how to debug "deep" crashes in Android?

I've been trying to debug an android crash that is occurring without a Java Stack Trace... Java Stack Trace bugs are very easy for me to fix... but this bug I'm getting seems to be crashing inside the "NDK" or whatever it is the deep internals of Android are called... I've made no modifications to the NDK btw... I just dunno what else to call that layer hehe.

Anyway I'm mainly looking for advice on deep-debug methods, rather than help with this specific problem... because I doubt I can post all the source code involved... so really I just need to know how to set breakpoints at the deep layers or whatever other methods there are to trace deep-crashes to their source... so I will briefly describe the bug and then post a LogCat.

I have an app with 7 Activities

Activity_INTRO
Activity_EULA
Activity_MAIN
Activity_Contact
Activity_News
Activity_Library
Activity_More

INTRO is the initiating one... it fades in some company logos... after displaying them for a set time it jumps to the EULA activity... after the user accepts the EULA, it jumps to MAIN... MAIN then creates a TabHost and populates it with the 4 remaining activities

now heres the thing... when I click on say, the More tab of the TabHost, the app pauses for a few seconds and then hard-crashes... no java stack trace, but an actual ASM level trace with the registers and IP and stack... the same thing occurs no matter which tab I select, Contact, News, Library, More... all of them crash with the same hard-crash

if however I set the manifest to start the app at Activity_MAIN, bypassing the INTRO and EULA, then these crashes do not occur... so something is lingering from those opening activities that is somehow hosing the TabHost'ed Activities... and I'm wondering what the hell that could be... because I'm using finish() on those activites when they need to jump... in fact here is how I'm doing it let me know if you see any bugs:

when jumping from INTRO to EULA I do:

//Display the EULA

Intent newIntent = new Intent (avi, Activity_EULA.class);

startActivity (newIntent);

finish();



and EULA to MAIN:

Intent newIntent = new Intent (this, Activity_Main.class);

startActivity (newIntent);

finish();

anyway, here is the hard crash log... please let me know if there is some way I can reverse engineer either /system/lib/libcutils.so or /system/lib/libandroid_runtime.so, because I think the crash is happening in one of them... i think its happening in the libandroid_runtime in fact.... anyway on to the log:

12-25 00:56:07.322: INFO/DEBUG(551): *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** ***

12-25 00:56:07.332: INFO/DEBUG(551): Build fingerprint: 'generic/sdk/generic/:1.5/CUPCAKE/150240:eng/test-keys'

12-25 00:56:07.362: INFO/DEBUG(551): pid: 722, tid: 723  >>> com.killerapps.chokes <<<

12-25 00:56:07.362: INFO/DEBUG(551): signal 11 (SIGSEGV), fault addr 00000004

12-25 00:56:07.362: INFO/DEBUG(551):  r0 00000004  r1 40021800  r2 00000004  r3 ad3296c5

12-25 00:56:07.372: INFO/DEBUG(551):  r4 00000000  r5 00000000  r6 ad342da5  r7 41039fb8

12-25 00:56:07.372: INFO/DEBUG(551):  r8 100ffcb0  r9 41039fb0  10 41e014a0  fp 00001071

12-25 00:56:07.382: INFO/DEBUG(551):  ip ad35b874  sp 100ffc98  lr ad3296cf  pc afb045a8  cpsr 00000010

12-25 00:56:07.552: INFO/DEBUG(551):          #00  pc 000045a8  /system/lib/libcutils.so

12-25 00:56:07.572: INFO/DEBUG(551):          #01  lr ad3296cf  /system/lib/libandroid_runtime.so

12-25 00:56:07.582: INFO/DEBUG(551): stack:

12-25 00:56:07.582: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc58  00000000  

12-25 00:56:07.592: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc5c  001c5278  [heap]

12-25 00:56:07.602: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc60  000000da  

12-25 00:56:07.602: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc64  0016c778  [heap]

12-25 00:56:07.602: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc68  100ffcc8  

12-25 00:56:07.602: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc6c  001c5278  [heap]

12-25 00:56:07.612: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc70  427d1ac0  

12-25 00:56:07.612: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc74  000000c1  

12-25 00:56:07.612: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc78  40021800  

12-25 00:56:07.612: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc7c  000000c2  

12-25 00:56:07.612: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc80  00000000  

12-25 00:56:07.612: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc84  00000000  

12-25 00:56:07.622: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc88  00000000  
开发者_高级运维
12-25 00:56:07.622: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc8c  00000000  

12-25 00:56:07.622: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc90  df002777  

12-25 00:56:07.632: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc94  e3a070ad  

12-25 00:56:07.632: INFO/DEBUG(551): #00 100ffc98  00000000  

12-25 00:56:07.632: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffc9c  ad3296cf  /system/lib/libandroid_runtime.so

12-25 00:56:07.632: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffca0  100ffcd0  

12-25 00:56:07.642: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffca4  ad342db5  /system/lib/libandroid_runtime.so

12-25 00:56:07.642: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffca8  410a79d0  

12-25 00:56:07.642: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffcac  ad00e3b8  /system/lib/libdvm.so

12-25 00:56:07.652: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffcb0  410a79d0  

12-25 00:56:07.652: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffcb4  0016bac0  [heap]

12-25 00:56:07.662: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffcb8  ad342da5  /system/lib/libandroid_runtime.so

12-25 00:56:07.662: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffcbc  40021800  

12-25 00:56:07.662: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffcc0  410a79d0  

12-25 00:56:07.662: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffcc4  afe39dd0  

12-25 00:56:07.662: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffcc8  100ffcd0  

12-25 00:56:07.662: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffccc  ad040a8d  /system/lib/libdvm.so

12-25 00:56:07.672: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffcd0  41039fb0  

12-25 00:56:07.672: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffcd4  420000f8  

12-25 00:56:07.672: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffcd8  ad342da5  /system/lib/libandroid_runtime.so

12-25 00:56:07.672: INFO/DEBUG(551):     100ffcdc  100ffd48  

12-25 00:56:07.852: DEBUG/dalvikvm(722): GC freed 367 objects / 15144 bytes in 210ms

12-25 00:56:08.081: DEBUG/InetAddress(722): www.akillerapp.com: 74.86.47.202 (family 2, proto 6)

12-25 00:56:08.242: DEBUG/dalvikvm(722): GC freed 62 objects / 2328 bytes in 122ms

12-25 00:56:08.771: DEBUG/dalvikvm(722): GC freed 245 objects / 11744 bytes in 179ms

12-25 00:56:09.131: INFO/ActivityManager(577): Process com.killerapps.chokes (pid 722) has died.

12-25 00:56:09.171: INFO/WindowManager(577): WIN DEATH: Window{43719320 
com.killerapps.chokes/com.killerapps.chokes.Activity_Main paused=false}

12-25 00:56:09.251: INFO/DEBUG(551): debuggerd committing suicide to free the zombie!

12-25 00:56:09.291: DEBUG/Zygote(553): Process 722 terminated by signal (11)

12-25 00:56:09.311: INFO/DEBUG(781): debuggerd: Jun 30 2009 17:00:51

12-25 00:56:09.331: WARN/InputManagerService(577): Got RemoteException sending 
setActive(false) notification to pid 722 uid 10020

That crash appears to be from the Android firmware. It should not be possible for an SDK developer to cause one of these, and so it means there is a bug either in Android or your device.

If you can create a test project that reliably reproduces this crash, open an issue on http://b.android.com and attach it, along with your core dump trace shown above and any other useful information. Ordinarily, I would say you should search b.android.com first, but I don't know what bits of the trace are sufficiently distinctive to determine if your crash has been reported before or not.

because I'm using finish() on those activites when they need to jump...

I'm not 100% certain, but I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to call finish() like that when you pass on control from one activity to another. Try removing the call to finish() and see if that makes it any better. It might not be this causing your error, but it's at least worth a shot.