[lldb-dev] Guessing pointed data size

[Greg Clayton]

The simplest way to accomplish this is to either cast the pointer to something:

(lldb) expr (Foo *)0x1230400000

Then you will be able to explore the expression result with the SBValue since it will be a pointer to data in "Foo". If you don't have a "Foo" type you want to cast to, you can make one yourself by creating a type with a '$' as the first character (which makes the type globally available for future expressions:

(lldb) expr
struct $Foo {
    uint32_t stuff[32];
};
return ($Foo *)0x1230400000

You will then be able to explore this. If you use a python command, you will be able to run multiple expressions (the first to lookup the malloc_size(), then second can use the result of the first to create the appropriate type with the appropriate size as the result).

Greg

On Aug 23, 2013, at 5:08 PM, Sebastien Metrot <meeloo at gmail.com> wrote:

> I used that and it works but I have to parse the result string. It's pretty simple but I always prefer to get the return value directly in the C++ API (in a SBValue/SBData kind of way).
> Wouldn't it be possible to have the malloc infos taken into account for SBValue that represent pointers so that we can enumerate the pointed data as children? Of course it could be somewhat wrong be cause the size we get from malloc_size is the block size and not the real size that was asked from malloc but it would probably still be better that having just one value.
> 
> S.
> 
> On 23 Aug 2013, at 02:31 , Greg Clayton <gclayton at apple.com> wrote:
> 
>> Calling a function is easy:
>> 
>> (lldb) expr (size_t)malloc_size(my_ptr)
>> 
>> Your pointer might have to be the exact allocated address, it can't be just any address in a heap allocated block.
>> 
>> LLDB also has utilities that help you with heap stuff:
>> 
>> (lldb) script import lldb.macosx
>> (lldb) malloc_info my_ptr
>> 
>> Or if you want to find a pointer value inside memory:
>> 
>> (lldb) ptr_prefs my_ptr
>> 
>> If LLDB can determine the dynamic type of a block of memory, it might be able to print it for you:
>> 
>> 
>> (lldb) malloc_info --type my_ptr
>> 
>> IF the block is Objective C, you can PO the address of the containing block:
>> 
>> (lldb) malloc_info --po my_ptr
>> 
>> 
>> For all the gory details type "help malloc_info" and "help ptr_refs" for more information.
>> 
>> Greg
>> 
>> 
>> On Aug 22, 2013, at 5:13 PM, Sebastien Metrot <meeloo at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>>> Hello,
>>> 
>>> I'm trying to find a way to guess the size of data that was malloc'd in the debugged process. I know there is an unsupported malloc_size function on MacOSX that is equivalent to _msize on Win32 (not found the equivalent on linux yet) and I'm wondering what would be the best way to call these functions in the debugged process+address space in order to display the data that is pointed to as children of the pointer instead of a single value as of now.
>>> 
>>> I though there was a way call a debuggee function with the lldb API but I haven't found it so I'm starting to think I have just imagined it.
>>> 
>>> S.
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>> 
>