Goals:
• To gain an understanding of assembly
• To get your hands dirty in GDB
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
C program compilation
Overview of the Binary Bomb Lab
Assembly basics
GDB basics
GDB “bug”
GDB demo
Assembly/C comparison practice
• Steps to building an executable file from a C source code file:
1.
Preprocessing: the preprocessor takes a C source code file and
replaces preprocessor directives with source code
• For example, #include and #define precede preprocessor
directives
2. Compilation: the compiler produces an object file based on the output
of the preprocessor
3. Assembling: conversion from assembly to machine instructions
4. Linking: the linker takes the object files produced by the compiler and
combines them to produce a library or an executable file
• If one is available, running the Makefile (using the command
“make”) can do these steps for you
• Alternatively, you could use the “gcc” command
• Dr. Evil has created a series of so-called “binary bombs” for
you to defuse by determining the password needed to prevent
an “explosion” from occurring
• You will only be given your bomb’s .o file because giving you the source
code would make this lab far too easy
• You will be expected to look at the assembly dump of this file to help
you determine the passwords
• It may be useful to learn how to set breakpoints to prevent explosions
• Each time you allow the bomb to explode, you will lose ¼ point
• Capped at 10 points lost
• Each phase is worth 10 points out of a total of 60 points
• movl Souce, Destination
• Ex: can move immediate value to a register or to memory, can move a
register value to another register or to memory, can move memory to a
register
• CANNOT move memory to memory
• leal Souce, Destination
• Commonly used for computing arithmetic expressions
• Ex: leal (%eax, %eax, 2), %eax would be the assembly version of C
code that looks something like the following: x = x + x*2
• cmpl Reg1, Reg2: Reg2 “relation” Reg1
• jmpl Label
• Could be of the form j“relation” (Ex: jle or jg or je)
• addl Souce, Destination: Dest = Dest + Src
• subl Souce, Destination: Dest = Dest - Src
•
•
•
•
•
%esp: stack pointer
%ebp: stack base pointer
%eax: function return value
%ebx, %ecx, %edx: general-purpose registers
%eip: instruction pointer (program counter)
•
•
•
•
0x8(%edx) => 0x8+%edx
(%edx, %ecx) => %edx + %ecx
(%edx, %ecx, 4) => %edx + 4*%ecx
0x8( , %edx, 2) => 2*%edx + 0x8
• Command line debugging tool
• Available on many different platforms
• Useful outside of classroom setting
• Allows you to trace a program in execution and
set breakpoints along the way
• Gives you a chance to inspect register contents and
the assembly breakdown of your executable
• When setting a breakpoint, GDB replaces the
instruction at which you are breaking with the
expression “int3” as an indicator of a system
interrupt so that the program will pause at that
point when it is running
• As a quick fix, please do the following:
• Within GDB: (gdb) set code-cache off
• As a permanent fix, please do the following:
• Command line: $ echo "set code-cache off" >> ~/.gdbinit
•
•
•
•
break: sets break point at specified location
print: prints a specified variable or register’s value
stepi: steps through one instruction in assembly
nexti: steps through one instruction, including function
calls
• disas: show the disassembly of the current code
• continue: continues execution after stopping at a
break point
• quit: exit gdb
•
•
•
•
•
disas [function]
disas *address
info break
info registers
x/* address: display contents of memory
• x/ 4x address: display 4 32-bit hex numbers starting at address
(Practice problem was adapted from Professor Mohamed Zahran’s practice exam)