[cfe-commits] [PATCH] Add support to VS debugger for previewing SmallString<>

[Will Wilson]

On 3 May 2012 19:40, Will Wilson <will at indefiant.com> wrote:
>>>>> For Visual Studio users: Here's little patch to the
>>>>> clangVisualizers.txt that allows the contents of a SmallString to be
>>>>> seen in string form, rather than (somewhat less usefully) as a
>>>>> SmallVector.
>>>>
>>>> I assume this wouldn't work for SmallStrings that include embedded
>>>> '\0' characters? Though I suppose we don't do any better for StringRef
>>>> either, so perhaps that's not a priority.
>>>
>>> Unfortunately not, I can't find any support for anything other than
>>> basic zero-terminated strings in the syntax.
>>
>> I don't know anything about VS, really, but SmallStrings are not usually null-terminated. Have you tested this when there is definitely something after the string?
>
> Yes, in such cases you see whatever follows the string data. Therefore
> (as with StringRef) you need to be careful interpreting the string
> data in the debugger preview. That said, I'd far rather have the
> utility of seeing it displayed as a string with garbage at the end
> than have to interpret it as an array of characters. And either way,
> you may still view it as an array by expanding the string node to show
> the underlying view of the SmallVector<> which also lets you see the
> true extent of it.
>
> So it's definitely imperfect, but better than nothing :)

Any thoughts on getting this committed? It's pretty minor but helpful.

Incidentally, I could look at writing a custom debug plugin in the
future to deal better with StringRef and it's relatives in VS.

- Will.