[webkit-dev] Any way to get a debugging symbols build without compiling?

[Krzysztof Konopko]

On Thu, Apr 08, 2021 at 12:29:01AM -0600, Alemar via webkit-dev wrote:
>
> Hello list,
>

Hi Alemar,

First, a disclaimer:  I'm not a WebKit developer, just another poor
(happy?) soul having a lot of fun (?) trying to integrate it ("fun"
mostly because of everything else, WebKit itself is just too awesome ;D)

> I just joined here because I have a question/problem related to
> WebKitGTK development. I wanted to know if it's possible for you devs
> to also publish or provide builds with debugging symbols?
>

Personally I don't think it's reasonable because of many possible build
configurations (configuration options etc.), storage it takes, toolchain
differences (unless using Flatpak build) etc.

> To give some context: I've spent around 2 days worth of free time this
> week trying to get the standard build to work, and it always
> hangs/crashes my computers when building the JavaSscriptCore files
> (not to mention they seem rather heavy).
>
> This has happened to me on my i7 4790K w/ 16 GB RAM (4C/8T) under both
> Manjaro Linux and Ubuntu 20.10 (I even switched to Manjaro to see if
> it was a lack of resources, but no) and it also happened on a VPS
> server I have rented on SSDNodes (12 vCPUs and 48 GB RAM), it hanged
> so bad that I had to hard-reboot it. I dunno what the code is doing,
> but I don't think I need to have a mainframe to build this, do I?
>

Hm, I just made a GTK debug build which took around 55 minutes on my
Lenovo P52 with Xeon.  Had no issues.

Just followed these:
https://trac.webkit.org/wiki/BuildingGtk
https://trac.webkit.org/wiki/WebKitGTK/Debugging

For simplicity, I used Flatpak based build.

> The question also comes out of frustration: I'm trying to debug a
> "stack smashing detected" issue and to see the call stack I need the
> debugging symbols, otherwise all I see is undefined symbols all
> around.
>
> So, how hard/possible it is for you to provide a build with the
> debugging symbols (since you're the devs and might have already
> reached a checkpoint where you don't have to build the JavaScriptCore
> anymore since builds are incremental) for us poor devs who can't
> afford a more powerful rig and are actually developing apps to bring
> some bread to the table?
>

Personally, being in a similar position to yours, I'm far from expecting
anyone to share debug symbols as typically every dev build is somewhat
unique.  And I can see how much of a burden it could be to provide them.

> Thanks and sorry for my lack of netiquette regarding mailing lists,
> I'm pretty new to using these. I wonder why don't you guys have a
> forum, a discourse, or a way to submit questions/bug that's not an
> email list?
>

https://webkit.org/getting-started/
(see "Staying in Touch")
Slack seems to be active.  There are some people on the IRC channel but
it seems quiet.

I hope this helps,
Kris


This transmission contains information that may be confidential and contain personal views which are not necessarily those of YouView TV Ltd. YouView TV Ltd (Co No:7308805) is a limited liability company registered in England and Wales with its registered address at YouView TV Ltd, 3rd Floor, 10 Lower Thames Street, London, EC3R 6YT. For details see our web site at http://www.youview.com