Re: [PATCH:MI] Return a subset of a variable object's children

[Nick Roberts <nickrob at snap dot net dot nz>]

 > > > I was thinking that only a small number of children would ever exist
 > > > simultaneously.  Scrolling might make that a larger number but maybe
 > > > it could be arranged to delete children that go out of view.
 > > 
 > > I wonder if deleting children that are not visible is possible/desirable.
 > 
 > Well, I would still prefer a simple toggle that would allow me to switch off
 > any automatic creation of children and one-shot 'expression evaluation'
 > and one-shot 'children listing'.

Are you arguing against the general concept of variable objects?

 > I would expect this to be much simpler to implement on the gdb side and
 > gives all the flexibility needed (as far as I am concerned) on the
 > frontend side.

Presumably your one-shot 'children listing' requires all values to be printed
each time.  Variable objects work by just printing the values which have
changed.

 > Complex containers may do all kind of funny stuff behind the debugger's
 > back (like reallocation, rebalancing, renumbering, moving stuff to and from
 > secondary memory) which a frontend might want to handle transparently.
 > I would not expect gdb to even be aware of that (let alone to handle(!) it).
 >
 > Also, hard-wiring behaviour to certain types calls for trouble on the
 > frontend side. E.g...

Who's talking about complex containers or hardwiring?  The vectors and linked
lists discussed in this thread are internal to Gdb, not those of the program
being debugged.


-- 
Nick                                           http://www.inet.net.nz/~nickrob