Debugging a Program With dbx

Event-Specific Variables

The following variables are only valid within the body of a when.

$handlerid

During the execution of the body, $handlerid is the id of the when command to which the body belongs. These commands are equivalent:


when X -temp { do_stuff; }
when X  { do_stuff; delete $handlerid; }

$booting

Is set to true if the event occurs during the boot process. Whenever a new program is debugged, it is first run without the user's knowledge so that the list and location of shared libraries can be ascertained. The process is then killed. This sequence is termed booting.

While booting is occurring, all events are still available. Use this variable to distinguish the sync and the syncrtld events occurring during a debug and the ones occurring during a normal run.