RE: [RFC] Removing in process agent (IPA)

["Terekhov, Mikhail via Gdb" <gdb@sourceware.org>]

Internal Use - Confidential
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Andrew Burgess <aburgess@redhat.com>
> Sent: Friday, June 14, 2024 4:08 AM
> To: Terekhov, Mikhail <Mikhail.Terekhov@dell.com>; Luis Machado
> <luis.machado@arm.com>; gdb-patches@sourceware.org;
> gdb@sourceware.org
> Cc: Pedro Alves <pedro@palves.net>
> Subject: RE: [RFC] Removing in process agent (IPA)
>
>
> [EXTERNAL EMAIL]
>
> "Terekhov, Mikhail" <Mikhail.Terekhov@dell.com> writes:
>
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From: Luis Machado <luis.machado@arm.com>
> >>
> >> Similarly, I also think it might be time to consider dropping the
> >> tracepoints (mainly static and fast) machinery from gdbserver, as I
> >> suspect that is another mechanism that is not being used very often.
> >>
> > We use tracepoints in our stub from the last millennia I guess (back
> > from EMC days) and plan to do so in the future.
> >
> >> I recall trying to use tracepoints for practical purposes (back in
> >> the day), and it wasn't up to the task, being too cumbersome to use,
> >> having bad failure modes
> >
> > Putting some UI/GUI on top of it makes it relatively simple to use.
> >
> >> and having other security implications when trying to debug stuff in
> >> production platforms. The remote protocol side of it is OK, but
> >> again, I bet no debugging stubs are using that anymore.
> >
> > We do use them but not in production though.
>
> Just so I'm clear, you're talking about tracepoints here either in gdbserver, or at
> least (if you have your own stub) in GDB and the remote protocol, right?
>
Yes, you are right, I'm talking about GDB, remote protocol and stub.
May be gdbserver in the future.

> This doesn't require gdb to continue shipping the IPA right?  Or have I failed to
> understand your position?
>
We do not use IPA explicitly and I did not check if it's code is used in the tracepoints implementation.
My replay was to the proposal to drop tracepoints.

Regards,
Mikhail