Debugging Environment on Android (Webkit + Symbols)

Android Debugging

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If you read this, most likely you've tried to debug something on Android and found out it's not as easy as you would have wanted it to be.
Here's a short tutorial, from my memory to get it working. If I forgot something, please write it down in the comments and I will keep this post updated.

First, There are many mistakes that can be made. The documentation/instructions and warnings under Google's Android website are less useful and you can find yourself compiling the whole environment of Android 2.1 on Ubuntu 8.04 (which is a very big mistake, and you'll waste your time - so don't do it!).

Make sure you use latest Ubuntu (I'm not a big fan of Ubuntu, as a Slackware user for the last 10 years, but apt-get just does a good job in this setup) to build latest Android.

Download Android using GIT & REPO:

repo init -u git://android.git.kernel.org/platform/manifest.git -b <version>
e.g : 
repo init -u git://android.git.kernel.org/platform/manifest.git -b eclair

This should take a few hours... ;)

Compile Webkit with debugging flags, I'm quite sure this link was helpful, but I also quite sure there were few mistakes which I don't remember, I do remember it wasn't perfect buildspec.mk so just change it to fit your debugging needs.
The link had the following instructions:
Debug Native C++ Code:

To get meaningful debug info, you do need to build WebCore with -
O0. It is simple. Add the following to your buildspec.mk and rebuild webcore and xml2.

 Use "rm out/target/product/dream/system/build.prop" (zuk's comment: I'm also sure they had path mistakes ;), take that into considerations) to make sure it takes effect.
To rebuild webcore and xml2:
make clean-libwebcore clean-libxml2 && make //DO NOT DO THAT YET!!!

Prepare your environment by downloading all the right packages at once (all in one line! yey!):

sudo apt-get install git-core gnupg sun-java5-jdk flex bison gperf libsdl-dev libreadline5-dev libesd0-dev libwxgtk2.6-dev build-essential zip curl libncurses5-dev zlib1g-dev build-essential

uninstall java, and install java 1.5:
sudo update-java-alternatives -s java-1.5.0-sun

"If you don't have buildspec.mk under the root directory yet, please copy build/buildspec.mk.default to the root (android/)

Change to the following lines :
DEBUG_MODULE_libwebcore:=true
DEBUG_MODULE_libxml2:=true
TARGET_CUSTOM_DEBUG_CFLAGS:=-O0 -mlong-calls
Add "ADDITIONAL_BUILD_PROPERTIES += debug.db.uid=100000" so that it
will wait for you to connect gdb when crashed.

in Webkit folder (for eclair branch only):

git commit / stash
git cherry-pick 18342a41ab72e2c21931afaaab6f1b9bdbedb9fa 

Environment setup (fix paths if needed):

export PATH="/usr/lib/jvm/java-1.5.0-sun-1.5.0.22/:$PATH"
export JAVA_HOME="/usr/lib/jvm/java-1.5.0-sun-1.5.0.22"
export ANDROID_JAVA_HOME=$JAVA_HOME
export PATH=$PATH:$JAVA_HOME/bin
chmod +x ./build/env-setup.sh
source ./build/env-setup.sh #make sure you use the source command and not trying to execute the file itself...
make clean-libwebcore clean-libxml2; make

Now debugging will be made possible using gdbserver, adb and gnu-arm-eabi-gdb client (use latest gdb! they had tons of bug fixes - great job!).
You will also be able to compile native code easily by having Android.mk and executing:

source /path/to/androidhome/build/env-setup.sh;
mm;

Happy debugging