I recently read about using GCC's code generation features (specifically, the -finstrument-functions compiler flag) to easily add instrumentation to my programs. I thought it sounded really cool and went to try it out on a previous C++ project. After several revisions of my patch, I found that any time I tried to use an STL container or print to stdout using C++ stream I/O, my program would immediately crash with a segfault. My first idea was to maintain a std::list
of Event
structs
typedef struct
{
unsigned char event_code;
intptr_t func_addr;
intptr_t caller_addr;
pthread_t thread_id;
timespec ts;
}Event;
list<Event> events;
which would be written to a file when the program terminated. GDB told me that when I tried to add an Event
to the list, calling events.push_back(ev)
itself initiated an instrumentation call. This wasn't terrible surprising and made sense after I thought about it for a bit, so on to plan 2.
The example in the blog which got me involved in all this mess didn't do anything crazy, it simply wrote a string to a file using fprintf()
. I didn't think there would be any harm in using C++'s stream-based I/O instead of the older (f)printf()
, but that assumption proved to be wrong. This time, instead of a nearly-infinite death spiral, GDB reported a fairly normal-looking descent into the standard library... followed by a segfault.
A Short Example
#include <list>
#include <iostream>
#include <stdio.h>
using namespace std;
extern "C" __attribute__ ((no_instrument_function)) void __cyg_profile_func_enter(void*, void*);
list<string> text;
extern "C" void __cyg_profile_func_enter(void* /* unused */, void* /* unused */)
{
// Method 1
text.push_back("NOPE");
// Method 2
cout << "This explodes" << endl;
// Method 3
printf("This works!");
}
Sample GDB Backtrace
Method 1
#0 _int_malloc (av=0x7ffff7380720, bytes=29) at malloc.c:3570
#1 0x00007ffff704ca45 in __GI___libc_malloc (bytes=29) at malloc.c:2924
#2 0x00007ffff7652ded in operator new(unsigned long) ()
from /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6
#3 0x00007ffff763ba89 in std::string::_Rep::_S_create(unsigned long, unsigned long, std::allocator<char> const&) () from /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6
#4 0x00007ffff763d495 in char* std::string::_S_construct<char const*>(char const*, char const*, std::allocator<char> const&, std::forward_iterator_tag) () from /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6
#5 0x00007ffff763d5e3 in std::basic_string<char, std::char_traits<char>, std::allocator<char> >::basic_string(char const*, std::allocator<char> const&) () from /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6
#6 0x00000000004028c1 in __cyg_profile_func_enter () at src/instrumentation.cpp:82
#7 0x0000000000402c6f in std::move<std::string&> (__t=...) at /usr/include/c++/4.6/bits/move.h:82
#8 0x0000000000402af5 in std::list<std::string, std::allocator<std::string> >::push_back(std::string&&) (this=0x6055c0, __x=...) at /usr/include/c++/4.6/bits/stl_list.h:993
#9 0x00000000004028d2 in __cyg_profile_func_enter () at src/instrumentation.cpp:82
#10 0x0000000000402c6f in std::move<std::string&> (__t=...) at /usr/include/c++/4.6/bits/move.h:82
#11 0x0000000000402af5 in std::list<std::string, std::allocator<std::string> >::push_back(std::string&&) (this=0x6055c0, __x=...) at /usr/include/c++/4.6/bits/stl_list.h:993
#12 0x00000000004028d2 in __cyg_profile_func_enter () at src/instrumentation.cpp:82
#13 0x0000000000402c6f in std::move<std::string&> (__t=...) at /usr/include/c++/4.6/bits/move.h:82
#14 0x0000000000402af5 in std::list<std::string, std::allocator<std::string> >::push_back(std::string&
...
Method 2
#0 0x00007ffff76307d1 in std::ostream::sentry::sentry(std::ostream&) ()
from /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6
#1 0x00007ffff7630ee9 in std::basic_ostream<char, std::char_traits<char> >& std::__ostream_insert<char, std::char_traits<char> >(std::basic_ostream<char, std::char_traits<char> >&, char const*, long) ()
from /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6
#2 0x00007ffff76312ef in std::basic_ostream<char, std::char_traits<char> >& std::operator<< <std::char_traits<char> >(std::basic_ostream<char, std::char_traits<char> >&, char const*) ()
from /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6
#3 0x000000000040251e in __cyg_profile_func_enter () at src/instrumentation.cpp:81
#4 0x000000000040216d in _GLOBAL__sub_I__ZN8GLWindow7attribsE () at src/glwindow.cpp:164
#5 0x0000000000402f2d in __libc_csu_init ()
#6 0x00007ffff6feb700 in __libc_start_main (main=0x402cac <main()>, argc=1, ubp_av=0x7fffffffe268,
init=0x402ed0 <__libc_csu_init>, fini=<optimized out>, rtld_fini=<optimized out>,
stack_end=0x7fffffffe258) at libc-start.c:185
#7 0x0000000000401589 in _start ()
Environment:
- Ubuntu Linux 12.04 (x64)
- GCC 4.6.3
- Intel 3750K CPU
- 8GB RAM