llvm dev - Jul 2016 - Gauging interest in generating PDBs from LLVM-backed languages

On Tue, Jul 26, 2016 at 12:30 PM, Zachary Turner <zturner at google.com>
wrote:
> I wrote most of the pdb code in llvm so far. As Reid suggested, if you
> look in DebugInfo/PDB/Raw there is a significant amount of code dealing
> with msf files and raw pdb streams. If you build the llvm-pdbdump tool you
> can run it with the "raw" subcommand to dump lots of low level
info from
> the file.
>
> It's pretty complete for reading pdb files, and I'm actively
working on
> expanding write support.

I'll check into that again. I ran across llvm-pdbdump earlier but
couldn't
get it to build on a vanilla 3.8 install (CMake is convinced I don't have
the DIA SDK and I haven't found a way to change its mind). I stopped short
of reading the code though so I wasn't aware of how much is actually there!

Anyways, I'll pore over what's in trunk and see if there's anything
I can
contribute. Thanks for the pointer.



 - Mike
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Even if you don't have DIA SDK, llvm-pdbdump will still work with the
"raw"
subcommand, just not the "pretty" subcommand.  That said, I would be
interested in finding out why it thinks you don't have DIA installed.  You
could do some diagnostics by littering the CMake with some print statements
to see if the directory it's looking for exists or what else the problem
might be.

On Tue, Jul 26, 2016 at 7:02 PM Michael Lewis <don.apoch at gmail.com>
wrote:
> On Tue, Jul 26, 2016 at 12:30 PM, Zachary Turner <zturner at
google.com>
>  wrote:
>
>> I wrote most of the pdb code in llvm so far. As Reid suggested, if you
>> look in DebugInfo/PDB/Raw there is a significant amount of code dealing
>> with msf files and raw pdb streams. If you build the llvm-pdbdump tool
you
>> can run it with the "raw" subcommand to dump lots of low
level info from
>> the file.
>>
>> It's pretty complete for reading pdb files, and I'm actively
working on
>> expanding write support.
>
>
> I'll check into that again. I ran across llvm-pdbdump earlier but
couldn't
> get it to build on a vanilla 3.8 install (CMake is convinced I don't
have
> the DIA SDK and I haven't found a way to change its mind). I stopped
short
> of reading the code though so I wasn't aware of how much is actually
there!
>
> Anyways, I'll pore over what's in trunk and see if there's
anything I can
> contribute. Thanks for the pointer.
>
>
>
>  - Mike
>
>
>
>
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Hi Mike,
> I'll check into that again. I ran across llvm-pdbdump earlier but
couldn't get it to build on a vanilla 3.8 install (CMake is convinced I
don't have the DIA SDK and I haven't found a way to change its mind).

I have experienced something similar with the DIA SDK.

Most of the time, it is a path problem:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3035999
<https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3035999>

If you open the file cmake/config-ix.cmake you will find the place where cmake
check if the DIA_SDK is present (there is also a note saying that sometime this
is a Windows bug).

You can modify the line "set(MSVC_DIA_SDK_DIR "$ENV{VSINSTALLDIR}DIA
SDK”)” by "set(MSVC_DIA_SDK_DIR “C:\\path\\to\\DIA SDK”)”.

In my case, it was working.

Hope this help.

Greetings,

Johan
> On 27 Jul 2016, at 04:02, Michael Lewis via llvm-dev <llvm-dev at
lists.llvm.org> wrote:
> 
> On Tue, Jul 26, 2016 at 12:30 PM, Zachary Turner <zturner at google.com
<mailto:zturner at google.com>> wrote:
> I wrote most of the pdb code in llvm so far. As Reid suggested, if you look
in DebugInfo/PDB/Raw there is a significant amount of code dealing with msf
files and raw pdb streams. If you build the llvm-pdbdump tool you can run it
with the "raw" subcommand to dump lots of low level info from the
file.
> 
> It's pretty complete for reading pdb files, and I'm actively
working on expanding write support.
> 
> I'll check into that again. I ran across llvm-pdbdump earlier but
couldn't get it to build on a vanilla 3.8 install (CMake is convinced I
don't have the DIA SDK and I haven't found a way to change its mind). I
stopped short of reading the code though so I wasn't aware of how much is
actually there!
> 
> Anyways, I'll pore over what's in trunk and see if there's
anything I can contribute. Thanks for the pointer.
> 
> 
> 
>  - Mike
> 
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> LLVM Developers mailing list
> llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org
> http://lists.llvm.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/llvm-dev
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On Wed, Jul 27, 2016 at 12:06 AM, Johan Wehrli <johan.wehrli at
strong.codes>
wrote:
>
> Most of the time, it is a path problem:
> https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3035999
>
> If you open the file cmake/config-ix.cmake you will find the place where
> cmake check if the DIA_SDK is present (there is also a note saying that
> sometime this is a Windows bug).
>
> You can modify the line "set(MSVC_DIA_SDK_DIR
"$ENV{VSINSTALLDIR}DIA
> SDK”)” by "set(MSVC_DIA_SDK_DIR “C:\\path\\to\\DIA SDK”)”.
>
>
Awesome, that did the trick - thanks!

It turns out I was running CMake without the VS Environment vars set, so
%VSINSTALLDIR% was empty. Running with the environment set up correctly
fixed the problem.



On Tue, Jul 26, 2016 at 7:56 PM, Zachary Turner <zturner at google.com>
wrote:
> Even if you don't have DIA SDK, llvm-pdbdump will still work with the
> "raw" subcommand, just not the "pretty" subcommand.
>
I was running a 3.8 install where this functionality had apparently not yet
landed. I pulled a fresh install from trunk earlier and I'm now playing
around with "raw". So far this looks immensely promising and probably
well
beyond my own scope of familiarity with the PDB/MSF formats. I didn't
realize that this much progress had been made since 3.8; serves me right I
guess for not looking at trunk sooner!


I will certainly be willing to speak up if I find anything I know that
isn't represented here already.



 - Mike
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