Debugging with GDB: Prompt

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22.1 Prompt

GDB indicates its readiness to read a command by printing a string called the prompt. This string is normally ‘(gdb)’. You can change the prompt string with the set prompt command. For instance, when debugging GDB with GDB, it is useful to change the prompt in one of the GDB sessions so that you can always tell which one you are talking to.

Note: set prompt does not add a space for you after the prompt you set. This allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or a prompt that does not.

set prompt newprompt

Directs GDB to use newprompt as its prompt string henceforth.

show prompt

Prints a line of the form: ‘Gdb's prompt is: your-prompt ’

Versions of GDB that ship with Python scripting enabled have prompt extensions. The commands for interacting with these extensions are:

set extended-prompt prompt

Set an extended prompt that allows for substitutions. See gdb.prompt, for a list of escape sequences that can be used for substitution. Any escape sequences specified as part of the prompt string are replaced with the corresponding strings each time the prompt is displayed.

For example:

set extended-prompt Current working directory: \w (gdb)

Note that when an extended-prompt is set, it takes control of the prompt_hook hook. See prompt_hook, for further information.

show extended-prompt

Prints the extended prompt. Any escape sequences specified as part of the prompt string with set extended-prompt, are replaced with the corresponding strings each time the prompt is displayed.

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