Subject: maxima debug feature? - or how to accomplish same
From: Max B
Date: Mon, 18 Oct 2010 08:19:43 -0700 (PDT)
Thanks to all who replied to my post about?a maxima debugger.
I spent some of last week installing slime, and some of it investigating
?trace... the maxima/lisp language?is more complex than I thought.
One purpose I had in mind when I installed the source code was to obtain hints
that are comments in the source, but direct one to bibliographic reference
material.
Cheers!
________________________________
From: Leo Butler <l.butler at ed.ac.uk>
To: Max B <txtmax at yahoo.ca>
Cc: maxima at math.utexas.edu
Sent: Sun, October 10, 2010 7:01:45 PM
Subject: Re: [Maxima] maxima debug feature? - or how to accomplish same
On Sun, 10 Oct 2010, Max B wrote:
<
< Hi,
<
< Thanks for Maxima - it is a great tool!? :)
<
< I am curious about how it operates; function call tree etc.? For example:
identify the functions that are called when the user inputs '2+2;', or
< 'collectterms(expand(sbs));'.? Unfortunately, maxima is written in lisp and I
can't seem to debug it.?? Tools with which I am familiar include gdb, the printf
< function, and the cpp macros __LINE__ etc.
<
< I do have the maxima-5.21.1 source code, and have managed to compile it.?
<
< I have resolved to insert lines of code like 'at line __LINE__ in function
__FUNC__' (or similar) into the functions in which I am interested, but cannot
discover the
< syntax of lisp that would allow me to announce watchpoints like printf.
<
< So in my desperation I thought to email this listserv to ask for help.
Maxima can be run using either the (default) Maxima reader or the Lisp
reader. The functions to_lisp() and (to-maxima) switch between readers.
The reason I say this is because you can run the Maxima package with
the Lisp reader on inside of, eg. SLIME. This is an Emacs mode that
gives you gdb-like features to step through code (more precisely, it
is similar to gdb-mode in Emacs).
Take some time and learn Lisp. At the very least you will discover
a language that throws many of your pre-conceptions about how things
ought to be done out the window.
Oh yeah, I think you will find this list is pretty friendly, so there
is no need to apologise for asking a question.
Leo
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