================================= -->
872<h3>
873  <a name="format_common_lifetime">Object lifetimes and scoping</a>
874</h3>
875
876<div>
877<p>In many languages, the local variables in functions can have their lifetimes
878   or scopes limited to a subset of a function.  In the C family of languages,
879   for example, variables are only live (readable and writable) within the
880   source block that they are defined in.  In functional languages, values are
881   only readable after they have been defined.  Though this is a very obvious
882   concept, it is non-trivial to model in LLVM, because it has no notion of
883   scoping in this sense, and does not want to be tied to a language's scoping
884   rules.</p>
885
886<p>In order to handle this, the LLVM debug format uses the metadata attached to
887   llvm instructions to encode line number and scoping information. Consider
888   the following C fragment, for example:</p>
889
890<div class="doc_code">
891<pre>
8921.  void foo() {
8932.    int X = 21;
8943.    int Y = 22;
8954.    {
8965.      int Z = 23;
8976.      Z = X;
8987.    }
8998.    X = Y;
9009.  }
901</pre>
902</div>
903
904<p>Compiled to LLVM, this function would be represented like this:</p>
905
906<div class="doc_code">
907<pre>
908define void @foo() nounwind ssp {
909entry:
910  %X = alloca i32, align 4                        ; &lt;i32*&gt; [#uses=4]
911  %Y = alloca i32, align 4                        ; &lt;i32*&gt; [#uses=4]
912  %Z = alloca i32, align 4                        ; &lt;i32*&gt; [#uses=3]
913  %0 = bitcast i32* %X to {}*                     ; &lt;{}*&gt; [#uses=1]
914  call void @llvm.dbg.declare(metadata !{i32 * %X}, metadata !0), !dbg !7
915  store i32 21, i32* %X, !dbg !8
916  %1 = bitcast i32* %Y to {}*                     ; &lt;{}*&gt; [#uses=1]
917  call void @llvm.dbg.declare(metadata !{i32 * %Y}, metadata !9), !dbg !10
918  store i32 22, i32* %Y, !dbg !11
919  %2 = bitcast i32* %Z to {}*                     ; &lt;{}*&gt; [#uses=1]
920  call void @llvm.dbg.declare(metadata !{i32 * %Z}, metadata !12), !dbg !14
921  store i32 23, i32* %Z, !dbg !15
922  %tmp = load i32* %X, !dbg !16                   ; &lt;i32&gt; [#uses=1]
923  %tmp1 = load i32* %Y, !dbg !16                  ; &lt;i32&gt; [#uses=1]
924  %add = add nsw i32 %tmp, %tmp1, !dbg !16        ; &lt;i32&gt; [#uses=1]
925  store i32 %add, i32* %Z, !dbg !16
926  %tmp2 = load i32* %Y, !dbg !17                  ; &lt;i32&gt; [#uses=1]
927  store i32 %tmp2, i32* %X, !dbg !17
928  ret void, !dbg !18
929}
930
931declare void @llvm.dbg.declare(metadata, metadata) nounwind readnone
932
933!0 = metadata !{i32 459008, metadata !1, metadata !"X",
934                metadata !3, i32 2, metadata !6}; [ DW_TAG_auto_variable ]
935!1 = metadata !{i32 458763, metadata !2}; [DW_TAG_lexical_block ]
936!2 = metadata !{i32 458798, i32 0, metadata !3, metadata !"foo", metadata !"foo",
937               metadata !"foo", metadata !3, i32 1, metadata !4,
938               i1 false, i1 true}; [DW_TAG_subprogram ]
939!3 = metadata !{i32 458769, i32 0, i32 12, metadata !"foo.c",
940                metadata !"/private/tmp", metadata !"clang 1.1", i1 true,
941                i1 false, metadata !"", i32 0}; [DW_TAG_compile_unit ]
942!4 = metadata !{i32 458773, metadata !3, metadata !"", null, i32 0, i64 0, i64 0,
943                i64 0, i32 0, null, metadata !5, i32 0}; [DW_TAG_subroutine_type ]
944!5 = metadata !{null}
945!6 = metadata !{i32 458788, metadata !3, metadata !"int", metadata !3, i32 0,
946                i64 32, i64 32, i64 0, i32 0, i32 5}; [DW_TAG_base_type ]
947!7 = metadata !{i32 2, i32 7, metadata !1, null}
948!8 = metadata !{i32 2, i32 3, metadata !1, null}
949!9 = metadata !{i32 459008, metadata !1, metadata !"Y", metadata !3, i32 3,
950                metadata !6}; [ DW_TAG_auto_variable ]
951!10 = metadata !{i32 3, i32 7, metadata !1, null}
952!11 = metadata !{i32 3, i32 3, metadata !1, null}
953!12 = metadata !{i32 459008, metadata !13, metadata !"Z", metadata !3, i32 5,
954                 metadata !6}; [ DW_TAG_auto_variable ]
955!13 = metadata !{i32 458763, metadata !1}; [DW_TAG_lexical_block ]
956!14 = metadata !{i32 5, i32 9, metadata !13, null}
957!15 = metadata !{i32 5, i32 5, metadata !13, null}
958!16 = metadata !{i32 6, i32 5, metadata !13, null}
959!17 = metadata !{i32 8, i32 3, metadata !1, null}
960!18 = metadata !{i32 9, i32 1, metadata !2, null}
961</pre>
962</div>
963
964<p>This example illustrates a few important details about LLVM debugging
965   information. In particular, it shows how the <tt>llvm.dbg.declare</tt>
966   intrinsic and location information, which are attached to an instruction,
967   are applied together to allow a debugger to analyze the relationship between
968   statements, variable definitions, and the code used to implement the
969   function.</p>
970
971<div class="doc_code">
972<pre>
973call void @llvm.dbg.declare(metadata, metadata !0), !dbg !7
974</pre>
975</div>
976
977<p>The first intrinsic
978   <tt>%<a href="#format_common_declare">llvm.dbg.declare</a></tt>
979   encodes debugging information for the variable <tt>X</tt>. The metadata
980   <tt>!dbg !7</tt> attached to the intrinsic provides scope information for the
981   variable <tt>X</tt>.</p>
982
983<div class="doc_code">
984<pre>
985!7 = metadata !{i32 2, i32 7, metadata !1, null}
986!1 = metadata !{i32 458763, metadata !2}; [DW_TAG_lexical_block ]
987!2 = metadata !{i32 458798, i32 0, metadata !3, metadata !"foo",
988                metadata !"foo", metadata !"foo", metadata !3, i32 1,
989                metadata !4, i1 false, i1 true}; [DW_TAG_subprogram ]
990</pre>
991</div>
992
993<p>Here <tt>!7</tt> is metadata providing location information. It has four
994   fields: line number, column number, scope, and original scope. The original
995   scope represents inline location if this instruction is inlined inside a
996   caller, and is null otherwise. In this example, scope is encoded by
997   <tt>!1</tt>. <tt>!1</tt> represents a lexical block inside the scope
998   <tt>!2</tt>, where <tt>!2</tt> is a
999   <a href="#format_subprograms">subprogram descriptor</a>. This way the
1000   location information attached to the intrinsics indicates that the
1001   variable <tt>X</tt> is declared at line number 2 at a function level scope in
1002   function <tt>foo</tt>.</p>
1003
1004<p>Now lets take another example.</p>
1005
1006<div class="doc_code">
1007<pre>
1008call void @llvm.dbg.declare(metadata, metadata !12), !dbg !14
1009</pre>
1010</div>
1011
1012<p>The second intrinsic
1013   <tt>%<a href="#format_common_declare">llvm.dbg.declare</a></tt>
1014   encodes debugging information for variable <tt>Z</tt>. The metadata
1015   <tt>!dbg !14</tt> attached to the intrinsic provides scope information for
1016   the variable <tt>Z</tt>.</p>
1017
1018<div class="doc_code">
1019<pre>
1020!13 = metadata !{i32 458763, metadata !1}; [DW_TAG_lexical_block ]
1021!14 = metadata !{i32 5, i32 9, metadata !13, null}
1022</pre>
1023</div>
1024
1025<p>Here <tt>!14</tt> indicates that <tt>Z</tt> is declared at line number 5 and
1026   column number 9 inside of lexical scope <tt>!13</tt>. The lexical scope
1027   itself resides inside of lexical scope <tt>!1</tt> described above.</p>
1028
1029<p>The scope information attached with each instruction provides a
1030   straightforward way to find instructions covered by a scope.</p>
1031
1032</div>
1033
1034</div>
1035
1036<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
1037<h2>
1038  <a name="ccxx_frontend">C/C++ front-end specific debug information</a>
1039</h2>
1040<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
1041
1042<div>
1043
1044<p>The C and C++ front-ends represent information about the program in a format
1045   that is effectively identical
1046   to <a href="http://www.eagercon.com/dwarf/dwarf3std.htm">DWARF 3.0</a> in
1047   terms of information content.  This allows code generators to trivially
1048   support native debuggers by generating standard dwarf information, and
1049   contains enough information for non-dwarf targets to translate it as
1050   needed.</p>
1051
1052<p>This section describes the forms used to represent C and C++ programs. Other
1053   languages could pattern themselves after this (which itself is tuned to
1054   representing programs in the same way that DWARF 3 does), or they could
1055   choose to provide completely different forms if they don't fit into the DWARF
1056   model.  As support for debugging information gets added to the various LLVM
1057   source-language front-ends, the information used should be documented
1058   here.</p>
1059
1060<p>The following sections provide examples of various C/C++ constructs and the
1061   debug information that would best describe those constructs.</p>
1062
1063<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1064<h3>
1065  <a name="ccxx_compile_units">C/C++ source file information</a>
1066</h3>
1067
1068<div>
1069
1070<p>Given the source files <tt>MySource.cpp</tt> and <tt>MyHeader.h</tt> located
1071   in the directory <tt>/Users/mine/sources</tt>, the following code:</p>
1072
1073<div class="doc_code">
1074<pre>
1075#include "MyHeader.h"
1076
1077int main(int argc, char *argv[]) {
1078  return 0;
1079}
1080</pre>
1081</div>
1082
1083<p>a C/C++ front-end would generate the following descriptors:</p>
1084
1085<div class="doc_code">
1086<pre>
1087...
1088;;
1089;; Define the compile unit for the main source file "/Users/mine/sources/MySource.cpp".
1090;;
1091!2 = metadata !{
1092  i32 524305,    ;; Tag
1093  i32 0,         ;; Unused
1094  i32 4,         ;; Language Id
1095  metadata !"MySource.cpp",
1096  metadata !"/Users/mine/sources",
1097  metadata !"4.2.1 (Based on Apple Inc. build 5649) (LLVM build 00)",
1098  i1 true,       ;; Main Compile Unit
1099  i1 false,      ;; Optimized compile unit
1100  metadata !"",  ;; Compiler flags
1101  i32 0}         ;; Runtime version
1102
1103;;
1104;; Define the file for the file "/Users/mine/sources/MySource.cpp".
1105;;
1106!1 = metadata !{
1107  i32 524329,    ;; Tag
1108  metadata !"MySource.cpp",
1109  metadata !"/Users/mine/sources",
1110  metadata !2    ;; Compile unit
1111}
1112
1113;;
1114;; Define the file for the file "/Users/mine/sources/Myheader.h"
1115;;
1116!3 = metadata !{
1117  i32 524329,    ;; Tag
1118  metadata !"Myheader.h"
1119  metadata !"/Users/mine/sources",
1120  metadata !2    ;; Compile unit
1121}
1122
1123...
1124</pre>
1125</div>
1126
1127<p>llvm::Instruction provides easy access to metadata attached with an
1128instruction. One can extract line number information encoded in LLVM IR
1129using <tt>Instruction::getMetadata()</tt> and
1130<tt>DILocation::getLineNumber()</tt>.
1131<pre>
1132 if (MDNode *N = I->getMetadata("dbg")) {  // Here I is an LLVM instruction
1133   DILocation Loc(N);                      // DILocation is in DebugInfo.h
1134   unsigned Line = Loc.getLineNumber();
1135   StringRef File = Loc.getFilename();
1136   StringRef Dir = Loc.getDirectory();
1137 }
1138</pre>
1139</div>
1140
1141<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1142<h3>
1143  <a name="ccxx_global_variable">C/C++ global variable information</a>
1144</h3>
1145
1146<div>
1147
1148<p>Given an integer global variable declared as follows:</p>
1149
1150<div class="doc_code">
1151<pre>
1152int MyGlobal = 100;
1153</pre>
1154</div>
1155
1156<p>a C/C++ front-end would generate the following descriptors:</p>
1157
1158<div class="doc_code">
1159<pre>
1160;;
1161;; Define the global itself.
1162;;
1163%MyGlobal = global int 100
1164...
1165;;
1166;; List of debug info of globals
1167;;
1168!llvm.dbg.cu = !{!0}
1169
1170;; Define the compile unit.
1171!0 = metadata !{
1172  i32 786449,                       ;; Tag
1173  i32 0,                            ;; Context
1174  i32 4,                            ;; Language
1175  metadata !"foo.cpp",              ;; File
1176  metadata !"/Volumes/Data/tmp",    ;; Directory
1177  metadata !"clang version 3.1 ",   ;; Producer
1178  i1 true,                          ;; Deprecated field
1179  i1 false,                         ;; "isOptimized"?
1180  metadata !"",                     ;; Flags
1181  i32 0,                            ;; Runtime Version
1182  metadata !1,                      ;; Enum Types
1183  metadata !1,                      ;; Retained Types
1184  metadata !1,                      ;; Subprograms
1185  metadata !3                       ;; Global Variables
1186} ; [ DW_TAG_compile_unit ]
1187
1188;; The Array of Global Variables
1189!3 = metadata !{
1190  metadata !4
1191}
1192
1193!4 = metadata !{
1194  metadata !5
1195}
1196
1197;;
1198;; Define the global variable itself.
1199;;
1200!5 = metadata !{
1201  i32 786484,                        ;; Tag
1202  i32 0,                             ;; Unused
1203  null,                              ;; Unused
1204  metadata !"MyGlobal",              ;; Name
1205  metadata !"MyGlobal",              ;; Display Name
1206  metadata !"",                      ;; Linkage Name
1207  metadata !6,                       ;; File
1208  i32 1,                             ;; Line
1209  metadata !7,                       ;; Type
1210  i32 0,                             ;; IsLocalToUnit
1211  i32 1,                             ;; IsDefinition
1212  i32* @MyGlobal                     ;; LLVM-IR Value
1213} ; [ DW_TAG_variable ]
1214
1215;;
1216;; Define the file
1217;;
1218!6 = metadata !{
1219  i32 786473,                        ;; Tag
1220  metadata !"foo.cpp",               ;; File
1221  metadata !"/Volumes/Data/tmp",     ;; Directory
1222  null                               ;; Unused
1223} ; [ DW_TAG_file_type ]
1224
1225;;
1226;; Define the type
1227;;
1228!7 = metadata !{
1229  i32 786468,                         ;; Tag
1230  null,                               ;; Unused
1231  metadata !"int",                    ;; Name
1232  null,                               ;; Unused
1233  i32 0,                              ;; Line
1234  i64 32,                             ;; Size in Bits
1235  i64 32,                             ;; Align in Bits
1236  i64 0,                              ;; Offset
1237  i32 0,                              ;; Flags
1238  i32 5                               ;; Encoding
1239} ; [ DW_TAG_base_type ]
1240
1241</pre>
1242</div>
1243
1244</div>
1245
1246<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1247<h3>
1248  <a name="ccxx_subprogram">C/C++ function information</a>
1249</h3>
1250
1251<div>
1252
1253<p>Given a function declared as follows:</p>
1254
1255<div class="doc_code">
1256<pre>
1257int main(int argc, char *argv[]) {
1258  return 0;
1259}
1260</pre>
1261</div>
1262
1263<p>a C/C++ front-end would generate the following descriptors:</p>
1264
1265<div class="doc_code">
1266<pre>
1267;;
1268;; Define the anchor for subprograms.  Note that the second field of the
1269;; anchor is 46, which is the same as the tag for subprograms
1270;; (46 = DW_TAG_subprogram.)
1271;;
1272!6 = metadata !{
1273  i32 524334,        ;; Tag
1274  i32 0,             ;; Unused
1275  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1276  metadata !"main",  ;; Name
1277  metadata !"main",  ;; Display name
1278  metadata !"main",  ;; Linkage name
1279  metadata !1,       ;; File
1280  i32 1,             ;; Line number
1281  metadata !4,       ;; Type
1282  i1 false,          ;; Is local
1283  i1 true,           ;; Is definition
1284  i32 0,             ;; Virtuality attribute, e.g. pure virtual function
1285  i32 0,             ;; Index into virtual table for C++ methods
1286  i32 0,             ;; Type that holds virtual table.
1287  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1288  i1 false,          ;; True if this function is optimized
1289  Function *,        ;; Pointer to llvm::Function
1290  null               ;; Function template parameters
1291}
1292;;
1293;; Define the subprogram itself.
1294;;
1295define i32 @main(i32 %argc, i8** %argv) {
1296...
1297}
1298</pre>
1299</div>
1300
1301</div>
1302
1303<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1304<h3>
1305  <a name="ccxx_basic_types">C/C++ basic types</a>
1306</h3>
1307
1308<div>
1309
1310<p>The following are the basic type descriptors for C/C++ core types:</p>
1311
1312<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1313<h4>
1314  <a name="ccxx_basic_type_bool">bool</a>
1315</h4>
1316
1317<div>
1318
1319<div class="doc_code">
1320<pre>
1321!2 = metadata !{
1322  i32 524324,        ;; Tag
1323  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1324  metadata !"bool",  ;; Name
1325  metadata !1,       ;; File
1326  i32 0,             ;; Line number
1327  i64 8,             ;; Size in Bits
1328  i64 8,             ;; Align in Bits
1329  i64 0,             ;; Offset in Bits
1330  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1331  i32 2              ;; Encoding
1332}
1333</pre>
1334</div>
1335
1336</div>
1337
1338<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1339<h4>
1340  <a name="ccxx_basic_char">char</a>
1341</h4>
1342
1343<div>
1344
1345<div class="doc_code">
1346<pre>
1347!2 = metadata !{
1348  i32 524324,        ;; Tag
1349  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1350  metadata !"char",  ;; Name
1351  metadata !1,       ;; File
1352  i32 0,             ;; Line number
1353  i64 8,             ;; Size in Bits
1354  i64 8,             ;; Align in Bits
1355  i64 0,             ;; Offset in Bits
1356  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1357  i32 6              ;; Encoding
1358}
1359</pre>
1360</div>
1361
1362</div>
1363
1364<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1365<h4>
1366  <a name="ccxx_basic_unsigned_char">unsigned char</a>
1367</h4>
1368
1369<div>
1370
1371<div class="doc_code">
1372<pre>
1373!2 = metadata !{
1374  i32 524324,        ;; Tag
1375  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1376  metadata !"unsigned char",
1377  metadata !1,       ;; File
1378  i32 0,             ;; Line number
1379  i64 8,             ;; Size in Bits
1380  i64 8,             ;; Align in Bits
1381  i64 0,             ;; Offset in Bits
1382  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1383  i32 8              ;; Encoding
1384}
1385</pre>
1386</div>
1387
1388</div>
1389
1390<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1391<h4>
1392  <a name="ccxx_basic_short">short</a>
1393</h4>
1394
1395<div>
1396
1397<div class="doc_code">
1398<pre>
1399!2 = metadata !{
1400  i32 524324,        ;; Tag
1401  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1402  metadata !"short int",
1403  metadata !1,       ;; File
1404  i32 0,             ;; Line number
1405  i64 16,            ;; Size in Bits
1406  i64 16,            ;; Align in Bits
1407  i64 0,             ;; Offset in Bits
1408  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1409  i32 5              ;; Encoding
1410}
1411</pre>
1412</div>
1413
1414</div>
1415
1416<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1417<h4>
1418  <a name="ccxx_basic_unsigned_short">unsigned short</a>
1419</h4>
1420
1421<div>
1422
1423<div class="doc_code">
1424<pre>
1425!2 = metadata !{
1426  i32 524324,        ;; Tag
1427  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1428  metadata !"short unsigned int",
1429  metadata !1,       ;; File
1430  i32 0,             ;; Line number
1431  i64 16,            ;; Size in Bits
1432  i64 16,            ;; Align in Bits
1433  i64 0,             ;; Offset in Bits
1434  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1435  i32 7              ;; Encoding
1436}
1437</pre>
1438</div>
1439
1440</div>
1441
1442<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1443<h4>
1444  <a name="ccxx_basic_int">int</a>
1445</h4>
1446
1447<div>
1448
1449<div class="doc_code">
1450<pre>
1451!2 = metadata !{
1452  i32 524324,        ;; Tag
1453  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1454  metadata !"int",   ;; Name
1455  metadata !1,       ;; File
1456  i32 0,             ;; Line number
1457  i64 32,            ;; Size in Bits
1458  i64 32,            ;; Align in Bits
1459  i64 0,             ;; Offset in Bits
1460  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1461  i32 5              ;; Encoding
1462}
1463</pre></div>
1464
1465</div>
1466
1467<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1468<h4>
1469  <a name="ccxx_basic_unsigned_int">unsigned int</a>
1470</h4>
1471
1472<div>
1473
1474<div class="doc_code">
1475<pre>
1476!2 = metadata !{
1477  i32 524324,        ;; Tag
1478  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1479  metadata !"unsigned int",
1480  metadata !1,       ;; File
1481  i32 0,             ;; Line number
1482  i64 32,            ;; Size in Bits
1483  i64 32,            ;; Align in Bits
1484  i64 0,             ;; Offset in Bits
1485  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1486  i32 7              ;; Encoding
1487}
1488</pre>
1489</div>
1490
1491</div>
1492
1493<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1494<h4>
1495  <a name="ccxx_basic_long_long">long long</a>
1496</h4>
1497
1498<div>
1499
1500<div class="doc_code">
1501<pre>
1502!2 = metadata !{
1503  i32 524324,        ;; Tag
1504  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1505  metadata !"long long int",
1506  metadata !1,       ;; File
1507  i32 0,             ;; Line number
1508  i64 64,            ;; Size in Bits
1509  i64 64,            ;; Align in Bits
1510  i64 0,             ;; Offset in Bits
1511  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1512  i32 5              ;; Encoding
1513}
1514</pre>
1515</div>
1516
1517</div>
1518
1519<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1520<h4>
1521  <a name="ccxx_basic_unsigned_long_long">unsigned long long</a>
1522</h4>
1523
1524<div>
1525
1526<div class="doc_code">
1527<pre>
1528!2 = metadata !{
1529  i32 524324,        ;; Tag
1530  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1531  metadata !"long long unsigned int",
1532  metadata !1,       ;; File
1533  i32 0,             ;; Line number
1534  i64 64,            ;; Size in Bits
1535  i64 64,            ;; Align in Bits
1536  i64 0,             ;; Offset in Bits
1537  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1538  i32 7              ;; Encoding
1539}
1540</pre>
1541</div>
1542
1543</div>
1544
1545<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1546<h4>
1547  <a name="ccxx_basic_float">float</a>
1548</h4>
1549
1550<div>
1551
1552<div class="doc_code">
1553<pre>
1554!2 = metadata !{
1555  i32 524324,        ;; Tag
1556  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1557  metadata !"float",
1558  metadata !1,       ;; File
1559  i32 0,             ;; Line number
1560  i64 32,            ;; Size in Bits
1561  i64 32,            ;; Align in Bits
1562  i64 0,             ;; Offset in Bits
1563  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1564  i32 4              ;; Encoding
1565}
1566</pre>
1567</div>
1568
1569</div>
1570
1571<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1572<h4>
1573  <a name="ccxx_basic_double">double</a>
1574</h4>
1575
1576<div>
1577
1578<div class="doc_code">
1579<pre>
1580!2 = metadata !{
1581  i32 524324,        ;; Tag
1582  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1583  metadata !"double",;; Name
1584  metadata !1,       ;; File
1585  i32 0,             ;; Line number
1586  i64 64,            ;; Size in Bits
1587  i64 64,            ;; Align in Bits
1588  i64 0,             ;; Offset in Bits
1589  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1590  i32 4              ;; Encoding
1591}
1592</pre>
1593</div>
1594
1595</div>
1596
1597</div>
1598
1599<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1600<h3>
1601  <a name="ccxx_derived_types">C/C++ derived types</a>
1602</h3>
1603
1604<div>
1605
1606<p>Given the following as an example of C/C++ derived type:</p>
1607
1608<div class="doc_code">
1609<pre>
1610typedef const int *IntPtr;
1611</pre>
1612</div>
1613
1614<p>a C/C++ front-end would generate the following descriptors:</p>
1615
1616<div class="doc_code">
1617<pre>
1618;;
1619;; Define the typedef "IntPtr".
1620;;
1621!2 = metadata !{
1622  i32 524310,          ;; Tag
1623  metadata !1,         ;; Context
1624  metadata !"IntPtr",  ;; Name
1625  metadata !3,         ;; File
1626  i32 0,               ;; Line number
1627  i64 0,               ;; Size in bits
1628  i64 0,               ;; Align in bits
1629  i64 0,               ;; Offset in bits
1630  i32 0,               ;; Flags
1631  metadata !4          ;; Derived From type
1632}
1633
1634;;
1635;; Define the pointer type.
1636;;
1637!4 = metadata !{
1638  i32 524303,          ;; Tag
1639  metadata !1,         ;; Context
1640  metadata !"",        ;; Name
1641  metadata !1,         ;; File
1642  i32 0,               ;; Line number
1643  i64 64,              ;; Size in bits
1644  i64 64,              ;; Align in bits
1645  i64 0,               ;; Offset in bits
1646  i32 0,               ;; Flags
1647  metadata !5          ;; Derived From type
1648}
1649;;
1650;; Define the const type.
1651;;
1652!5 = metadata !{
1653  i32 524326,          ;; Tag
1654  metadata !1,         ;; Context
1655  metadata !"",        ;; Name
1656  metadata !1,         ;; File
1657  i32 0,               ;; Line number
1658  i64 32,              ;; Size in bits
1659  i64 32,              ;; Align in bits
1660  i64 0,               ;; Offset in bits
1661  i32 0,               ;; Flags
1662  metadata !6          ;; Derived From type
1663}
1664;;
1665;; Define the int type.
1666;;
1667!6 = metadata !{
1668  i32 524324,          ;; Tag
1669  metadata !1,         ;; Context
1670  metadata !"int",     ;; Name
1671  metadata !1,         ;; File
1672  i32 0,               ;; Line number
1673  i64 32,              ;; Size in bits
1674  i64 32,              ;; Align in bits
1675  i64 0,               ;; Offset in bits
1676  i32 0,               ;; Flags
1677  5                    ;; Encoding
1678}
1679</pre>
1680</div>
1681
1682</div>
1683
1684<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1685<h3>
1686  <a name="ccxx_composite_types">C/C++ struct/union types</a>
1687</h3>
1688
1689<div>
1690
1691<p>Given the following as an example of C/C++ struct type:</p>
1692
1693<div class="doc_code">
1694<pre>
1695struct Color {
1696  unsigned Red;
1697  unsigned Green;
1698  unsigned Blue;
1699};
1700</pre>
1701</div>
1702
1703<p>a C/C++ front-end would generate the following descriptors:</p>
1704
1705<div class="doc_code">
1706<pre>
1707;;
1708;; Define basic type for unsigned int.
1709;;
1710!5 = metadata !{
1711  i32 524324,        ;; Tag
1712  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1713  metadata !"unsigned int",
1714  metadata !1,       ;; File
1715  i32 0,             ;; Line number
1716  i64 32,            ;; Size in Bits
1717  i64 32,            ;; Align in Bits
1718  i64 0,             ;; Offset in Bits
1719  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1720  i32 7              ;; Encoding
1721}
1722;;
1723;; Define composite type for struct Color.
1724;;
1725!2 = metadata !{
1726  i32 524307,        ;; Tag
1727  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1728  metadata !"Color", ;; Name
1729  metadata !1,       ;; Compile unit
1730  i32 1,             ;; Line number
1731  i64 96,            ;; Size in bits
1732  i64 32,            ;; Align in bits
1733  i64 0,             ;; Offset in bits
1734  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1735  null,              ;; Derived From
1736  metadata !3,       ;; Elements
1737  i32 0              ;; Runtime Language
1738}
1739
1740;;
1741;; Define the Red field.
1742;;
1743!4 = metadata !{
1744  i32 524301,        ;; Tag
1745  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1746  metadata !"Red",   ;; Name
1747  metadata !1,       ;; File
1748  i32 2,             ;; Line number
1749  i64 32,            ;; Size in bits
1750  i64 32,            ;; Align in bits
1751  i64 0,             ;; Offset in bits
1752  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1753  metadata !5        ;; Derived From type
1754}
1755
1756;;
1757;; Define the Green field.
1758;;
1759!6 = metadata !{
1760  i32 524301,        ;; Tag
1761  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1762  metadata !"Green", ;; Name
1763  metadata !1,       ;; File
1764  i32 3,             ;; Line number
1765  i64 32,            ;; Size in bits
1766  i64 32,            ;; Align in bits
1767  i64 32,             ;; Offset in bits
1768  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1769  metadata !5        ;; Derived From type
1770}
1771
1772;;
1773;; Define the Blue field.
1774;;
1775!7 = metadata !{
1776  i32 524301,        ;; Tag
1777  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1778  metadata !"Blue",  ;; Name
1779  metadata !1,       ;; File
1780  i32 4,             ;; Line number
1781  i64 32,            ;; Size in bits
1782  i64 32,            ;; Align in bits
1783  i64 64,             ;; Offset in bits
1784  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1785  metadata !5        ;; Derived From type
1786}
1787
1788;;
1789;; Define the array of fields used by the composite type Color.
1790;;
1791!3 = metadata !{metadata !4, metadata !6, metadata !7}
1792</pre>
1793</div>
1794
1795</div>
1796
1797<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1798<h3>
1799  <a name="ccxx_enumeration_types">C/C++ enumeration types</a>
1800</h3>
1801
1802<div>
1803
1804<p>Given the following as an example of C/C++ enumeration type:</p>
1805
1806<div class="doc_code">
1807<pre>
1808enum Trees {
1809  Spruce = 100,
1810  Oak = 200,
1811  Maple = 300
1812};
1813</pre>
1814</div>
1815
1816<p>a C/C++ front-end would generate the following descriptors:</p>
1817
1818<div class="doc_code">
1819<pre>
1820;;
1821;; Define composite type for enum Trees
1822;;
1823!2 = metadata !{
1824  i32 524292,        ;; Tag
1825  metadata !1,       ;; Context
1826  metadata !"Trees", ;; Name
1827  metadata !1,       ;; File
1828  i32 1,             ;; Line number
1829  i64 32,            ;; Size in bits
1830  i64 32,            ;; Align in bits
1831  i64 0,             ;; Offset in bits
1832  i32 0,             ;; Flags
1833  null,              ;; Derived From type
1834  metadata !3,       ;; Elements
1835  i32 0              ;; Runtime language
1836}
1837
1838;;
1839;; Define the array of enumerators used by composite type Trees.
1840;;
1841!3 = metadata !{metadata !4, metadata !5, metadata !6}
1842
1843;;
1844;; Define Spruce enumerator.
1845;;
1846!4 = metadata !{i32 524328, metadata !"Spruce", i64 100}
1847
1848;;
1849;; Define Oak enumerator.
1850;;
1851!5 = metadata !{i32 524328, metadata !"Oak", i64 200}
1852
1853;;
1854;; Define Maple enumerator.
1855;;
1856!6 = metadata !{i32 524328, metadata !"Maple", i64 300}
1857
1858</pre>
1859</div>
1860
1861</div>
1862
1863</div>
1864
1865
1866<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
1867<h2>
1868  <a name="llvmdwarfextension">Debugging information format</a>
1869</h2>
1870<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
1871<div>
1872<!-- ======================================================================= -->
1873<h3>
1874  <a name="objcproperty">Debugging Information Extension for Objective C Properties</a>
1875</h3>
1876<div>
1877<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
1878<h4>
1879  <a name="objcpropertyintroduction">Introduction</a>
1880</h4>
1881<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
1882
1883<div>
1884<p>Objective C provides a simpler way to declare and define accessor methods
1885using declared properties. The language provides features to declare a
1886property and to let compiler synthesize accessor methods.
1887</p>
1888
1889<p>The debugger lets developer inspect Objective C interfaces and their
1890instance variables and class variables. However, the debugger does not know
1891anything about the properties defined in Objective C interfaces. The debugger
1892consumes information generated by compiler in DWARF format. The format does
1893not support encoding of Objective C properties. This proposal describes DWARF
1894extensions to encode Objective C properties, which the debugger can use to let
1895developers inspect Objective C properties.
1896</p>
1897
1898</div>
1899
1900
1901<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
1902<h4>
1903  <a name="objcpropertyproposal">Proposal</a>
1904</h4>
1905<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
1906
1907<div>
1908<p>Objective C properties exist separately from class members. A property
1909can be defined only by &quot;setter&quot; and &quot;getter&quot; selectors, and
1910be calculated anew on each access.  Or a property can just be a direct access
1911to some declared ivar.  Finally it can have an ivar &quot;automatically
1912synthesized&quot; for it by the compiler, in which case the property can be
1913referred to in user code directly using the standard C dereference syntax as
1914well as through the property &quot;dot&quot; syntax, but there is no entry in
1915the @interface declaration corresponding to this ivar.
1916</p>
1917<p>
1918To facilitate debugging, these properties we will add a new DWARF TAG into the
1919DW_TAG_structure_type definition for the class to hold the description of a
1920given property, and a set of DWARF attributes that provide said description.
1921The property tag will also contain the name and declared type of the property.
1922</p>
1923<p>
1924If there is a related ivar, there will also be a DWARF property attribute placed
1925in the DW_TAG_member DIE for that ivar referring back to the property TAG for
1926that property. And in the case where the compiler synthesizes the ivar directly,
1927the compiler is expected to generate a DW_TAG_member for that ivar (with the
1928DW_AT_artificial set to 1), whose name will be the name used to access this
1929ivar directly in code, and with the property attribute pointing back to the
1930property it is backing.
1931</p>
1932<p>
1933The following examples will serve as illustration for our discussion:
1934</p>
1935
1936<div class="doc_code">
1937<pre>
1938@interface I1 {
1939  int n2;
1940}
1941
1942@property int p1;
1943@property int p2;
1944@end
1945
1946@implementation I1
1947@synthesize p1;
1948@synthesize p2 = n2;
1949@end
1950</pre>
1951</div>
1952
1953<p>
1954This produces the following DWARF (this is a &quot;pseudo dwarfdump&quot; output):
1955</p>
1956<div class="doc_code">
1957<pre>
19580x00000100:  TAG_structure_type [7] *
1959               AT_APPLE_runtime_class( 0x10 )
1960               AT_name( "I1" )
1961               AT_decl_file( "Objc_Property.m" )
1962               AT_decl_line( 3 )
1963
19640x00000110    TAG_APPLE_property
1965                AT_name ( "p1" )
1966                AT_type ( {0x00000150} ( int ) )
1967
19680x00000120:   TAG_APPLE_property
1969                AT_name ( "p2" )
1970                AT_type ( {0x00000150} ( int ) )
1971
19720x00000130:   TAG_member [8]
1973                AT_name( "_p1" )
1974                AT_APPLE_property ( {0x00000110} "p1" )
1975                AT_type( {0x00000150} ( int ) )
1976                AT_artificial ( 0x1 )
1977
19780x00000140:    TAG_member [8]
1979                 AT_name( "n2" )
1980                 AT_APPLE_property ( {0x00000120} "p2" )
1981                 AT_type( {0x00000150} ( int ) )
1982
19830x00000150:  AT_type( ( int ) )
1984</pre>
1985</div>
1986
1987<p> Note, the current convention is that the name of the ivar for an
1988auto-synthesized property is the name of the property from which it derives with
1989an underscore prepended, as is shown in the example.
1990But we actually don't need to know this convention, since we are given the name
1991of the ivar directly.
1992</p>
1993
1994<p>
1995Also, it is common practice in ObjC to have different property declarations in
1996the @interface and @implementation - e.g. to provide a read-only property in
1997the interface,and a read-write interface in the implementation.  In that case,
1998the compiler should emit whichever property declaration will be in force in the
1999current translation unit.
2000</p>
2001
2002<p> Developers can decorate a property with attributes which are encoded using
2003DW_AT_APPLE_property_attribute.
2004</p>
2005
2006<div class="doc_code">
2007<pre>
2008@property (readonly, nonatomic) int pr;
2009</pre>
2010</div>
2011<p>
2012Which produces a property tag:
2013<p>
2014<div class="doc_code">
2015<pre>
2016TAG_APPLE_property [8]
2017  AT_name( "pr" )
2018  AT_type ( {0x00000147} (int) )
2019  AT_APPLE_property_attribute (DW_APPLE_PROPERTY_readonly, DW_APPLE_PROPERTY_nonatomic)
2020</pre>
2021</div>
2022
2023<p> The setter and getter method names are attached to the property using
2024DW_AT_APPLE_property_setter and DW_AT_APPLE_property_getter attributes.
2025</p>
2026<div class="doc_code">
2027<pre>
2028@interface I1
2029@property (setter=myOwnP3Setter:) int p3;
2030-(void)myOwnP3Setter:(int)a;
2031@end
2032
2033@implementation I1
2034@synthesize p3;
2035-(void)myOwnP3Setter:(int)a{ }
2036@end
2037</pre>
2038</div>
2039
2040<p>
2041The DWARF for this would be:
2042</p>
2043<div class="doc_code">
2044<pre>
20450x000003bd: TAG_structure_type [7] *
2046              AT_APPLE_runtime_class( 0x10 )
2047              AT_name( "I1" )
2048              AT_decl_file( "Objc_Property.m" )
2049              AT_decl_line( 3 )
2050
20510x000003cd      TAG_APPLE_property
2052                  AT_name ( "p3" )
2053                  AT_APPLE_property_setter ( "myOwnP3Setter:" )
2054                  AT_type( {0x00000147} ( int ) )
2055
20560x000003f3:     TAG_member [8]
2057                  AT_name( "_p3" )
2058                  AT_type ( {0x00000147} ( int ) )
2059                  AT_APPLE_property ( {0x000003cd} )
2060                  AT_artificial ( 0x1 )
2061</pre>
2062</div>
2063
2064</div>
2065
2066<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
2067<h4>
2068  <a name="objcpropertynewtags">New DWARF Tags</a>
2069</h4>
2070<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
2071
2072<div>
2073<table border="1" cellspacing="0">
2074  <col width="200">
2075  <col width="200">
2076  <tr>
2077    <th>TAG</th>
2078    <th>Value</th>
2079  </tr>
2080  <tr>
2081    <td>DW_TAG_APPLE_property</td>
2082    <td>0x4200</td>
2083  </tr>
2084</table>
2085
2086</div>
2087
2088<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
2089<h4>
2090  <a name="objcpropertynewattributes">New DWARF Attributes</a>
2091</h4>
2092<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
2093
2094<div>
2095<table border="1" cellspacing="0">
2096  <col width="200">
2097  <col width="200">
2098  <col width="200">
2099  <tr>
2100    <th>Attribute</th>
2101    <th>Value</th>
2102    <th>Classes</th>
2103  </tr>
2104  <tr>
2105    <td>DW_AT_APPLE_property</td>
2106    <td>0x3fed</td>
2107    <td>Reference</td>
2108  </tr>
2109  <tr>
2110    <td>DW_AT_APPLE_property_getter</td>
2111    <td>0x3fe9</td>
2112    <td>String</td>
2113  </tr>
2114  <tr>
2115    <td>DW_AT_APPLE_property_setter</td>
2116    <td>0x3fea</td>
2117    <td>String</td>
2118  </tr>
2119  <tr>
2120    <td>DW_AT_APPLE_property_attribute</td>
2121    <td>0x3feb</td>
2122    <td>Constant</td>
2123  </tr>
2124</table>
2125
2126</div>
2127
2128<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
2129<h4>
2130  <a name="objcpropertynewconstants">New DWARF Constants</a>
2131</h4>
2132<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
2133
2134<div>
2135<table border="1" cellspacing="0">
2136  <col width="200">
2137  <col width="200">
2138  <tr>
2139    <th>Name</th>
2140    <th>Value</th>
2141  </tr>
2142  <tr>
2143    <td>DW_AT_APPLE_PROPERTY_readonly</td>
2144    <td>0x1</td>
2145  </tr>
2146  <tr>
2147    <td>DW_AT_APPLE_PROPERTY_readwrite</td>
2148    <td>0x2</td>
2149  </tr>
2150  <tr>
2151    <td>DW_AT_APPLE_PROPERTY_assign</td>
2152    <td>0x4</td>
2153  </tr>
2154  <tr>
2155    <td>DW_AT_APPLE_PROPERTY_retain</td>
2156    <td>0x8</td>
2157  </tr>
2158  <tr>
2159    <td>DW_AT_APPLE_PROPERTY_copy</td>
2160    <td>0x10</td>
2161  </tr>
2162  <tr>
2163    <td>DW_AT_APPLE_PROPERTY_nonatomic</td>
2164    <td>0x20</td>
2165  </tr>
2166</table>
2167
2168</div>
2169</div>
2170
2171<!-- ======================================================================= -->
2172<h3>
2173  <a name="acceltable">Name Accelerator Tables</a>
2174</h3>
2175<!-- ======================================================================= -->
2176<div>
2177<!-- ======================================================================= -->
2178<h4>
2179  <a name="acceltableintroduction">Introduction</a>
2180</h4>
2181<!-- ======================================================================= -->
2182<div>
2183<p>The .debug_pubnames and .debug_pubtypes formats are not what a debugger
2184  needs. The "pub" in the section name indicates that the entries in the
2185  table are publicly visible names only. This means no static or hidden
2186  functions show up in the .debug_pubnames. No static variables or private class
2187  variables are in the .debug_pubtypes. Many compilers add different things to
2188  these tables, so we can't rely upon the contents between gcc, icc, or clang.</p>
2189
2190<p>The typical query given by users tends not to match up with the contents of
2191  these tables. For example, the DWARF spec states that "In the case of the
2192  name of a function member or static data member of a C++ structure, class or
2193  union, the name presented in the .debug_pubnames section is not the simple
2194  name given by the DW_AT_name attribute of the referenced debugging information
2195  entry, but rather the fully qualified name of the data or function member."
2196  So the only names in these tables for complex C++ entries is a fully
2197  qualified name.  Debugger users tend not to enter their search strings as
2198  "a::b::c(int,const Foo&) const", but rather as "c", "b::c" , or "a::b::c".  So
2199  the name entered in the name table must be demangled in order to chop it up
2200  appropriately and additional names must be manually entered into the table
2201  to make it effective as a name lookup table for debuggers to use.</p>
2202
2203<p>All debuggers currently ignore the .debug_pubnames table as a result of
2204  its inconsistent and useless public-only name content making it a waste of
2205  space in the object file. These tables, when they are written to disk, are
2206  not sorted in any way, leaving every debugger to do its own parsing
2207  and sorting. These tables also include an inlined copy of the string values
2208  in the table itself making the tables much larger than they need to be on
2209  disk, especially for large C++ programs.</p>
2210
2211<p>Can't we just fix the sections by adding all of the names we need to this
2212  table? No, because that is not what the tables are defined to contain and we
2213  won't know the difference between the old bad tables and the new good tables.
2214  At best we could make our own renamed sections that contain all of the data
2215  we need.</p>
2216
2217<p>These tables are also insufficient for what a debugger like LLDB needs.
2218  LLDB uses clang for its expression parsing where LLDB acts as a PCH. LLDB is
2219  then often asked to look for type "foo" or namespace "bar", or list items in
2220  namespace "baz". Namespaces are not included in the pubnames or pubtypes
2221  tables. Since clang asks a lot of questions when it is parsing an expression,
2222  we need to be very fast when looking up names, as it happens a lot. Having new
2223  accelerator tables that are optimized for very quick lookups will benefit
2224  this type of debugging experience greatly.</p>
2225
2226<p>We would like to generate name lookup tables that can be mapped into
2227  memory from disk, and used as is, with little or no up-front parsing. We would
2228  also be able to control the exact content of these different tables so they
2229  contain exactly what we need. The Name Accelerator Tables were designed
2230  to fix these issues. In order to solve these issues we need to:</p>
2231
2232<ul>
2233  <li>Have a format that can be mapped into memory from disk and used as is</li>
2234  <li>Lookups should be very fast</li>
2235  <li>Extensible table format so these tables can be made by many producers</li>
2236  <li>Contain all of the names needed for typical lookups out of the box</li>
2237  <li>Strict rules for the contents of tables</li>
2238</ul>
2239
2240<p>Table size is important and the accelerator table format should allow the
2241  reuse of strings from common string tables so the strings for the names are
2242  not duplicated. We also want to make sure the table is ready to be used as-is
2243  by simply mapping the table into memory with minimal header parsing.</p>
2244
2245<p>The name lookups need to be fast and optimized for the kinds of lookups
2246  that debuggers tend to do. Optimally we would like to touch as few parts of
2247  the mapped table as possible when doing a name lookup and be able to quickly
2248  find the name entry we are looking for, or discover there are no matches. In
2249  the case of debuggers we optimized for lookups that fail most of the time.</p>
2250
2251<p>Each table that is defined should have strict rules on exactly what is in
2252  the accelerator tables and documented so clients can rely on the content.</p>
2253
2254</div>
2255
2256<!-- ======================================================================= -->
2257<h4>
2258  <a name="acceltablehashes">Hash Tables</a>
2259</h4>
2260<!-- ======================================================================= -->
2261
2262<div>
2263<h5>Standard Hash Tables</h5>
2264
2265<p>Typical hash tables have a header, buckets, and each bucket points to the
2266bucket contents:
2267</p>
2268
2269<div class="doc_code">
2270<pre>
2271.------------.
2272|  HEADER    |
2273|------------|
2274|  BUCKETS   |
2275|------------|
2276|  DATA      |
2277`------------'
2278</pre>
2279</div>
2280
2281<p>The BUCKETS are an array of offsets to DATA for each hash:</p>
2282
2283<div class="doc_code">
2284<pre>
2285.------------.
2286| 0x00001000 | BUCKETS[0]
2287| 0x00002000 | BUCKETS[1]
2288| 0x00002200 | BUCKETS[2]
2289| 0x000034f0 | BUCKETS[3]
2290|            | ...
2291| 0xXXXXXXXX | BUCKETS[n_buckets]
2292'------------'
2293</pre>
2294</div>
2295
2296<p>So for bucket[3] in the example above, we have an offset into the table
2297  0x000034f0 which points to a chain of entries for the bucket. Each bucket
2298  must contain a next pointer, full 32 bit hash value, the string itself,
2299  and the data for the current string value.</p>
2300
2301<div class="doc_code">
2302<pre>
2303            .------------.
23040x000034f0: | 0x00003500 | next pointer
2305            | 0x12345678 | 32 bit hash
2306            | "erase"    | string value
2307            | data[n]    | HashData for this bucket
2308            |------------|
23090x00003500: | 0x00003550 | next pointer
2310            | 0x29273623 | 32 bit hash
2311            | "dump"     | string value
2312            | data[n]    | HashData for this bucket
2313            |------------|
23140x00003550: | 0x00000000 | next pointer
2315            | 0x82638293 | 32 bit hash
2316            | "main"     | string value
2317            | data[n]    | HashData for this bucket
2318            `------------'
2319</pre>
2320</div>
2321
2322<p>The problem with this layout for debuggers is that we need to optimize for
2323  the negative lookup case where the symbol we're searching for is not present.
2324  So if we were to lookup "printf" in the table above, we would make a 32 hash
2325  for "printf", it might match bucket[3]. We would need to go to the offset
2326  0x000034f0 and start looking to see if our 32 bit hash matches. To do so, we
2327  need to read the next pointer, then read the hash, compare it, and skip to
2328  the next bucket. Each time we are skipping many bytes in memory and touching
2329  new cache pages just to do the compare on the full 32 bit hash. All of these
2330  accesses then tell us that we didn't have a match.</p>
2331
2332<h5>Name Hash Tables</h5>
2333
2334<p>To solve the issues mentioned above we have structured the hash tables
2335  a bit differently: a header, buckets, an array of all unique 32 bit hash
2336  values, followed by an array of hash value data offsets, one for each hash
2337  value, then the data for all hash values:</p>
2338
2339<div class="doc_code">
2340<pre>
2341.-------------.
2342|  HEADER     |
2343|-------------|
2344|  BUCKETS    |
2345|-------------|
2346|  HASHES     |
2347|-------------|
2348|  OFFSETS    |
2349|-------------|
2350|  DATA       |
2351`-------------'
2352</pre>
2353</div>
2354
2355<p>The BUCKETS in the name tables are an index into the HASHES array. By
2356  making all of the full 32 bit hash values contiguous in memory, we allow
2357  ourselves to efficiently check for a match while touching as little
2358  memory as possible. Most often checking the 32 bit hash values is as far as
2359  the lookup goes. If it does match, it usually is a match with no collisions.
2360  So for a table with "n_buckets" buckets, and "n_hashes" unique 32 bit hash
2361  values, we can clarify the contents of the BUCKETS, HASHES and OFFSETS as:</p>
2362
2363<div class="doc_code">
2364<pre>
2365.-------------------------.
2366|  HEADER.magic           | uint32_t
2367|  HEADER.version         | uint16_t
2368|  HEADER.hash_function   | uint16_t
2369|  HEADER.bucket_count    | uint32_t
2370|  HEADER.hashes_count    | uint32_t
2371|  HEADER.header_data_len | uint32_t
2372|  HEADER_DATA            | HeaderData
2373|-------------------------|
2374|  BUCKETS                | uint32_t[n_buckets] // 32 bit hash indexes
2375|-------------------------|
2376|  HASHES                 | uint32_t[n_buckets] // 32 bit hash values
2377|-------------------------|
2378|  OFFSETS                | uint32_t[n_buckets] // 32 bit offsets to hash value data
2379|-------------------------|
2380|  ALL HASH DATA          |
2381`-------------------------'
2382</pre>
2383</div>
2384
2385<p>So taking the exact same data from the standard hash example above we end up
2386  with:</p>
2387
2388<div class="doc_code">
2389<pre>
2390            .------------.
2391            | HEADER     |
2392            |------------|
2393            |          0 | BUCKETS[0]
2394            |          2 | BUCKETS[1]
2395            |          5 | BUCKETS[2]
2396            |          6 | BUCKETS[3]
2397            |            | ...
2398            |        ... | BUCKETS[n_buckets]
2399            |------------|
2400            | 0x........ | HASHES[0]
2401            | 0x........ | HASHES[1]
2402            | 0x........ | HASHES[2]
2403            | 0x........ | HASHES[3]
2404            | 0x........ | HASHES[4]
2405            | 0x........ | HASHES[5]
2406            | 0x12345678 | HASHES[6]    hash for BUCKETS[3]
2407            | 0x29273623 | HASHES[7]    hash for BUCKETS[3]
2408            | 0x82638293 | HASHES[8]    hash for BUCKETS[3]
2409            | 0x........ | HASHES[9]
2410            | 0x........ | HASHES[10]
2411            | 0x........ | HASHES[11]
2412            | 0x........ | HASHES[12]
2413            | 0x........ | HASHES[13]
2414            | 0x........ | HASHES[n_hashes]
2415            |------------|
2416            | 0x........ | OFFSETS[0]
2417            | 0x........ | OFFSETS[1]
2418            | 0x........ | OFFSETS[2]
2419            | 0x........ | OFFSETS[3]
2420            | 0x........ | OFFSETS[4]
2421            | 0x........ | OFFSETS[5]
2422            | 0x000034f0 | OFFSETS[6]   offset for BUCKETS[3]
2423            | 0x00003500 | OFFSETS[7]   offset for BUCKETS[3]
2424            | 0x00003550 | OFFSETS[8]   offset for BUCKETS[3]
2425            | 0x........ | OFFSETS[9]
2426            | 0x........ | OFFSETS[10]
2427            | 0x........ | OFFSETS[11]
2428            | 0x........ | OFFSETS[12]
2429            | 0x........ | OFFSETS[13]
2430            | 0x........ | OFFSETS[n_hashes]
2431            |------------|
2432            |            |
2433            |            |
2434            |            |
2435            |            |
2436            |            |
2437            |------------|
24380x000034f0: | 0x00001203 | .debug_str ("erase")
2439            | 0x00000004 | A 32 bit array count - number of HashData with name "erase"
2440            | 0x........ | HashData[0]
2441            | 0x........ | HashData[1]
2442            | 0x........ | HashData[2]
2443            | 0x........ | HashData[3]
2444            | 0x00000000 | String offset into .debug_str (terminate data for hash)
2445            |------------|
24460x00003500: | 0x00001203 | String offset into .debug_str ("collision")
2447            | 0x00000002 | A 32 bit array count - number of HashData with name "collision"
2448            | 0x........ | HashData[0]
2449            | 0x........ | HashData[1]
2450            | 0x00001203 | String offset into .debug_str ("dump")
2451            | 0x00000003 | A 32 bit array count - number of HashData with name "dump"
2452            | 0x........ | HashData[0]
2453            | 0x........ | HashData[1]
2454            | 0x........ | HashData[2]
2455            | 0x00000000 | String offset into .debug_str (terminate data for hash)
2456            |------------|
24570x00003550: | 0x00001203 | String offset into .debug_str ("main")
2458            | 0x00000009 | A 32 bit array count - number of HashData with name "main"
2459            | 0x........ | HashData[0]
2460            | 0x........ | HashData[1]
2461            | 0x........ | HashData[2]
2462            | 0x........ | HashData[3]
2463            | 0x........ | HashData[4]
2464            | 0x........ | HashData[5]
2465            | 0x........ | HashData[6]
2466            | 0x........ | HashData[7]
2467            | 0x........ | HashData[8]
2468            | 0x00000000 | String offset into .debug_str (terminate data for hash)
2469            `------------'
2470</pre>
2471</div>
2472
2473<p>So we still have all of the same data, we just organize it more efficiently
2474  for debugger lookup. If we repeat the same "printf" lookup from above, we
2475  would hash "printf" and find it matches BUCKETS[3] by taking the 32 bit hash
2476  value and modulo it by n_buckets. BUCKETS[3] contains "6" which is the index
2477  into the HASHES table. We would then compare any consecutive 32 bit hashes
2478  values in the HASHES array as long as the hashes would be in BUCKETS[3]. We
2479  do this by verifying that each subsequent hash value modulo n_buckets is still
2480  3. In the case of a failed lookup we would access the memory for BUCKETS[3], and
2481  then compare a few consecutive 32 bit hashes before we know that we have no match.
2482  We don't end up marching through multiple words of memory and we really keep the
2483  number of processor data cache lines being accessed as small as possible.</p>
2484
2485<p>The string hash that is used for these lookup tables is the Daniel J.
2486  Bernstein hash which is also used in the ELF GNU_HASH sections. It is a very
2487  good hash for all kinds of names in programs with very few hash collisions.</p>
2488
2489<p>Empty buckets are designated by using an invalid hash index of UINT32_MAX.</p>
2490</div>
2491
2492<!-- ======================================================================= -->
2493<h4>
2494  <a name="acceltabledetails">Details</a>
2495</h4>
2496<!-- ======================================================================= -->
2497<div>
2498<p>These name hash tables are designed to be generic where specializations of
2499  the table get to define additional data that goes into the header
2500  ("HeaderData"), how the string value is stored ("KeyType") and the content
2501  of the data for each hash value.</p>
2502
2503<h5>Header Layout</h5>
2504<p>The header has a fixed part, and the specialized part. The exact format of
2505  the header is:</p>
2506<div class="doc_code">
2507<pre>
2508struct Header
2509{
2510  uint32_t   magic;           // 'HASH' magic value to allow endian detection
2511  uint16_t   version;         // Version number
2512  uint16_t   hash_function;   // The hash function enumeration that was used
2513  uint32_t   bucket_count;    // The number of buckets in this hash table
2514  uint32_t   hashes_count;    // The total number of unique hash values and hash data offsets in this table
2515  uint32_t   header_data_len; // The bytes to skip to get to the hash indexes (buckets) for correct alignment
2516                              // Specifically the length of the following HeaderData field - this does not
2517                              // include the size of the preceding fields
2518  HeaderData header_data;     // Implementation specific header data
2519};
2520</pre>
2521</div>
2522<p>The header starts with a 32 bit "magic" value which must be 'HASH' encoded as
2523  an ASCII integer. This allows the detection of the start of the hash table and
2524  also allows the table's byte order to be determined so the table can be
2525  correctly extracted. The "magic" value is followed by a 16 bit version number
2526  which allows the table to be revised and modified in the future. The current
2527  version number is 1. "hash_function" is a uint16_t enumeration that specifies
2528  which hash function was used to produce this table. The current values for the
2529  hash function enumerations include:</p>
2530<div class="doc_code">
2531<pre>
2532enum HashFunctionType
2533{
2534  eHashFunctionDJB = 0u, // Daniel J Bernstein hash function
2535};
2536</pre>
2537</div>
2538<p>"bucket_count" is a 32 bit unsigned integer that represents how many buckets
2539  are in the BUCKETS array. "hashes_count" is the number of unique 32 bit hash
2540  values that are in the HASHES array, and is the same number of offsets are
2541  contained in the OFFSETS array. "header_data_len" specifies the size in
2542  bytes of the HeaderData that is filled in by specialized versions of this
2543  table.</p>
2544
2545<h5>Fixed Lookup</h5>
2546<p>The header is followed by the buckets, hashes, offsets, and hash value
2547  data.
2548<div class="doc_code">
2549<pre>
2550struct FixedTable
2551{
2552  uint32_t buckets[Header.bucket_count];  // An array of hash indexes into the "hashes[]" array below
2553  uint32_t hashes [Header.hashes_count];  // Every unique 32 bit hash for the entire table is in this table
2554  uint32_t offsets[Header.hashes_count];  // An offset that corresponds to each item in the "hashes[]" array above
2555};
2556</pre>
2557</div>
2558<p>"buckets" is an array of 32 bit indexes into the "hashes" array. The
2559  "hashes" array contains all of the 32 bit hash values for all names in the
2560  hash table. Each hash in the "hashes" table has an offset in the "offsets"
2561  array that points to the data for the hash value.</p>
2562
2563<p>This table setup makes it very easy to repurpose these tables to contain
2564  different data, while keeping the lookup mechanism the same for all tables.
2565  This layout also makes it possible to save the table to disk and map it in
2566  later and do very efficient name lookups with little or no parsing.</p>
2567
2568<p>DWARF lookup tables can be implemented in a variety of ways and can store
2569  a lot of information for each name. We want to make the DWARF tables
2570  extensible and able to store the data efficiently so we have used some of the
2571  DWARF features that enable efficient data storage to define exactly what kind
2572  of data we store for each name.</p>
2573
2574<p>The "HeaderData" contains a definition of the contents of each HashData
2575  chunk. We might want to store an offset to all of the debug information
2576  entries (DIEs) for each name. To keep things extensible, we create a list of
2577  items, or Atoms, that are contained in the data for each name. First comes the
2578  type of the data in each atom:</p>
2579<div class="doc_code">
2580<pre>
2581enum AtomType
2582{
2583  eAtomTypeNULL       = 0u,
2584  eAtomTypeDIEOffset  = 1u,   // DIE offset, check form for encoding
2585  eAtomTypeCUOffset   = 2u,   // DIE offset of the compiler unit header that contains the item in question
2586  eAtomTypeTag        = 3u,   // DW_TAG_xxx value, should be encoded as DW_FORM_data1 (if no tags exceed 255) or DW_FORM_data2
2587  eAtomTypeNameFlags  = 4u,   // Flags from enum NameFlags
2588  eAtomTypeTypeFlags  = 5u,   // Flags from enum TypeFlags
2589};
2590</pre>
2591</div>
2592<p>The enumeration values and their meanings are:</p>
2593<div class="doc_code">
2594<pre>
2595  eAtomTypeNULL       - a termination atom that specifies the end of the atom list
2596  eAtomTypeDIEOffset  - an offset into the .debug_info section for the DWARF DIE for this name
2597  eAtomTypeCUOffset   - an offset into the .debug_info section for the CU that contains the DIE
2598  eAtomTypeDIETag     - The DW_TAG_XXX enumeration value so you don't have to parse the DWARF to see what it is
2599  eAtomTypeNameFlags  - Flags for functions and global variables (isFunction, isInlined, isExternal...)
2600  eAtomTypeTypeFlags  - Flags for types (isCXXClass, isObjCClass, ...)
2601</pre>
2602</div>
2603<p>Then we allow each atom type to define the atom type and how the data for
2604  each atom type data is encoded:</p>
2605<div class="doc_code">
2606<pre>
2607struct Atom
2608{
2609  uint16_t type;  // AtomType enum value
2610  uint16_t form;  // DWARF DW_FORM_XXX defines
2611};
2612</pre>
2613</div>
2614<p>The "form" type above is from the DWARF specification and defines the
2615  exact encoding of the data for the Atom type. See the DWARF specification for
2616  the DW_FORM_ definitions.</p>
2617<div class="doc_code">
2618<pre>
2619struct HeaderData
2620{
2621  uint32_t die_offset_base;
2622  uint32_t atom_count;
2623  Atoms    atoms[atom_count0];
2624};
2625</pre>
2626</div>
2627<p>"HeaderData" defines the base DIE offset that should be added to any atoms
2628  that are encoded using the DW_FORM_ref1, DW_FORM_ref2, DW_FORM_ref4,
2629  DW_FORM_ref8 or DW_FORM_ref_udata. It also defines what is contained in
2630  each "HashData" object -- Atom.form tells us how large each field will be in
2631  the HashData and the Atom.type tells us how this data should be interpreted.</p>
2632
2633<p>For the current implementations of the ".apple_names" (all functions + globals),
2634  the ".apple_types" (names of all types that are defined), and the
2635  ".apple_namespaces" (all namespaces), we currently set the Atom array to be:</p>
2636<div class="doc_code">
2637<pre>
2638HeaderData.atom_count = 1;
2639HeaderData.atoms[0].type = eAtomTypeDIEOffset;
2640HeaderData.atoms[0].form = DW_FORM_data4;
2641</pre>
2642</div>
2643<p>This defines the contents to be the DIE offset (eAtomTypeDIEOffset) that is
2644  encoded as a 32 bit value (DW_FORM_data4). This allows a single name to have
2645  multiple matching DIEs in a single file, which could come up with an inlined
2646  function for instance. Future tables could include more information about the
2647  DIE such as flags indicating if the DIE is a function, method, block,
2648  or inlined.</p>
2649
2650<p>The KeyType for the DWARF table is a 32 bit string table offset into the
2651  ".debug_str" table. The ".debug_str" is the string table for the DWARF which
2652  may already contain copies of all of the strings. This helps make sure, with
2653  help from the compiler, that we reuse the strings between all of the DWARF
2654  sections and keeps the hash table size down. Another benefit to having the
2655  compiler generate all strings as DW_FORM_strp in the debug info, is that
2656  DWARF parsing can be made much faster.</p>
2657
2658<p>After a lookup is made, we get an offset into the hash data. The hash data
2659  needs to be able to deal with 32 bit hash collisions, so the chunk of data
2660  at the offset in the hash data consists of a triple:</p>
2661<div class="doc_code">
2662<pre>
2663uint32_t str_offset
2664uint32_t hash_data_count
2665HashData[hash_data_count]
2666</pre>
2667</div>
2668<p>If "str_offset" is zero, then the bucket contents are done. 99.9% of the
2669  hash data chunks contain a single item (no 32 bit hash collision):</p>
2670<div class="doc_code">
2671<pre>
2672.------------.
2673| 0x00001023 | uint32_t KeyType (.debug_str[0x0001023] => "main")
2674| 0x00000004 | uint32_t HashData count
2675| 0x........ | uint32_t HashData[0] DIE offset
2676| 0x........ | uint32_t HashData[1] DIE offset
2677| 0x........ | uint32_t HashData[2] DIE offset
2678| 0x........ | uint32_t HashData[3] DIE offset
2679| 0x00000000 | uint32_t KeyType (end of hash chain)
2680`------------'
2681</pre>
2682</div>
2683<p>If there are collisions, you will have multiple valid string offsets:</p>
2684<div class="doc_code">
2685<pre>
2686.------------.
2687| 0x00001023 | uint32_t KeyType (.debug_str[0x0001023] => "main")
2688| 0x00000004 | uint32_t HashData count
2689| 0x........ | uint32_t HashData[0] DIE offset
2690| 0x........ | uint32_t HashData[1] DIE offset
2691| 0x........ | uint32_t HashData[2] DIE offset
2692| 0x........ | uint32_t HashData[3] DIE offset
2693| 0x00002023 | uint32_t KeyType (.debug_str[0x0002023] => "print")
2694| 0x00000002 | uint32_t HashData count
2695| 0x........ | uint32_t HashData[0] DIE offset
2696| 0x........ | uint32_t HashData[1] DIE offset
2697| 0x00000000 | uint32_t KeyType (end of hash chain)
2698`------------'
2699</pre>
2700</div>
2701<p>Current testing with real world C++ binaries has shown that there is around 1
2702  32 bit hash collision per 100,000 name entries.</p>
2703</div>
2704<!-- ======================================================================= -->
2705<h4>
2706  <a name="acceltablecontents">Contents</a>
2707</h4>
2708<!-- ======================================================================= -->
2709<div>
2710<p>As we said, we want to strictly define exactly what is included in the
2711  different tables. For DWARF, we have 3 tables: ".apple_names", ".apple_types",
2712  and ".apple_namespaces".</p>
2713
2714<p>".apple_names" sections should contain an entry for each DWARF DIE whose
2715  DW_TAG is a DW_TAG_label, DW_TAG_inlined_subroutine, or DW_TAG_subprogram that
2716  has address attributes: DW_AT_low_pc, DW_AT_high_pc, DW_AT_ranges or
2717  DW_AT_entry_pc. It also contains DW_TAG_variable DIEs that have a DW_OP_addr
2718  in the location (global and static variables). All global and static variables
2719  should be included, including those scoped withing functions and classes. For
2720  example using the following code:</p>
2721<div class="doc_code">
2722<pre>
2723static int var = 0;
2724
2725void f ()
2726{
2727  static int var = 0;
2728}
2729</pre>
2730</div>
2731<p>Both of the static "var" variables would be included in the table. All
2732  functions should emit both their full names and their basenames. For C or C++,
2733  the full name is the mangled name (if available) which is usually in the
2734  DW_AT_MIPS_linkage_name attribute, and the DW_AT_name contains the function
2735  basename. If global or static variables have a mangled name in a
2736  DW_AT_MIPS_linkage_name attribute, this should be emitted along with the
2737  simple name found in the DW_AT_name attribute.</p>
2738
2739<p>".apple_types" sections should contain an entry for each DWARF DIE whose
2740  tag is one of:</p>
2741<ul>
2742  <li>DW_TAG_array_type</li>
2743  <li>DW_TAG_class_type</li>
2744  <li>DW_TAG_enumeration_type</li>
2745  <li>DW_TAG_pointer_type</li>
2746  <li>DW_TAG_reference_type</li>
2747  <li>DW_TAG_string_type</li>
2748  <li>DW_TAG_structure_type</li>
2749  <li>DW_TAG_subroutine_type</li>
2750  <li>DW_TAG_typedef</li>
2751  <li>DW_TAG_union_type</li>
2752  <li>DW_TAG_ptr_to_member_type</li>
2753  <li>DW_TAG_set_type</li>
2754  <li>DW_TAG_subrange_type</li>
2755  <li>DW_TAG_base_type</li>
2756  <li>DW_TAG_const_type</li>
2757  <li>DW_TAG_constant</li>
2758  <li>DW_TAG_file_type</li>
2759  <li>DW_TAG_namelist</li>
2760  <li>DW_TAG_packed_type</li>
2761  <li>DW_TAG_volatile_type</li>
2762  <li>DW_TAG_restrict_type</li>
2763  <li>DW_TAG_interface_type</li>
2764  <li>DW_TAG_unspecified_type</li>
2765  <li>DW_TAG_shared_type</li>
2766</ul>
2767<p>Only entries with a DW_AT_name attribute are included, and the entry must
2768  not be a forward declaration (DW_AT_declaration attribute with a non-zero value).
2769  For example, using the following code:</p>
2770<div class="doc_code">
2771<pre>
2772int main ()
2773{
2774  int *b = 0;
2775  return *b;
2776}
2777</pre>
2778</div>
2779<p>We get a few type DIEs:</p>
2780<div class="doc_code">
2781<pre>
27820x00000067:     TAG_base_type [5]
2783                AT_encoding( DW_ATE_signed )
2784                AT_name( "int" )
2785                AT_byte_size( 0x04 )
2786
27870x0000006e:     TAG_pointer_type [6]
2788                AT_type( {0x00000067} ( int ) )
2789                AT_byte_size( 0x08 )
2790</pre>
2791</div>
2792<p>The DW_TAG_pointer_type is not included because it does not have a DW_AT_name.</p>
2793
2794<p>".apple_namespaces" section should contain all DW_TAG_namespace DIEs. If
2795  we run into a namespace that has no name this is an anonymous namespace,
2796  and the name should be output as "(anonymous namespace)" (without the quotes).
2797  Why? This matches the output of the abi::cxa_demangle() that is in the standard
2798  C++ library that demangles mangled names.</p>
2799</div>
2800
2801<!-- ======================================================================= -->
2802<h4>
2803  <a name="acceltableextensions">Language Extensions and File Format Changes</a>
2804</h4>
2805<!-- ======================================================================= -->
2806<div>
2807<h5>Objective-C Extensions</h5>
2808<p>".apple_objc" section should contain all DW_TAG_subprogram DIEs for an
2809  Objective-C class. The name used in the hash table is the name of the
2810  Objective-C class itself. If the Objective-C class has a category, then an
2811  entry is made for both the class name without the category, and for the class
2812  name with the category. So if we have a DIE at offset 0x1234 with a name
2813  of method "-[NSString(my_additions) stringWithSpecialString:]", we would add
2814  an entry for "NSString" that points to DIE 0x1234, and an entry for
2815  "NSString(my_additions)" that points to 0x1234. This allows us to quickly
2816  track down all Objective-C methods for an Objective-C class when doing
2817  expressions. It is needed because of the dynamic nature of Objective-C where
2818  anyone can add methods to a class. The DWARF for Objective-C methods is also
2819  emitted differently from C++ classes where the methods are not usually
2820  contained in the class definition, they are scattered about across one or more
2821  compile units. Categories can also be defined in different shared libraries.
2822  So we need to be able to quickly find all of the methods and class functions
2823  given the Objective-C class name, or quickly find all methods and class
2824  functions for a class + category name. This table does not contain any selector
2825  names, it just maps Objective-C class names (or class names + category) to all
2826  of the methods and class functions. The selectors are added as function
2827  basenames in the .debug_names section.</p>
2828
2829<p>In the ".apple_names" section for Objective-C functions, the full name is the
2830  entire function name with the brackets ("-[NSString stringWithCString:]") and the
2831  basename is the selector only ("stringWithCString:").</p>
2832
2833<h5>Mach-O Changes</h5>
2834<p>The sections names for the apple hash tables are for non mach-o files. For
2835  mach-o files, the sections should be contained in the "__DWARF" segment with
2836  names as follows:</p>
2837<ul>
2838  <li>".apple_names" -> "__apple_names"</li>
2839  <li>".apple_types" -> "__apple_types"</li>
2840  <li>".apple_namespaces" -> "__apple_namespac" (16 character limit)</li>
2841  <li> ".apple_objc" -> "__apple_objc"</li>
2842</ul>
2843</div>
2844</div>
2845</div>
2846
2847<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
2848
2849<hr>
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2855
2856  <a href="mailto:sabre@nondot.org">Chris Lattner</a><br>
2857  <a href="http://llvm.org/">LLVM Compiler Infrastructure</a><br>
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