Breakpad is a library and tool suite that allows you to distribute an application to users with compiler-provided debugging information removed, record crashes in compact "minidump" files, send them back to your server, and produce C and C++ stack traces from these minidumps. Breakpad can also write minidumps on request for programs that have not crashed.
Breakpad has three main components:
The client is a library that you include in your application. It can write minidump files capturing the current threads' state and the identities of the currently loaded executable and shared libraries. You can configure the client to write a minidump when a crash occurs, or when explicitly requested.
The symbol dumper is a program that reads the debugging information produced by the compiler and produces a symbol file, in Breakpad's own format.
The processor is a program that reads a minidump file, finds the appropriate symbol files for the versions of the executables and shared libraries the minidump mentions, and produces a human-readable C/C++ stack trace.
(excerpt from Google Breakpad's wiki)
