#### 8.21.3 Directives for debugging information

mips ecoff `as` supports several directives used for generating debugging information which are not support by traditional mips assemblers. These are `.def`, `.endef`, `.dim`, `.file`, `.scl`, `.size`, `.tag`, `.type`, `.val`, `.stabd`, `.stabn`, and `.stabs`. The debugging information generated by the three `.stab` directives can only be read by gdb, not by traditional mips debuggers (this enhancement is required to fully support C++ debugging). These directives are primarily used by compilers, not assembly language programmers!