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0 pointsjjoonathan7y ago0 comments

Nah, gradparent is not a wizard, just someone who has spent a lot of time in a single relatively simple environment that is mostly under their control. It's a beautiful thing when it happens. Most aren't so lucky.

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thedirt01157y ago

+1 to the above, it's just a different environment. I haven't used a debugger at my current (mostly Python) job at all, whereas at a previous job in C++, I was using gdb practically every day.

tropo7y ago

He is taking after Linus Torvalds, who resisted adding a kernel debugger for many years. Linus used console spew, PC speaker beeps, and storing a hash of file/line into the PC's time/date.

jjoonathanOP7y ago

... who resisted adding a kernel debugger for the explicit purpose of keeping casuals out of his zen garden, per your link below.

For people who don't have a hoard of elite developers banging down their gates to contribute code for free, I suspect the economics of being such a Prima Donna are not as attractive.

hackcasual7y ago

That's less not needing a debugger by design, more how challenging it is to debug an operating system.

tropo7y ago

Those last two (speaker and clock) yes, but otherwise no. Linus Torvalds really doesn't like using a debugger and he'd rather you didn't use one either. His words:

https://yarchive.net/comp/linux/debuggers.html

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thedirt01157y ago

+1 to the above, it's just a different environment. I haven't used a debugger at my current (mostly Python) job at all, whereas at a previous job in C++, I was using gdb practically every day.

tropo7y ago

He is taking after Linus Torvalds, who resisted adding a kernel debugger for many years. Linus used console spew, PC speaker beeps, and storing a hash of file/line into the PC's time/date.

jjoonathanOP7y ago

... who resisted adding a kernel debugger for the explicit purpose of keeping casuals out of his zen garden, per your link below.

For people who don't have a hoard of elite developers banging down their gates to contribute code for free, I suspect the economics of being such a Prima Donna are not as attractive.

hackcasual7y ago

That's less not needing a debugger by design, more how challenging it is to debug an operating system.

tropo7y ago

Those last two (speaker and clock) yes, but otherwise no. Linus Torvalds really doesn't like using a debugger and he'd rather you didn't use one either. His words:

https://yarchive.net/comp/linux/debuggers.html

2 more replies

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse