From: Tom de Vries <tdevries@suse.de>
To: gdb-patches@sourceware.org
Subject: [PATCH] [gdb/cli] Document \001 and \002 usage for set prompt
Date: Sat, 19 Jul 2025 08:16:36 +0200 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <20250719061636.11460-1-tdevries@suse.de> (raw)
PR cli/28887 reports the following problem when using a custom prompt.
First, we set up the custom prompt (with ^ marking the position of the
blinking cursor on the line above):
...
$ gdb -q -ex "set prompt \033[31mgdb$ \033[0m"
gdb$
^
...
Then we type some string, and enter it into the command history:
...
gdb$ some long command
❌️ Undefined command: "some". Try "help".
gdb$
^
...
We use C-p to fetch the previous command:
...
gdb$ some long command
^
...
Sofar, so good.
Finally, we use C-a which should move the cursor to just after the prompt, but
instead we get:
...
gdb$ some long command
^
...
This is fixed by using \001 and \002:
...
(gdb) set prompt \001\033[31m\002gdb$ \001\033[0m\002
...
aka as RL_PROMPT_START_IGNORE and RL_PROMPT_END_IGNORE [1].
Add an example to the documentation showing the use of these markers.
The added example is the equivalent of the "\[\e[0;34m\](gdb)\[\e[0m\]"
example documented at gdb.prompt.substitute_string that can be used with
"set extended-prompt".
While working on this, I noticed that "show prompt" doesn't show back the
original string, using '\e' instead of '\033':
...
gdb$ show prompt
Gdb's prompt is "\001\e[31m\002gdb$ \001\e[0m\002".
...
and that the shown string can't be used as an argument to "set prompt":
...
gdb$ set prompt \001\e[31m\002gdb$ \001\e[0m\002
e[31mgdb$ e[0m
...
I've filed this as PR cli/33184.
[1] https://tiswww.case.edu/php/chet/readline/readline.html
---
gdb/doc/gdb.texinfo | 10 ++++++++++
1 file changed, 10 insertions(+)
diff --git a/gdb/doc/gdb.texinfo b/gdb/doc/gdb.texinfo
index 35b770f8138..0a2d34756eb 100644
--- a/gdb/doc/gdb.texinfo
+++ b/gdb/doc/gdb.texinfo
@@ -27659,6 +27659,16 @@ or a prompt that does not.
@item set prompt @var{newprompt}
Directs @value{GDBN} to use @var{newprompt} as its prompt string henceforth.
+For example, this will set a blue-colored ``(gdb)'' prompt:
+
+@smallexample
+set prompt \001\033[0;34m\002(gdb)\001\033[0m\002
+@end smallexample
+
+It uses ``\001'' and ``\002'' to begin and end a sequence of
+non-printing characters, to make sure they're not counted in the string
+length.
+
@kindex show prompt
@item show prompt
Prints a line of the form: @samp{Gdb's prompt is: @var{your-prompt}}
base-commit: cfbf9925c1c34f9e9d47c8b29d165866557663e3
--
2.43.0
next reply other threads:[~2025-07-19 6:17 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 3+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2025-07-19 6:16 Tom de Vries [this message]
2025-07-19 6:47 ` Eli Zaretskii
2025-07-19 16:07 ` Tom de Vries
Reply instructions:
You may reply publicly to this message via plain-text email
using any one of the following methods:
* Save the following mbox file, import it into your mail client,
and reply-to-all from there: mbox
Avoid top-posting and favor interleaved quoting:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posting_style#Interleaved_style
* Reply using the --to, --cc, and --in-reply-to
switches of git-send-email(1):
git send-email \
--in-reply-to=20250719061636.11460-1-tdevries@suse.de \
--to=tdevries@suse.de \
--cc=gdb-patches@sourceware.org \
/path/to/YOUR_REPLY
https://kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/git-send-email.html
* If your mail client supports setting the In-Reply-To header
via mailto: links, try the mailto: link
Be sure your reply has a Subject: header at the top and a blank line
before the message body.
This is a public inbox, see mirroring instructions
for how to clone and mirror all data and code used for this inbox