When I remotely debug applications running in foreign countries, I always feel that X (and ssh -Y) are miraculous inventions. Unix gives a divine feeling of ubiquity.
You should look up how Plan 9 handles debugging, you just import /proc from the remove machine, and run the debugger locally.
This works even across different architectures, and the debugger is completely network unware, is all handled transparently by the file system interface to processes.
Some goes for the window system, which also works across the network even when it knows nothing about networks.
Comments
When I remotely debug applications running in foreign countries, I always feel that X (and ssh -Y) are miraculous inventions. Unix gives a divine feeling of ubiquity.
Way too few people know about and understand X forwarding.
I'm not a linux guy at all, and it saddens me when I am the one to teach (supposedly advanced and technical) linux users about X forwarding.
You should look up how Plan 9 handles debugging, you just import /proc from the remove machine, and run the debugger locally.
This works even across different architectures, and the debugger is completely network unware, is all handled transparently by the file system interface to processes.
Some goes for the window system, which also works across the network even when it knows nothing about networks.
See this paper by Rob Pike about how to design window systems: http://doc.cat-v.org/bell_labs/transparent_wsys/