Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-lcc!pyramid!amdahl!kim
From: kim@amdahl.uts.amdahl.com (Kim DeVaughn)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: SDB minor bugs, and 1st impressions
Message-ID: <23532@amdahl.uts.amdahl.com>
Date: 2 Mar 88 07:21:52 GMT
Organization: Amdahl Corporation,  Sunnyvale, CA 94086
Lines: 56
Keywords: Pretty durn nice!


[ For all you do ... this line's for you ... ]

Well, the Manx 3.6a update, along with SDB showed up the other day.  Very
nice package!  And contrary to what I had been told back in October, the
library sources *were* indeed included.  I'm pleased that Manx honored what
I felt were the terms of the "Commercial" package.

I've only had a chance to work with SDB a little bit, but have found what
I think are a couple of (minor) bugs.  Since I can never seem to get the
(West Coast) support BBS to answer, I'm posting them here.  Hopefully, Jim
will see them.


  1 - I tried starting SDB on the "pi" demo program, using the -a command
      line option (start in assembly mode), stepped thru a few instructions,
      and then gave it a "z" command (change mode).  I got the "source mode
      on" message, but SDB seemed to be hung ... wouldn't respond to any
      command.  Gave it a few ^C's, which didn't *seem* to do anything, but
      as I was about to boot the machine, the SDB window closed (this was
      maybe 30 seconds after the ^C's).  Alas, the CLI where I started SDB
      from was now "hung", and wouldn't respond to any input.  Had to go
      ahead and reboot to clear the condition.

  2 - When a non-zero exit() function is executed [say, "exit(-1);" or
      "exit(10);"], the message in the display window is: "Program
      terminated normally, exit(0)."  Hmmmm ...


Neither of these are a big deal ... just thought I'd mention them.  I am
impressed with what I've seen of SDB, as well as the Demo's that were
provided ... that should be a big help to people that have never used a
SLD.

Also, many thanks for providing convenient way of changing the color usage
to suit one's own setup!  With a little playing around, I've found a couple
of pleasing and effective combinations of *my* normal colors.  Wish that I
could specify the color of the command-line cursor independently, though.
I wish *all* authors would provide a similar level of "customizeability" in
their software!  Nice job, Jim!

One other suggestion for a future release ... have the -p option (set prompt
string) apply to the windowed mode, as well as the non-windowed mode.  I've
zapped my working copy from "CMD?" to "cmd>", which I think looks better with
my color scheme.  Also, how about putting a space between the prompt, and the
actual command?

/kim



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