DBGHELP: user32.pdb - file not found

[herge]

Hi All:

I have a corrupt user32.pdb file.
I have deleted user32.pdb.
Is there any way that I can create the
user32.pdb myself?

[sinsi]

Hi herge:

Where did you get the .pdb from?
It's usually produced by a linker.

You can get the Windows .pdb's from the MS symbol server - download the whole set (muchos megs) or windbg/ida/whatever can download them on the fly.

[herge]

Hi sinsi:

You are right sinsi Windows Symbols XP2 is a measly
204 MB. I think it took a couple of Days to download
from Microsoft.
I tried re-installing but that did not work.

Regards Herge

[sinsi]

You also need to let your debugger know where they are.
After much trial and error, I got windbg to find mine - the help file is twisted but (in the end) helpful.
Any other debugger, you are on your own (sorry).

[herge]

 Hi sinsi:

I find that using the
.sym noisy
comes in handy it shows where
windbg is looking for pdb files.
Also a simple text editor like
notepad comes in handy for
setting up paths to symbols,
and source and image files.
You can't see the bytes you
type in the little window in
windbg. So I paste them in
from a notepad file. Now you
can the typing mistakes.

Regards Herge

[herge]

hi All:
It should be
!sym noisy

Regards herge

[sinsi]

G'day herge, merry xmas

In my 'environment variables' I have:
_NT_SYMBOL_PATH=srv*c:\utils\symbols*http://msdl.microsoft.com/download/symbols

Now "c:\utils\symbols" is my own dir, it has subdirs called e.g. "C:\Utils\symbols\kernel32.pdb\34560E80F5C54175B208848EF863C5BD2"
Every time I use windbg or ida it gets the latest .pdb file from msdn, and it can have multiple copies (I have 3 other *long number* subdirs for kernel32.pdb)