i386 x86_64 architecture Assembly language no symbol error - debugging

just started out assembly programming, after compiling it with nasm and when i open the file with gdb ./myfile, (No debugging symbols found in ./sandbox (its my file name))
tried many commands from terminal objdump, nm and all, no debugging symbol found in ./sandbox
ASM code
section .data
section .text
global _start
_start:
nop
; put your experiments between here
; put your experiments between here
nop
section .bss
Code from makefile
sandbox: sandbox.o
ld -m elf_i386 -s -o sandbox sandbox.o
sandbox.o: sandbox.asm
nasm -f elf -g -F dwarf sandbox.asm -l sanbox.lst
error getting from gdb objdump
(No debugging symbols found in ./sandbox (its my file name))

Related

What causes "x.asm:(.text+0xd): undefined reference to `y'"?

For a long time I had not programmed with C and Assembler (about 2 years). Now I have decided to start again but I would like to do something much more complicated. I thought about creating a simple kernel. Now I found this source code on the internet:
boot.asm:
global loader
extern kernel_main
MAGIC equ 0xbad
FLAGS equ 0x3
CHECKSUM equ -(MAGIC+FLAGS)
section .text
align 4
dd MAGIC
dd FLAGS
dd CHECKSUM
loader:
call kernel_main
cli
quit:
hlt
jmp quit
kernel.c:
void print(char *text) {
char *memory = (char*)0xb8000;
while(*text) {
*memory++ = *text++;
*memory++ = 0x3;
}
}
void kernel_main() {
print("My cat sometimes smells like cafe. I love it.");
}
linker.ld:
ENTRY(loader)
SECTIONS {
. = 0x100000;
.text : { *(.text) }
}
Note: I compiled the C file with "GCC" and the Assembler file with "NASM".
If I try this command:
ld -T linker.ld -elf_i386 -o final.bin boot.o kernel.o
It says: "boot.asm:(.text+0xd): undefined reference to `kernel_main'".
How can I fix this?
Im working on windows and do not want to run a VM with Linux or anything. Thanks in advance!
Edit:
This is my GCC command:
gcc -m32 -o kernel.o srckernel.c -nostdlib -nostartfiles -nodefaultlibs
This is my NASM command:
nasm -f elf32 -o boot.o boot.asm
There are a number of things wrong. I will assume given the error:
boot.asm:(.text+0xd): undefined reference to kernel_main
that you are not using an ELF cross compiler and that you are using a GCC compiler that generates native Windows executables (ie. Cygwin and MinGW). I highly recommend the use of an i686 (or x86_64) ELF cross compiler for OS Development especially on Windows.
Your primary problems are:
The option -elf_i386 was probably meant to be -melf_i386 however that is even incorrect. With a GCC that targets windows you will want to use -mi386pe to output as Win32 PE/COFF format. The Windows GCC linker usually doesn't know how to generate ELF executables. I also recommend using the -N option when using LD to output i386pe format. Change your linker command to be:
ld -N -T linker.ld -mi386pe -o final.bin boot.o kernel.o
With Win32 PE/COFF objects1: functions that use the CDECL calling convention have to have an underscore (_) prepended to them. kernel_main needs to be _kernel_main. You need to change these lines in boot.asm from:
extern kernel_main
call kernel_main
to:
extern _kernel_main
call _kernel_main
You don't show how you compile kernel.c and how you assemble boot.asm but they should look similar to:
nasm -f win32 boot.asm -o boot.o
gcc -g -c -m32 -ffreestanding kernel.c -o kernel.o
When you do manage to generate final.bin it is a Windows PE executable. The Multiboot specification requires ELF executables. After linking to final.bin with LD, you can convert final.bin to ELF format with:
objcopy -O elf32-i386 final.bin final.elf
final.elf should now be usable as a Multiboot ELF executable.
There is an issue with your Multiboot header in boot.asm. The Multiboot magic value is 0x1badb002 not 0xbad. Since you haven't specified a video configuration in your Multiboot header FLAGS should not have Bit 1 set, FLAGS should be 0x1 instead of 0x3. Change your Multiboot header from:
MAGIC equ 0xbad
FLAGS equ 0x3
to:
MAGIC equ 0x1badb002
FLAGS equ 0x1
With the changes noted above I was able to generate an ELF executable called final.elf. When run with QEMU using the command:
qemu-system-i386 -kernel final.elf
The output I get is:
Footnotes:
1The extra underscore on function names doesn't apply when generating Win64 PE32+ objects.

are there debugging options for ld

I have written an assembly program that, for testing purposes, just exits. The code is as follows:
section .text
_global start
_start:
mov eax, 1
mov ebx, 0
int 0x80
The program is obviously in 32-bit; however, I am using 1 64-bit processor and operating system, so I compiled it (using nasm) and linked it as follows:
nasm -f elf exit.asm
ld -m elf_i386 -s -o exit exit.o
debugging the program with gdb, I can't list the code since there are no debugging symbols.
(gdb) list
No symbol table is loaded. Use the "file" command.
In using gcc, you can use the options -ggdb to load the symbols while compiling a c file. but since I don't how to use gcc to compile 32-bit assembly for 64-bit machines (I have searched this but can't find a solution,) I am forced to use ld. can I load the debugging symbols using ld? sorry for the long question and the excess information. Thanks in advance.
Debugging information is generated by nasm when you pass -g. Additionally, you also need to specify what type of debugging information you want (typically dwarf), which is done with the -F switch. So to assemble your file, write
nasm -f elf -F dwarf -g file.asm
then link without -s to preserve the symbol table and debugging information:
ld -m elf_i386 -o file file.o
The -s switch tells ld to "strip" the debugging info. Lose that!

yasm writing to PAGEZERO in x86_64 mach-o format

I'm following a assembly book which uses the yasm assembler and ld linker. I'm on OSX 10.12 and I'm trying to assembly to Mach-O format. Unfortunately, I'm receiving a segmentation fault. This is the original .asm file:
BITS 64
segment .data
a dd 4
segment .bss
g resd 1
segment .text
global start
start:
push rbp
mov rbp, rsp
sub rsp, 16
xor eax, eax
leave
ret
I compile it:
yasm -f macho64 -m amd64 -l memory.lst -o memory.o memory.asm
link it:
ld memory.o -o memory
and run it in lldb, I receive this error:
thread #1: tid = 0xb3b4b, 0x0000000000000001, stop reason = EXC_BAD_ACCESS (code=1, address=0x1)
frame #0: 0x0000000000000001
error: error reading data from section __PAGEZERO
In lldb, I ran 'target modules dump sections', and I see that it's __PAGEZERO segment is defined as so:
[0x0000000000000000-0x0000000000001000) --- memory.__PAGEZERO
I looked at a normal Mach-O binary built with clang, and the __PAGEZERO segment looks like this:
[0x0000000000000000-0x0000000100000000) --- test.__PAGEZERO
I then noticed that it's actually the linker that creates the PAGEZERO segment. I believe clang uses a special linker called 'lld'. My question is:
Is my error actually caused by reading from PAGEZERO.
If so, can I tell my linker (ld) to define PAGEZERO in the correct size?
SOLVED: I changed the link command to:
ld memory.o -macosx_version_min 10.12 -lSystem -o memory
This doesn't change the PAGEZERO size, so I'm not sure how it fixed it, but it works now.

NASM debug symbols for Windows?

I am trying to learn x86 assembly on Windows. I can assemble and link a program successfully using:
nasm -f win32 -g sandbox.asm -l sandbox.lst
ld -mi386pe -o sandbox.exe sandbox.obj
But when I try running my program with gdb, it says that it can't find the debug symbols. Nasm says that only the "null" debug symbol format is available for win32. Does this mean that it can't generate debug symbols for windows? If so, then how can I debug my program on windows?
Here is the example program that I am using:
section .data
section .bss
section .text
global start
start:
mov ebp, esp
mov eax, 0
ret
You must specify the debugging format to include in your binary (sometimes there is not one by default)
try -gcv8 instead of -g

Can't link assembly file in Mac OS X using ld

I'm trying to run a basic assembly file using 64 Bit Mac OS X Lion, using nasm and ld which are installed by default with Xcode.
I've written an assembly file, which prints a character, and I got it to build using nasm.
nasm -f elf -o program.o main.asm
However, when I go to link it with ld, it fails with quite a few errors/warnings:
ld -o program program.o
ld: warning: -arch not specified
ld: warning: -macosx_version_min not specificed, assuming 10.7
ld: warning: ignoring file program.o, file was built for unsupported file format which is not the architecture being linked (x86_64)
ld: warning: symbol dyld_stub_binder not found, normally in libSystem.dylib
ld: entry point (start) undefined. Usually in crt1.o for inferred architecture x86_64
So, I tried to rectify a few of these issues, and got nowhere.
Here's one of things I've tried:
ld -arch i386 -e _start -o program program.o
Which I thought would work, but I was wrong.
How do you make the object file a compatible architecture that nasm and ld will agree with?
Also, how would you define the entry point in the program (right now I'm using global _start in .section text, which is above _start, which doesn't seem to do much good.)
I'm a bit confused as to how you would successfully link an object file to a binary file using ld, and I think I'm just missing some code (or argument to nasm or ld) that will make them agree.
Any help appreciated.
You need to use global start and start:, no underscore. Also, you should not be using elf as the arch. Here is a bash script I use to assemble my x86-64 NASM programs on Mac OS X:
#!/bin/bash
if [[ -n "$1" && -f "$1" ]]; then
filename="$1"
base="${filename%%.*}"
ext="${filename##*.}"
nasm -f macho64 -Ox "$filename" \
&& ld -macosx_version_min 10.7 "${base}.o" -o "$base"
fi
If you have a file called foo.s, this script will first run
nasm -f macho64 -Ox foo.s
Which will create foo.o. The -Ox flag makes NASM do some extra optimization with jumps (i.e. making them short, near or far) so that you don't have to do it yourself. I'm using x86-64, so my code is 64-bit, but it looks like you're trying to assemble 32-bit. In that case, you would use -f macho32. See nasm -hf for a list of valid output formats.
Now, the object file will be linked:
ld -macosx_version_min 10.7 foo.o -o foo
I've set the -macosx_version_min option to quiet NASM down and prevent a warning. You don't have to set it to Lion (10.7). This will create an executable called foo. With any luck, typing ./foo and hitting return should run your program.
In regard to the ld: warning: symbol dyld_stub_binder not found, normally in libSystem.dylib warning, I get that every time too and I'm not sure why, but everything seems fine when I run the executable.
OK, looking at your samples I assume you either used a generic nasm or linux assembly tutorial.
The first thing you need to take care of is the binary format created by nasm.
Your post states:
ld: warning: ignoring file program.o, file was built for unsupported file format which is not the architecture being linked (x86_64)
Thats the result of the '-f elf' parameter which tells nasm you want a 32bit ELF object (which would be the case for e.g. linux). But since you're on OSX what you want is a Mach-O object.
Try the following:
nasm -f macho64 -o program.o main.asm
gcc -o program program.o
Or if you wan't to create a 32bit binary:
nasm -f macho32 -o program.o main.asm
gcc -m32 -o program program.o
Regarding the _start symbol - if you wan't to create a simple program that will be able
to use the provided libc system functions then you shouldn't use _start at al.
It's the default entry point ld will look for and normaly it's provided in your libc / libsystem.
I suggest you try to replace the _start in your code by something like '_main'
and link it like the example above states.
A generic libc-based assembly template for nasm could look like this:
;---------------------------------------------------
.section text
;---------------------------------------------------
use32 ; use64 if you create 64bit code
global _main ; export the symbol so ld can find it
_main:
push ebp
mov ebp, esp ; create a basic stack frame
[your code here]
pop ebp ; restore original stack
mov eax, 0 ; store the return code for main in eax
ret ; exit the program
In addition to this I should mention that any call's you do on OSX need to use an aligned stack frame or your code will just crash.
There are some good tutorials on that out there too - try searching for OSX assembly guide.
It's probably easier just to let gcc do the heavy lifting for you, rather than trying to drive ld directly, e.g.
$ gcc -m32 program.o -o program
The mac gcc compiler won't link elf objects. You need a cross compiler...
http://crossgcc.rts-software.org/doku.php?id=compiling_for_linux
Then you can proceed with something similar to this...
/usr/local/gcc-4.8.1-for-linux32/bin/i586-pc-linux-ld -m elf_i386 -T link.ld -o kernel kasm.o kc.o

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