[RFA] File-name completion improvements

Eli Zaretskii
2001-02-12T00:18:00Z

I was never happy with GDB's completion: I think it doesn't quite help as
much as it could. For example, there are commands which mostly operate
on files, but insist to complete on symbols instead.

So I will be submitting a series of patches to make this better. But
first, I need to make the file-name completion DTRT; currently, it
doesn't. For example, try "dir >foo TAB" or "dir foo:bar TAB" (assuming
you have a directory or a file which begin with `foo' and `bar').

(Yes, I know "dir >foo" is nonsense, but GDB shouldn't prevent me from
saying that; there are GDB commands which can use redirection near file
names.)

The following patches correct several minor but annoying problems in
file-name completion:

- completion on a file name in a list of file names didn't work;
- GDB would not always append a slash if the completion is a directory;
- completion failed when the file name had non-file-name characters,
such as redirection, around it;
- on DOS/Windows, completion would fail with files with a drive letter.

Okay to commit?

2001-02-12 Eli Zaretskii <eliz@is.elta.co.il>

* completer.c (gdb_completer_file_name_break_characters): Remove
slash from file-name break characters.
[__MSDOS__]: Special definition for DOS/Windows file names.
(line_completion_function): When completing on file names, bump
`p' to the first file-name constituent character of `word', before
invoking the completer.

--- gdb/completer.c~0 Fri Dec 15 03:01:46 2000
+++ gdb/completer.c Mon Feb 12 00:28:42 2001
@@ -64,7 +64,13 @@ static char *gdb_completer_command_word_
break characters any characters that are commonly used in file
names, such as '-', '+', '~', etc. Otherwise, readline displays
incorrect completion candidates. */
-static char *gdb_completer_file_name_break_characters = " \t\n*|\"';:?/><";
+#ifdef __MSDOS__
+/* MS-DOS and MS-Windows use colon as part of the drive spec, and most
+ programs support @foo style response files. */
+static char *gdb_completer_file_name_break_characters = " \t\n*|\"';?><@";
+#else
+static char *gdb_completer_file_name_break_characters = " \t\n*|\"';:?><";
+#endif

/* Characters that can be used to quote completion strings. Note that we
can't include '"' because the gdb C parser treats such quoted sequences
@@ -348,10 +354,25 @@ line_completion_function (char *text, in
{
/* It is a normal command; what comes after it is
completed by the command's completer function. */
- list = (*c->completer) (p, word);
if (c->completer == filename_completer)
- rl_completer_word_break_characters =
- gdb_completer_file_name_break_characters;
+ {
+ char *fbc = gdb_completer_file_name_break_characters;
+
+ /* Many commands which want to complete on
+ file names accept several file names, as
+ in "run foo bar >>baz". So we don't want
+ to complete the entire text after the
+ command, just the last word. To this
+ end, we need to find the beginning of the
+ file name starting at word and going
+ backwards. */
+ for (p = word;
+ p > tmp_command && strchr (fbc, p[-1]) == NULL;
+ p--)
+ ;
+ rl_completer_word_break_characters = fbc;
+ }
+ list = (*c->completer) (p, word);
}
}
else
@@ -397,10 +418,19 @@ line_completion_function (char *text, in
else
{
/* It is a normal command. */
- list = (*c->completer) (p, word);
if (c->completer == filename_completer)
- rl_completer_word_break_characters =
- gdb_completer_file_name_break_characters;
+ {
+ char *fbc = gdb_completer_file_name_break_characters;
+
+ /* See the commentary above about the specifics
+ of file-name completion. */
+ for (p = word;
+ p > tmp_command && strchr (fbc, p[-1]) == NULL;
+ p--)
+ ;
+ rl_completer_word_break_characters = fbc;
+ }
+ list = (*c->completer) (p, word);
}
}
}