[Lazarus] A simple way to stop the never ending story of long executable?

[Martin Frb]

On 20/05/2017 11:24, Giuliano Colla via Lazarus wrote:
> I had tried in remote times to activate the "use external gdb debug 
> symbols file" option, and it didn't work properly, so I forgot about 
> it. But some time ago I tried again, and now it turns out to work 
> perfectly, at least under Linux.
>
> Wouldn't it be nice to set it active by default?
>
> This could make unnecessary in many cases a different build mode for 
> testing and for deploying, and would stop the complaints about "long 
> executable".

1) It would need a lot of testing.
- On ALL platforms.
- With lots of different versions of gdb
- and with fpdebug
- and with -gl (dump line numbers in traces)
- and with the IDE tool "Leaks and traces", the button "resolve"

2) The statement "make unnecessary in many cases a different build 
mode..." is wrong.
If you are serious about developing or teaching to do so, then I see no 
case where this applies.
Debug mode still needs -Criot -gt -gh  and assertions, and maybe others.

---------------------
Also people complain about the size of a debug free exe too. So the 
problem persists, yet with less people complaining.

Anyway the issue is not to change the size of the debug exe, the issue 
is to make sure people realize that there is debug and release (so the 
benefit from -Criot... in debug too).

If you have ideas how to highlight them better...
Maybe the debug mode can be set to create it's output in a folder named 
debug? Then people who look at the exe will be forced to notice (well, 
some may notice the obvious, others may not)