What is the format for debug info in Windows obj files?

Question

I'm messing around with compilers, .obj files, assembly, etc. The .obj file contains info that eventually ends up in the PDB, but I can't find any reference to the format that's used within the debug sections of the .obj file. (I have, however, found a reference to the COFF file format -- so I already know about that).

So: What's the format of the .debug$S and .debug$T sections when the source C file is compiled with the /Zi flag?

Answer 1

This information isn't published (the format used for native PDBs). If you can link the object file into an executable using "link" there are windows "debugging apis" you can use to "interrogate" symbols in an image. However, the format used for object files is not made publicly available.

You could try and reverse engineer it. If you find any info, please share it.