DDT Printing to Screen

Is it possible for someone with access to the !DDT debugger sources – how it Prints to the screen.

Viewfinder 1.44 (27 May 200) works – but 1.53 (01 Jan 2003) and the latest version 1.78 – !DDT windows don’t appear on the screen.

But !DDT quits using the keyboard Ctr – Q – so it was probably running.

It would be handy if any sources could be released – even parts. Could the unresolved bits of code be released as linkable code only.

Thanks for any pointers.

Doesn’t look like it does anything special to me – just OS_SpriteOp, OS_WriteC and OS_Plot. Certainly not poking screen memory or anything like that.

Because this is how DDT works, it does have to save and restore quite a bit of VDU state when switching between showing the debuggee and debugger windows. The main candidates that I can see that might explain your problem are:

• OS_SpriteOp 60 is used to switch output to the screen. Perhaps ViewFinder screws up if this is called when output is already switched to the screen?
• OS_Bytes 251 and 112 are used to ensure that the VDU drivers write to the same screen bank as is being displayed. Is ViewFinder’s screen bank handling broken?

We’ve already released all the tools sources that we can reasonably do – the remaining tools not only rely on libraries where the copyright owners are either uncontactable or have declined to allow them to be released, but also header files for the same, which we are equally unable to release. So even though some of the source code might be clean, you couldn’t compile it, let alone link it. I know a lot of people are keen to see DDT improved, and we’re working on getting it back into fully functional shape, but I’ll have to ask you to be patient a bit longer.

Is DeskDebug a viable alternative to !DDT? (Probably not on the OMAP port yet, if ever, I guess.) I’ve never used it (on any hardware), but I’ve always been curious about it. Does anyone have any experience with it?

• 2005 discussions at c.s.a.programmer
• Get Demo

!DeskDebug does in-fact run on the OMAP port. I have not fully tested it, but I have run a debug image and stepped it.
Niklaus Weiss sent me a copy to test, and I think he would welcom others as well (I do own !DeskDebug running on the Iyonix).
My experience with it, is that its simpler to use than !DDT but one omission is the ability to change register values in the program you are debugging (this may be added though).

Thanks for that info, Tank and Trevor. That’s interesting. Sounds like !DeskDebug might still be worth investing in!