netbsd man page for dbsym

DBSYM(8)						    BSD System Manager's Manual 						  DBSYM(8)

NAME
     dbsym -- copy kernel symbol table into db_symtab space

SYNOPSIS
     dbsym [-v] [-b bfdname] kernel

DESCRIPTION
     dbsym is used to copy the symbol table in a newly linked kernel into the db_symtab array (in the data section) so that the ddb(4) kernel
     debugger can find the symbols.  This program is only used on systems for which the boot program does not load the symbol table into memory
     with the kernel.  The space for these symbols is reserved in the data segment using a config option like:

     options	    SYMTAB_SPACE=72000

     The size of the db_symtab array (the value of SYMTAB_SPACE) must be at least as large as the kernel symbol table.	If insufficient space is
     reserved, dbsym will refuse to copy the symbol table.

     To recognize kernel executable format, the -b flag specifies BFD name of kernel.

     If the -v flag is given, dbsym will print out status information as it is copying the symbol table.

     Note that debugging symbols are not useful to the ddb(4) kernel debugger, so to minimize the size of the kernel, one should either compile
     the kernel without debugging symbols (no -g flag) or use the strip(1) command to strip debugging symbols from the kernel before dbsym is used
     to copy the symbol table.	The command

     strip -d netbsd

     will strip out debugging symbols.

SEE ALSO
     strip(1), ddb(4)

BSD
								 November 9, 2001							       BSD