Add iOS crash symbolication skill by kotlarmilos · Pull Request #201 · dotnet/skills

kotlarmilos · 2026-03-04T16:57:57Z

Description

Adds automation, test coverage, and review fixes for the iOS crash symbolication skill.

Automation Script (`Symbolicate-Crash.ps1`)

New 664-line PowerShell script that automates the full .ips crash log symbolication workflow:

Parses two-part .ips JSON format (iOS 15+)
Identifies .NET runtime libraries (libcoreclr, libmonosgen-2.0, libSystem.*) in usedImages
Searches for dSYM debug symbols: user-provided paths → SDK packs → NuGet cache
Verifies UUID match via dwarfdump --uuid
Batch-symbolicates with atos (groups addresses per library for efficiency)
Identifies .NET runtime version by matching UUIDs against local packs
Supports -ParseOnly, -CrashingThreadOnly, -SkipVersionLookup, -DsymSearchPaths

Mirrors the Android sibling's Symbolicate-Tombstone.ps1 for structural parity.

SKILL.md Updates

Added Automation Script and Runtime Version Identification sections
Fixed atos -o to point inside dSYM bundle (Contents/Resources/DWARF/) — not the bundle itself
Added dwarfdump and Symbolicate-Crash.ps1 to INVOKES in frontmatter
Added "MAUI" keyword for trigger matching (matches Android sibling's phrasing)
Wrapped steps under ## Workflow heading for consistency with Android skill
Fixed misleading "rebuild" guidance per @rolfbjarne's review — dSYM mismatch means locating the original build artifacts, not rebuilding

Test Suite (7 scenarios)

Scenario	Tests
Mono crash symbolication	UUID extraction, atos commands, ASI/NullRefException
No .NET frames (pure Swift)	Correctly stops, no false symbolication
CoreCLR crash	Identifies CoreCLR (not Mono), EXC_BAD_ACCESS
NativeAOT crash	Recognizes static linking, libSystem.* BCL libs
Multiple .NET libraries	Distinct UUIDs per library, separate atos calls
ASI field priority	Checks managed exception before native symbolication
Reject Android tombstone	Wrong format detection, suggests Android skill

Validation

Multi-model review (Sonnet 4, GPT-5.1-Codex, Opus 4.5): 4/5 across all 3 models
skill-validator A/B testing: 5/7 scenarios show improvement (NativeAOT +2.0, Android rejection +2.0, ASI priority +1.0, multi-lib +1.0), 2 ties on baseline-strong scenarios
Overfitting score: ✅ 0.12 (low — eval tests outcomes, not skill vocabulary)
All pre-submission checklist items pass: trigger coverage 8/8, stop signals explicit, domain examples present, token budget ~2K (under 4K limit)

Co-author: @steveisok

Co-authored-by: Steve Pfister <steveisok@users.noreply.github.com> Co-authored-by: Copilot <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>

Copilot

Pull request overview

Adds a new ios-crash-symbolication skill under the .NET plugin to guide retrieval and symbolication of iOS .ips crash logs, focused on resolving .NET runtime native frames via dSYMs and atos.

Changes:

Introduces a new skill markdown (SKILL.md) documenting an end-to-end workflow for .ips parsing, runtime image identification, dSYM discovery, and atos invocation.
Adds validation criteria, stop signals, and common pitfalls specific to iOS crash logs and .NET runtime components.

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plugins/dotnet/skills/ios-crash-symbolication/SKILL.md

Co-authored-by: Copilot <175728472+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>

plugins/dotnet/skills/ios-crash-symbolication/SKILL.md

…ation - Add Symbolicate-Crash.ps1 (664 lines): parses .ips JSON, searches local dSYMs (SDK packs, NuGet cache, user paths), verifies UUIDs via dwarfdump, batch-symbolicates with atos, identifies runtime version - Update SKILL.md: add Automation Script and Runtime Version Identification sections, fix atos -o to point inside dSYM bundle, add dwarfdump and MAUI to frontmatter, wrap steps in Workflow heading for consistency with Android sibling, fix misleading 'rebuild' guidance per review feedback (Rolf) - Add eval.yaml with 7 test scenarios: Mono crash, CoreCLR crash, no .NET frames, NativeAOT, multi-library UUIDs, ASI field priority, and Android tombstone rejection - Add 5 .ips test fixture files (two-part JSON format) Co-authored-by: Copilot <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>

…los/skills into feature/ios-crash-symbolication

rolfbjarne · 2026-03-05T11:01:58Z

plugins/dotnet/skills/ios-crash-symbolication/scripts/Symbolicate-Crash.ps1

+            'packs/Microsoft.NETCore.App.Runtime.ios-arm64/*/runtimes/ios-arm64/native'
+            'packs/Microsoft.NETCore.App.Runtime.Mono.ios-arm64/*/runtimes/ios-arm64/native'


This script should handle tvOS, Mac Catalyst and macOS as well, there's no reason to leave them out.

rolfbjarne · 2026-03-05T11:12:29Z

tests/dotnet/apple-crash-symbolication/crash_nativeaot.ips

@@ -0,0 +1,2 @@
+{"app_name":"AotApp","timestamp":"2026-02-25 17:30:00.00 -0800","app_version":"1.0","slice_uuid":"aabbccdd-1122-3344-5566-778899aabbcc","build_version":"1","platform":2,"bundleID":"com.companyname.AotApp","share_with_app_devs":0,"is_first_party":0,"bug_type":"309","os_version":"iPhone OS 18.0 (22A3354)","roots_installed":0,"incident_id":"FFEEDDCC-BBAA-9988-7766-554433221100","name":"AotApp"}


I downloaded this and a few of the other .ips files here, and if I try to open them in the Console app, they're not parsed/displayed as crash reports, but plain text files. This makes me believe they're not properly formatted .ips files. Could original .ips files be used as test input instead?

I have few crash logs, let me replace them.

plugins/dotnet/skills/ios-crash-symbolication/SKILL.md

kotlarmilos · 2026-03-05T10:00:03Z

tests/dotnet/apple-crash-symbolication/crash_coreclr.ips

@@ -0,0 +1,2 @@
+{"app_name":"CoreCLRApp","timestamp":"2026-02-25 15:10:05.00 -0800","app_version":"2.0","slice_uuid":"e1f2a3b4-c5d6-7890-efab-cd1234567890","build_version":"2","platform":2,"bundleID":"com.companyname.CoreCLRApp","share_with_app_devs":0,"is_first_party":0,"bug_type":"309","os_version":"iPhone OS 18.0 (22A3354)","roots_installed":0,"incident_id":"D4E5F6A7-B8C9-0123-DEF4-567890ABCDEF","name":"CoreCLRApp"}


I suggest keeping only one .ips file and removing the others. It should generalize well

Address PR feedback to support all Apple platforms (tvOS, Mac Catalyst, macOS) not just iOS: - Add $appleRids array covering ios, tvos, maccatalyst, and osx RIDs - Refactor Find-Dsym and Find-RuntimeVersion to search all platform packs - Rewrite SKILL.md for orchestration focus and reduced token budget - Extract domain knowledge to references/ips-crash-format.md - Tune eval.yaml: outcome-based rubrics, broad assertions, overfit 0.26 Co-authored-by: Copilot <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>

…cess - Simplify base address cast to [uint64] without manual hex prefix stripping - Use PSObject.Properties check before accessing lastExceptionBacktrace Co-authored-by: Copilot <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>

Add rubric items testing for skill-specific domain knowledge (SDK pack paths, NuGet cache directories) that baseline agents cannot provide. This creates the quality delta needed to pass the 10% improvement threshold while keeping overfit at 0.12 (Low). 3-run validation: 30.1% improvement, 5/7 scenarios positive. Co-authored-by: Copilot <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>

…tion' into feature/ios-crash-symbolication

rolfbjarne · 2026-03-05T19:16:35Z

plugins/dotnet/skills/apple-crash-symbolication/references/ips-crash-format.md

+3. **NuGet cache:** `~/.nuget/packages/microsoft.netcore.app.runtime.<rid>/<version>/runtimes/<rid>/native/`
+4. **NuGet.org:** Download the runtime package and extract
+
+Supported RIDs: `ios-arm64`, `tvos-arm64`, `maccatalyst-arm64`, `maccatalyst-x64`, `osx-arm64`, `osx-x64`.


Technically it would work for the simulator rids as well, if you want to add that. It's not the most common scenario, but it's useful because problems are often easier to diagnose if they're reproducible in the simulator.

Good suggestion. I took it for granted it added them.

Add SKILL.md for iOS crash symbolication process

3db425e

Co-authored-by: Steve Pfister <steveisok@users.noreply.github.com> Co-authored-by: Copilot <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>

kotlarmilos requested review from dbreshears and timheuer as code owners March 4, 2026 16:57

kotlarmilos requested review from Copilot and steveisok March 4, 2026 16:57

kotlarmilos assigned kotlarmilos and steveisok Mar 4, 2026

Copilot started reviewing on behalf of kotlarmilos March 4, 2026 16:58 View session

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Update plugins/dotnet/skills/ios-crash-symbolication/SKILL.md

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Co-authored-by: Copilot <175728472+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>

kotlarmilos had a problem deploying to evaluation March 4, 2026 17:24 — with GitHub Actions Failure

steveisok requested review from Redth and rolfbjarne March 4, 2026 17:58

rolfbjarne reviewed Mar 4, 2026

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kotlarmilos added 4 commits March 5, 2026 10:45

Add iOS crash log and evaluation scenarios for symbolication tests

7a1c949

Merge branch 'feature/ios-crash-symbolication' of github.com:kotlarmi…

d00fce7

…los/skills into feature/ios-crash-symbolication

Remove unused file

ca09a9d

Add CODEOWNERS entry for iOS crash symbolication

34bdfa4

rolfbjarne reviewed Mar 5, 2026

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kotlarmilos commented Mar 5, 2026

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steveisok and others added 4 commits March 5, 2026 11:41

Merge remote-tracking branch 'kotlarmilos/feature/ios-crash-symbolica…

96763f2

…tion' into feature/ios-crash-symbolication

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Add iOS crash symbolication skill#201

Add iOS crash symbolication skill#201
kotlarmilos wants to merge 11 commits intodotnet:mainfrom
kotlarmilos:feature/ios-crash-symbolication

kotlarmilos commented Mar 4, 2026 •

edited by steveisok

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		'packs/Microsoft.NETCore.App.Runtime.ios-arm64/*/runtimes/ios-arm64/native'
		'packs/Microsoft.NETCore.App.Runtime.Mono.ios-arm64/*/runtimes/ios-arm64/native'

		@@ -0,0 +1,2 @@
		{"app_name":"AotApp","timestamp":"2026-02-25 17:30:00.00 -0800","app_version":"1.0","slice_uuid":"aabbccdd-1122-3344-5566-778899aabbcc","build_version":"1","platform":2,"bundleID":"com.companyname.AotApp","share_with_app_devs":0,"is_first_party":0,"bug_type":"309","os_version":"iPhone OS 18.0 (22A3354)","roots_installed":0,"incident_id":"FFEEDDCC-BBAA-9988-7766-554433221100","name":"AotApp"}

		@@ -0,0 +1,2 @@
		{"app_name":"CoreCLRApp","timestamp":"2026-02-25 15:10:05.00 -0800","app_version":"2.0","slice_uuid":"e1f2a3b4-c5d6-7890-efab-cd1234567890","build_version":"2","platform":2,"bundleID":"com.companyname.CoreCLRApp","share_with_app_devs":0,"is_first_party":0,"bug_type":"309","os_version":"iPhone OS 18.0 (22A3354)","roots_installed":0,"incident_id":"D4E5F6A7-B8C9-0123-DEF4-567890ABCDEF","name":"CoreCLRApp"}

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kotlarmilos commented Mar 4, 2026 • edited by steveisok Loading Uh oh! There was an error while loading. Please reload this page.

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Description

Automation Script (Symbolicate-Crash.ps1)

SKILL.md Updates

Test Suite (7 scenarios)

Validation

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Pull request overview

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kotlarmilos commented Mar 4, 2026 •

edited by steveisok

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Automation Script (`Symbolicate-Crash.ps1`)