Delphi Remote Debugger Freezing up

3
votes

I have Windows Server 2008 R2 Machine that is running a Delphi 2007 application. Update: Switching Delphi versions is currently not an option. I have Delphi XE but there are over 300,000 lines of code to review before any switch can occur.

I have run into a problem where I would like to step through the code. I don't want to install Delphi on the machine, so I have installed the remote debugger.

Updated steps to be more complete:

  1. Compile app with Remote Debug Symbols
  2. Copy Application and Remote Debug Symbols to Remote Location.
  3. Launched an Command Prompt (Running As an Administrator) on the Remote Machine.
  4. Enabled Server Firewall exception for rmtdbg105 process.
  5. Run rmtdbg105 -listen in the Command Prompt
  6. I run the process I want to debug.
  7. On my local machine I select attach to process and select the remote process.
  8. Press Attach

Behavior observed: Remote Process locks up and stops running, and so does Delphi on my machine.

I have waited several minutes just in case it caused by some type of network performance problem.

Is there step I am missing? I am looking for a way to get this to work.

2
delphidelphi-2007remote-debugging
May be a dumb question, but you copied the .rsm file to the remote folder with your executable, right? (I know you said "compiled with Remote Symbols", but the copy is a separate step.) - Ken White
Delphi 2007 has one of the least-usable versions of remote-debug that I had ever used. I found Delphi 7 reliable, and Delphi 2009 and XE are reliable, but Delphi 2007 remote debug always had these freeze-ups. - Warren P

2 Answers

1
votes

Move back to Delphi 7, or up to Delphi XE, and try again. [Moving up to XE might be a bit of work, because you need to port your sources up to unicode delphi language level.]

I never did get Delphi 2007 remote debug to work reliably. The freeze-ups you see are something I remember too, when I was using Delphi 2007. I found that it froze less often when the PC had been rebooted recently. After a reboot you might get a few more uses, before you need to reboot again.

0
votes

Did you run the remote debugger from a privileged console? Also check the debugger files against those in Delphi bin directory, IIRC some files has been updated by a patch, but the remote debugger installer wasn't. Try to use the updated files as well. Anyway the 2007 debugger has issue under 7 and I guess it may have as well under 2008 R2, there is an unsupported patch from Embarcadero site, try that too.