how to know if a binary contains debugging symbols or not without file, objdump or gdb?

Question

I need to know whether a binary has debugging symbols in it or not. Its a production system and so doesnt have commands like file or objdump or gdb.

Can provide more info when needed.

OS: Debian

Answer 1

probably you are looking for a tool like objdump

Lets say we have a small program like this

#include <stdio.h>

int main()
{
    printf("Hello ");
    return 0;
}

compile normally now

gcc example.c -o example

now lets check presence of debugging symbols using objdump tool

objdump -h example | grep debug

we won't find any of course

now lets try again by compiling with debug options

gcc -g example.c -o example
objdump -h example | grep debug
 26 .debug_aranges 00000030  0000000000000000  0000000000000000  000008b0  2**0
 27 .debug_pubnames 0000001b  0000000000000000  0000000000000000  000008e0  2**0
 28 .debug_info   0000008b  0000000000000000  0000000000000000  000008fb  2**0
 29 .debug_abbrev 0000003f  0000000000000000  0000000000000000  00000986  2**0
 30 .debug_line   0000003f  0000000000000000  0000000000000000  000009c5  2**0
 31 .debug_str    00000087  0000000000000000  0000000000000000  00000a04  2**0
 32 .debug_pubtypes 00000012  0000000000000000  0000000000000000  00000a8b  2**0

man -a objdump might help a lot more