Re: Move remote protocol doc to separate chapter?

[Stan Shebs <shebs at apple dot com>]

Andrew Cagney wrote:
> 
> Hello,
> 
> At present the remote protocol documentation is burried in amongst the
> other
> 
> Specifying a Debugging target
> -> Remote debugging
> -> The GDB remote serial protocol
> -> Communication protocol
> 
> Should this external interface be given a chapter of its own?

I've thought about this several times, but haven't yet come to a final
decision on what to do.  If you look at the top-level organization of
the manual, all chapters but one (the configurations chapter) contain
information that applies to all users.  For a native Solaris user, a
chapter on the remote protocol is at best irrelevant, and at worst
misleading (perhaps a user will think that a native Solaris GDB uses
the protocol - going by the queries on bug-gdb, this is not at
all unlikely!).

Second, the standard protocol is supposed to be one of a crowd, which
is why it's documented alongside other target command options.  So
the logic of hierarchic organization says it should be right where
it is now.

On the other hand, the manual should be organized for easy lookup of
of its key information, and the remote protocol is one of those key
areas.  It's also likely to get larger and more detailed over time,
and when the agentexpr.texi file gets merged in as it should (it's
a part of the protocol, eh?), it will be even larger.  So when I
think about it that way, a chapter dedicated to the standard protocol
makes a lot of sense.  It shouldn't be too hard to put lots of
warnings up front - "native users, this doesn't concern you,
nothing to see here, move along to the next chapter please" :-)

Stan