Reading DWARF data from an ELF object file with libelf and libdwarf

Once a descriptor has been created, consumer operations can use it to read the DWARF debugging information from the ELF object file. This section discusses how consumer operations read from an ELF object file using the libelf and libdwarf libraries.

The following diagram shows an overview of the process.

Figure 1. Read from an ELF object file with libelf and libdwarf

An overview of the process to read from an ELF object file using the libelf and libdwarf libraries.

The following table shows the stages of reading from an ELF descriptor with calls to libelf and libdwarf operations.

Stage	Description
Create an ELF descriptor	Create an ELF descriptor for reading. This descriptor will be used to access the DWARF debugging information in the ELF object file. For more information, see Creating an ELF descriptor.
Initialize a `libdwarf` object	Initialize the `Dwarf_Debug` consumer object by calling `dwarf_elf_init`, using the ELF descriptor. `libdwarf` sets up the consumer `libdwarf` object to be able to load debugging information from the ELF descriptor.
Use `libdwarf` APIs	`libdwarf` operations are called to retrieve the DWARF data. For example, `dwarf_get_globals` will retrieve the list of global symbol entries, and `dwarf_get_dies_given_name` will return a list of DIEs in a section that match the given name.
Terminate the `libdwarf` object	`dwarf_finish` is called to terminate the `Dwarf_Debug` object.
Terminate the ELF descriptor	The ELF descriptor is terminated with `elf_end`.