How to import 'GDB' in Python

Question

I am using Python 2.7 and Python 3.1.3. But in my Python I am unable to "import gdb".

It is giving me an error as:

>>> import gdb Traceback (most recent call last):   File "<interactive input>", line 1, in <module> ImportError: No module named gdb >>> 

What's a reason for this? How should I solve this problem?

Answer 1

import gdb only works when your Python code is running within the GDB process. It's not supposed to work from the regular system Python interpreter.

Explanation

• GDB embeds the Python interpreter so it can use Python as an extension language.
• You can't just import gdb from /usr/bin/python like it's an ordinary Python library because GDB isn't structured as a library.
• What you can do is source MY-SCRIPT.py from within gdb (equivalent to running gdb -x MY-SCRIPT.py).

Example Program

Here's a self contained example. Save the file below to t.py:

import gdb gdb.execute('file /bin/cat') o = gdb.execute('disassemble exit', to_string=True) print(o) gdb.execute('quit') 

run:

$ gdb -q -x t.py  

and you'll see the PLT stub for exit() disassembled. On x86-64 Linux:

Dump of assembler code for function exit@plt:    0x0000000000401ae0 <+0>:  jmpq   *0x20971a(%rip)    # 0x60b200 <[email protected]>    0x0000000000401ae6 <+6>:  pushq  $0x3d    0x0000000000401aeb <+11>: jmpq   0x401700 End of assembler dump. 

I've collected some resources on learning the GDB Python API here.