PR python/13599:
[deliverable/binutils-gdb.git] / gdb / NEWS
CommitLineData
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1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
3
8d5b6c2b 4*** Changes since GDB 7.4
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6* Python scripting
7
8 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" is now deleted.
9
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10 ** A new class, gdb.printing.FlagEnumerationPrinter, can be used to
11 apply "flag enum"-style pretty-printing to any enum.
12
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13 ** gdb.lookup_symbol can now work when there is no current frame.
14
15 ** gdb.Symbol now has a 'line' attribute, holding the line number in
16 the source at which the symbol was defined.
17
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18* GDBserver now supports stdio connections.
19 E.g. (gdb) target remote | ssh myhost gdbserver - hello
20
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21* The binary "gdbtui" can no longer be built or installed.
22 Use "gdb -tui" instead.
23
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24* GDB will now print "flag" enums specially. A flag enum is one where
25 all the enumerator values have no bits in common when pairwise
26 "and"ed. When printing a value whose type is a flag enum, GDB will
27 show all the constants, e.g., for enum E { ONE = 1, TWO = 2}:
28 (gdb) print (enum E) 3
29 $1 = (ONE | TWO)
30
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31* The filename part of a linespec will now match trailing components
32 of a source file name. For example, "break gcc/expr.c:1000" will
33 now set a breakpoint in build/gcc/expr.c, but not
34 build/libcpp/expr.c.
35
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36* The "info proc" and "generate-core-file" commands will now also
37 work on remote targets connected to GDBserver on Linux.
38
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39* The command "info catch" has been removed. It has been disabled
40 since December 2007.
41
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42* New commands
43
44 ** "catch load" and "catch unload" can be used to stop when a shared
45 library is loaded or unloaded, respectively.
46
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47*** Changes in GDB 7.4
48
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49* GDB now handles ambiguous linespecs more consistently; the existing
50 FILE:LINE support has been expanded to other types of linespecs. A
51 breakpoint will now be set on all matching locations in all
52 inferiors, and locations will be added or removed according to
53 inferior changes.
54
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55* GDB now allows you to skip uninteresting functions and files when
56 stepping with the "skip function" and "skip file" commands.
57
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58* GDB has two new commands: "set remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit"
59 and "show remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit". These allows to
60 set or show the maximum length limit (in bytes) of a remote
61 target hardware watchpoint.
62
63 This allows e.g. to use "unlimited" hardware watchpoints with the
64 gdbserver integrated in Valgrind version >= 3.7.0. Such Valgrind
65 watchpoints are slower than real hardware watchpoints but are
66 significantly faster than gdb software watchpoints.
67
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68* Python scripting
69
32d1c362 70 ** The register_pretty_printer function in module gdb.printing now takes
7d0aff21 71 an optional `replace' argument. If True, the new printer replaces any
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72 existing one.
73
3a7bf607 74 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" command has been
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75 deprecated and will be deleted in GDB 7.5.
76 A new command: "set python print-stack none|full|message" has
77 replaced it. Additionally, the default for "print-stack" is
78 now "message", which just prints the error message without
79 the stack trace.
3a7bf607 80
baacfb07 81 ** A prompt substitution hook (prompt_hook) is now available to the
3a7bf607 82 Python API.
713389e0 83
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84 ** A new Python module, gdb.prompt has been added to the GDB Python
85 modules library. This module provides functionality for
baacfb07 86 escape sequences in prompts (used by set/show
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87 extended-prompt). These escape sequences are replaced by their
88 corresponding value.
89
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90 ** Python commands and convenience-functions located in
91 'data-directory'/python/gdb/command and
92 'data-directory'/python/gdb/function are now automatically loaded
93 on GDB start-up.
94
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95 ** Blocks now provide four new attributes. global_block and
96 static_block will return the global and static blocks
97 respectively. is_static and is_global are boolean attributes
98 that indicate if the block is one of those two types.
99
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100 ** Symbols now provide the "type" attribute, the type of the symbol.
101
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102 ** The "gdb.breakpoint" function has been deprecated in favor of
103 "gdb.breakpoints".
104
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105 ** A new class "gdb.FinishBreakpoint" is provided to catch the return
106 of a function. This class is based on the "finish" command
107 available in the CLI.
108
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109 ** Type objects for struct and union types now allow access to
110 the fields using standard Python dictionary (mapping) methods.
111 For example, "some_type['myfield']" now works, as does
112 "some_type.items()".
113
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114 ** A new event "gdb.new_objfile" has been added, triggered by loading a
115 new object file.
116
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117 ** A new function, "deep_items" has been added to the gdb.types
118 module in the GDB Python modules library. This function returns
119 an iterator over the fields of a struct or union type. Unlike
120 the standard Python "iteritems" method, it will recursively traverse
121 any anonymous fields.
122
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123* MI changes
124
125 ** "*stopped" events can report several new "reason"s, such as
126 "solib-event".
127
128 ** Breakpoint changes are now notified using new async records, like
129 "=breakpoint-modified".
130
131 ** New command -ada-task-info.
132
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133* libthread-db-search-path now supports two special values: $sdir and $pdir.
134 $sdir specifies the default system locations of shared libraries.
135 $pdir specifies the directory where the libpthread used by the application
136 lives.
137
138 GDB no longer looks in $sdir and $pdir after it has searched the directories
139 mentioned in libthread-db-search-path. If you want to search those
140 directories, they must be specified in libthread-db-search-path.
141 The default value of libthread-db-search-path on GNU/Linux and Solaris
142 systems is now "$sdir:$pdir".
143
144 $pdir is not supported by gdbserver, it is currently ignored.
145 $sdir is supported by gdbserver.
146
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147* New configure option --with-iconv-bin.
148 When using the internationalization support like the one in the GNU C
149 library, GDB will invoke the "iconv" program to get a list of supported
150 character sets. If this program lives in a non-standard location, one can
151 use this option to specify where to find it.
152
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153* When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
154 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports masked hardware
155 watchpoints, which specify a mask in addition to an address to watch.
156 The mask specifies that some bits of an address (the bits which are
157 reset in the mask) should be ignored when matching the address accessed
158 by the inferior against the watchpoint address. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
159 section in the user manual for more details.
160
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161* The new option --once causes GDBserver to stop listening for connections once
162 the first connection is made. The listening port used by GDBserver will
163 become available after that.
164
71eba9c2 165* New commands "info macros" and "alias" have been added.
edc84990 166
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167* New function parameters suffix @entry specifies value of function parameter
168 at the time the function got called. Entry values are available only since
169 gcc version 4.7.
170
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171* New commands
172
173!SHELL COMMAND
174 "!" is now an alias of the "shell" command.
175 Note that no space is needed between "!" and SHELL COMMAND.
176
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177* Changed commands
178
179watch EXPRESSION mask MASK_VALUE
180 The watch command now supports the mask argument which allows creation
181 of masked watchpoints, if the current architecture supports this feature.
182
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183info auto-load-scripts [REGEXP]
184 This command was formerly named "maintenance print section-scripts".
185 It is now generally useful and is no longer a maintenance-only command.
186
71eba9c2 187info macro [-all] [--] MACRO
188 The info macro command has new options `-all' and `--'. The first for
189 printing all definitions of a macro. The second for explicitly specifying
190 the end of arguments and the beginning of the macro name in case the macro
191 name starts with a hyphen.
192
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193collect[/s] EXPRESSIONS
194 The tracepoint collect command now takes an optional modifier "/s"
195 that directs it to dereference pointer-to-character types and
196 collect the bytes of memory up to a zero byte. The behavior is
197 similar to what you see when you use the regular print command on a
198 string. An optional integer following the "/s" sets a bound on the
199 number of bytes that will be collected.
200
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201tstart [NOTES]
202 The trace start command now interprets any supplied arguments as a
203 note to be recorded with the trace run, with an effect similar to
204 setting the variable trace-notes.
205
206tstop [NOTES]
207 The trace stop command now interprets any arguments as a note to be
208 mentioned along with the tstatus report that the trace was stopped
209 with a command. The effect is similar to setting the variable
210 trace-stop-notes.
211
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212* Tracepoints can now be enabled and disabled at any time after a trace
213 experiment has been started using the standard "enable" and "disable"
214 commands. It is now possible to start a trace experiment with no enabled
215 tracepoints; GDB will display a warning, but will allow the experiment to
216 begin, assuming that tracepoints will be enabled as needed while the trace
217 is running.
218
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219* Fast tracepoints on 32-bit x86-architectures can now be placed at
220 locations with 4-byte instructions, when they were previously
221 limited to locations with instructions of 5 bytes or longer.
222
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223* New options
224
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225set extended-prompt
226show extended-prompt
227 Set the GDB prompt, and allow escape sequences to be inserted to
228 display miscellaneous information (see 'help set extended-prompt'
229 for the list of sequences). This prompt (and any information
230 accessed through the escape sequences) is updated every time the
231 prompt is displayed.
232
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233set print entry-values (both|compact|default|if-needed|no|only|preferred)
234show print entry-values
235 Set printing of frame argument values at function entry. In some cases
236 GDB can determine the value of function argument which was passed by the
237 function caller, even if the value was modified inside the called function.
238
239set debug entry-values
240show debug entry-values
241 Control display of debugging info for determining frame argument values at
242 function entry and virtual tail call frames.
243
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244set basenames-may-differ
245show basenames-may-differ
246 Set whether a source file may have multiple base names.
247 (A "base name" is the name of a file with the directory part removed.
248 Example: The base name of "/home/user/hello.c" is "hello.c".)
249 If set, GDB will canonicalize file names (e.g., expand symlinks)
250 before comparing them. Canonicalization is an expensive operation,
251 but it allows the same file be known by more than one base name.
252 If not set (the default), all source files are assumed to have just
253 one base name, and gdb will do file name comparisons more efficiently.
254
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255set trace-user
256show trace-user
257set trace-notes
258show trace-notes
259 Set a user name and notes for the current and any future trace runs.
260 This is useful for long-running and/or disconnected traces, to
261 inform others (or yourself) as to who is running the trace, supply
262 contact information, or otherwise explain what is going on.
263
264set trace-stop-notes
265show trace-stop-notes
266 Set a note attached to the trace run, that is displayed when the
267 trace has been stopped by a tstop command. This is useful for
268 instance as an explanation, if you are stopping a trace run that was
269 started by someone else.
270
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271* New remote packets
272
273QTEnable
274
275 Dynamically enable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
276
277QTDisable
278
279 Dynamically disable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
280
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281QTNotes
282
283 Set the user and notes of the trace run.
284
285qTP
286
287 Query the current status of a tracepoint.
288
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289qTMinFTPILen
290
291 Query the minimum length of instruction at which a fast tracepoint may
292 be placed.
293
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294* Dcache size (number of lines) and line-size are now runtime-configurable
295 via "set dcache line" and "set dcache line-size" commands.
296
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297* New targets
298
299Texas Instruments TMS320C6x tic6x-*-*
300
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301* New Simulators
302
303Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
304
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305*** Changes in GDB 7.3.1
306
307* The build failure for NetBSD and OpenBSD targets have now been fixed.
308
d6e00af6 309*** Changes in GDB 7.3
797054e6 310
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311* GDB has a new command: "thread find [REGEXP]".
312 It finds the thread id whose name, target id, or thread extra info
313 matches the given regular expression.
314
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315* The "catch syscall" command now works on mips*-linux* targets.
316
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317* The -data-disassemble MI command now supports modes 2 and 3 for
318 dumping the instruction opcodes.
319
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320* New command line options
321
322-data-directory DIR Specify DIR as the "data-directory".
323 This is mostly for testing purposes.
324
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325* The "maint set python auto-load on|off" command has been renamed to
326 "set auto-load-scripts on|off".
327
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328* GDB has a new command: "set directories".
329 It is like the "dir" command except that it replaces the
330 source path list instead of augmenting it.
331
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332* GDB now understands thread names.
333
334 On GNU/Linux, "info threads" will display the thread name as set by
335 prctl or pthread_setname_np.
336
337 There is also a new command, "thread name", which can be used to
338 assign a name internally for GDB to display.
339
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340* OpenCL C
341 Initial support for the OpenCL C language (http://www.khronos.org/opencl)
342 has been integrated into GDB.
343
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344* Python scripting
345
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346 ** The function gdb.Write now accepts an optional keyword 'stream'.
347 This keyword, when provided, will direct the output to either
348 stdout, stderr, or GDB's logging output.
349
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350 ** Parameters can now be be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
351 you may implement the get_set_doc and get_show_doc functions.
352 This improves how Parameter set/show documentation is processed
353 and allows for more dynamic content.
354
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355 ** Symbols, Symbol Table, Symbol Table and Line, Object Files,
356 Inferior, Inferior Thread, Blocks, and Block Iterator APIs now
357 have an is_valid method.
358
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359 ** Breakpoints can now be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
360 you may implement a 'stop' function that is executed each time
361 the inferior reaches that breakpoint.
362
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363 ** New function gdb.lookup_global_symbol looks up a global symbol.
364
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365 ** GDB values in Python are now callable if the value represents a
366 function. For example, if 'some_value' represents a function that
367 takes two integer parameters and returns a value, you can call
368 that function like so:
369
370 result = some_value (10,20)
371
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372 ** Module gdb.types has been added.
373 It contains a collection of utilities for working with gdb.Types objects:
374 get_basic_type, has_field, make_enum_dict.
375
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376 ** Module gdb.printing has been added.
377 It contains utilities for writing and registering pretty-printers.
378 New classes: PrettyPrinter, SubPrettyPrinter,
379 RegexpCollectionPrettyPrinter.
380 New function: register_pretty_printer.
381
382 ** New commands "info pretty-printers", "enable pretty-printer" and
383 "disable pretty-printer" have been added.
384
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385 ** gdb.parameter("directories") is now available.
386
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387 ** New function gdb.newest_frame returns the newest frame in the
388 selected thread.
389
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390 ** The gdb.InferiorThread class has a new "name" attribute. This
391 holds the thread's name.
392
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393 ** Python Support for Inferior events.
394 Python scripts can add observers to be notified of events
824446ad 395 occurring in the process being debugged.
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396 The following events are currently supported:
397 - gdb.events.cont Continue event.
398 - gdb.events.exited Inferior exited event.
399 - gdb.events.stop Signal received, and Breakpoint hit events.
400
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401* C++ Improvements:
402
403 ** GDB now puts template parameters in scope when debugging in an
404 instantiation. For example, if you have:
405
406 template<int X> int func (void) { return X; }
407
408 then if you step into func<5>, "print X" will show "5". This
409 feature requires proper debuginfo support from the compiler; it
410 was added to GCC 4.5.
411
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412 ** The motion commands "next", "finish", "until", and "advance" now
413 work better when exceptions are thrown. In particular, GDB will
414 no longer lose control of the inferior; instead, the GDB will
415 stop the inferior at the point at which the exception is caught.
416 This functionality requires a change in the exception handling
417 code that was introduced in GCC 4.5.
418
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419* GDB now follows GCC's rules on accessing volatile objects when
420 reading or writing target state during expression evaluation.
421 One notable difference to prior behavior is that "print x = 0"
422 no longer generates a read of x; the value of the assignment is
423 now always taken directly from the value being assigned.
424
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425* GDB now has some support for using labels in the program's source in
426 linespecs. For instance, you can use "advance label" to continue
427 execution to a label.
428
429* GDB now has support for reading and writing a new .gdb_index
430 section. This section holds a fast index of DWARF debugging
431 information and can be used to greatly speed up GDB startup and
432 operation. See the documentation for `save gdb-index' for details.
433
b56df873 434* The "watch" command now accepts an optional "-location" argument.
14c0d4e1 435 When used, this causes GDB to watch the memory referred to by the
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436 expression. Such a watchpoint is never deleted due to it going out
437 of scope.
438
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439* GDB now supports thread debugging of core dumps on GNU/Linux.
440
441 GDB now activates thread debugging using the libthread_db library
442 when debugging GNU/Linux core dumps, similarly to when debugging
443 live processes. As a result, when debugging a core dump file, GDB
444 is now able to display pthread_t ids of threads. For example, "info
445 threads" shows the same output as when debugging the process when it
446 was live. In earlier releases, you'd see something like this:
447
448 (gdb) info threads
449 * 1 LWP 6780 main () at main.c:10
450
451 While now you see this:
452
453 (gdb) info threads
454 * 1 Thread 0x7f0f5712a700 (LWP 6780) main () at main.c:10
455
456 It is also now possible to inspect TLS variables when debugging core
457 dumps.
458
459 When debugging a core dump generated on a machine other than the one
460 used to run GDB, you may need to point GDB at the correct
461 libthread_db library with the "set libthread-db-search-path"
462 command. See the user manual for more details on this command.
463
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464* When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
465 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports ranged breakpoints,
466 which stop execution of the inferior whenever it executes an instruction
467 at any address within the specified range. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
468 section in the user manual for more details.
469
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470* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
471
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472 ** GDBserver is now supported on PowerPC LynxOS (versions 4.x and 5.x),
473 and i686 LynxOS (version 5.x).
248c9dbc 474
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475 ** GDBserver is now supported on Blackfin Linux.
476
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477* New native configurations
478
479ia64 HP-UX ia64-*-hpux*
480
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481* New targets:
482
483Analog Devices, Inc. Blackfin Processor bfin-*
484
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485* Ada task switching is now supported on sparc-elf targets when
486 debugging a program using the Ravenscar Profile. For more information,
487 see the "Tasking Support when using the Ravenscar Profile" section
488 in the GDB user manual.
489
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490* Guile support was removed.
491
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492* New features in the GNU simulator
493
494 ** The --map-info flag lists all known core mappings.
495
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496 ** CFI flashes may be simulated via the "cfi" device.
497
76b8507d 498*** Changes in GDB 7.2
bfbf3774 499
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500* Shared library support for remote targets by default
501
502 When GDB is configured for a generic, non-OS specific target, like
503 for example, --target=arm-eabi or one of the many *-*-elf targets,
504 GDB now queries remote stubs for loaded shared libraries using the
505 `qXfer:libraries:read' packet. Previously, shared library support
506 was always disabled for such configurations.
507
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508* C++ Improvements:
509
510 ** Argument Dependent Lookup (ADL)
511
512 In C++ ADL lookup directs function search to the namespaces of its
513 arguments even if the namespace has not been imported.
514 For example:
515 namespace A
516 {
517 class B { };
518 void foo (B) { }
519 }
520 ...
521 A::B b
522 foo(b)
523 Here the compiler will search for `foo' in the namespace of 'b'
524 and find A::foo. GDB now supports this. This construct is commonly
525 used in the Standard Template Library for operators.
526
527 ** Improved User Defined Operator Support
528
529 In addition to member operators, GDB now supports lookup of operators
530 defined in a namespace and imported with a `using' directive, operators
531 defined in the global scope, operators imported implicitly from an
532 anonymous namespace, and the ADL operators mentioned in the previous
533 entry.
534 GDB now also supports proper overload resolution for all the previously
535 mentioned flavors of operators.
536
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537 ** static const class members
538
539 Printing of static const class members that are initialized in the
540 class definition has been fixed.
541
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542* Windows Thread Information Block access.
543
544 On Windows targets, GDB now supports displaying the Windows Thread
545 Information Block (TIB) structure. This structure is visible either
546 by using the new command `info w32 thread-information-block' or, by
547 dereferencing the new convenience variable named `$_tlb', a
548 thread-specific pointer to the TIB. This feature is also supported
549 when remote debugging using GDBserver.
550
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551* Static tracepoints
552
553 Static tracepoints are calls in the user program into a tracing
554 library. One such library is a port of the LTTng kernel tracer to
555 userspace --- UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer, http://lttng.org/ust).
556 When debugging with GDBserver, GDB now supports combining the GDB
557 tracepoint machinery with such libraries. For example: the user can
558 use GDB to probe a static tracepoint marker (a call from the user
559 program into the tracing library) with the new "strace" command (see
560 "New commands" below). This creates a "static tracepoint" in the
561 breakpoint list, that can be manipulated with the same feature set
562 as fast and regular tracepoints. E.g., collect registers, local and
563 global variables, collect trace state variables, and define
564 tracepoint conditions. In addition, the user can collect extra
565 static tracepoint marker specific data, by collecting the new
566 $_sdata internal variable. When analyzing the trace buffer, you can
567 inspect $_sdata like any other variable available to GDB. For more
568 information, see the "Tracepoints" chapter in GDB user manual. New
569 remote packets have been defined to support static tracepoints, see
570 the "New remote packets" section below.
571
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572* Better reconstruction of tracepoints after disconnected tracing
573
574 GDB will attempt to download the original source form of tracepoint
575 definitions when starting a trace run, and then will upload these
576 upon reconnection to the target, resulting in a more accurate
577 reconstruction of the tracepoints that are in use on the target.
578
579* Observer mode
580
581 You can now exercise direct control over the ways that GDB can
582 affect your program. For instance, you can disallow the setting of
583 breakpoints, so that the program can run continuously (assuming
584 non-stop mode). In addition, the "observer" variable is available
585 to switch all of the different controls; in observer mode, GDB
586 cannot affect the target's behavior at all, which is useful for
587 tasks like diagnosing live systems in the field.
588
589* The new convenience variable $_thread holds the number of the
590 current thread.
591
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592* New remote packets
593
594qGetTIBAddr
595
596 Return the address of the Windows Thread Information Block of a given thread.
597
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598qRelocInsn
599
600 In response to several of the tracepoint packets, the target may now
601 also respond with a number of intermediate `qRelocInsn' request
602 packets before the final result packet, to have GDB handle
603 relocating an instruction to execute at a different address. This
604 is particularly useful for stubs that support fast tracepoints. GDB
605 reports support for this feature in the qSupported packet.
606
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607qTfSTM, qTsSTM
608
609 List static tracepoint markers in the target program.
610
611qTSTMat
612
613 List static tracepoint markers at a given address in the target
614 program.
615
616qXfer:statictrace:read
617
618 Read the static trace data collected (by a `collect $_sdata'
619 tracepoint action). The remote stub reports support for this packet
620 to gdb's qSupported query.
621
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SS
622QAllow
623
624 Send the current settings of GDB's permission flags.
625
626QTDPsrc
627
628 Send part of the source (textual) form of a tracepoint definition,
629 which includes location, conditional, and action list.
630
3f7b2faa
DE
631* The source command now accepts a -s option to force searching for the
632 script in the source search path even if the script name specifies
633 a directory.
634
d337e9f0
PA
635* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
636
0fb4aa4b
PA
637 - GDBserver now support tracepoints (including fast tracepoints, and
638 static tracepoints). The feature is currently supported by the
639 i386-linux and amd64-linux builds. See the "Tracepoints support
640 in gdbserver" section in the manual for more information.
641
642 GDBserver JIT compiles the tracepoint's conditional agent
643 expression bytecode into native code whenever possible for low
644 overhead dynamic tracepoints conditionals. For such tracepoints,
645 an expression that examines program state is evaluated when the
646 tracepoint is reached, in order to determine whether to capture
647 trace data. If the condition is simple and false, processing the
648 tracepoint finishes very quickly and no data is gathered.
649
650 GDBserver interfaces with the UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer) library
651 for static tracepoints support.
d337e9f0 652
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PM
653 - GDBserver now supports x86_64 Windows 64-bit debugging.
654
c8d5aac9
L
655* GDB now sends xmlRegisters= in qSupported packet to indicate that
656 it understands register description.
657
7c953934
TT
658* The --batch flag now disables pagination and queries.
659
8685c86f
L
660* X86 general purpose registers
661
662 GDB now supports reading/writing byte, word and double-word x86
663 general purpose registers directly. This means you can use, say,
664 $ah or $ax to refer, respectively, to the byte register AH and
665 16-bit word register AX that are actually portions of the 32-bit
666 register EAX or 64-bit register RAX.
667
95a42b64 668* The `commands' command now accepts a range of breakpoints to modify.
86b17b60
PA
669 A plain `commands' following a command that creates multiple
670 breakpoints affects all the breakpoints set by that command. This
671 applies to breakpoints set by `rbreak', and also applies when a
672 single `break' command creates multiple breakpoints (e.g.,
673 breakpoints on overloaded c++ functions).
95a42b64 674
8bd10a10
CM
675* The `rbreak' command now accepts a filename specification as part of
676 its argument, limiting the functions selected by the regex to those
677 in the specified file.
678
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PA
679* Support for remote debugging Windows and SymbianOS shared libraries
680 from Unix hosts has been improved. Non Windows GDB builds now can
681 understand target reported file names that follow MS-DOS based file
682 system semantics, such as file names that include drive letters and
683 use the backslash character as directory separator. This makes it
684 possible to transparently use the "set sysroot" and "set
685 solib-search-path" on Unix hosts to point as host copies of the
686 target's shared libraries. See the new command "set
687 target-file-system-kind" described below, and the "Commands to
688 specify files" section in the user manual for more information.
689
6149aea9
PA
690* New commands
691
f1421989
HZ
692eval template, expressions...
693 Convert the values of one or more expressions under the control
694 of the string template to a command line, and call it.
695
ab38a727
PA
696set target-file-system-kind unix|dos-based|auto
697show target-file-system-kind
698 Set or show the assumed file system kind for target reported file
699 names.
700
6149aea9
PA
701save breakpoints <filename>
702 Save all current breakpoint definitions to a file suitable for use
703 in a later debugging session. To read the saved breakpoint
704 definitions, use the `source' command.
705
706`save tracepoints' is a new alias for `save-tracepoints'. The latter
707is now deprecated.
708
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PA
709info static-tracepoint-markers
710 Display information about static tracepoint markers in the target.
711
712strace FN | FILE:LINE | *ADDR | -m MARKER_ID
713 Define a static tracepoint by probing a marker at the given
714 function, line, address, or marker ID.
715
ca11e899
SS
716set observer on|off
717show observer
718 Enable and disable observer mode.
719
720set may-write-registers on|off
721set may-write-memory on|off
722set may-insert-breakpoints on|off
723set may-insert-tracepoints on|off
724set may-insert-fast-tracepoints on|off
725set may-interrupt on|off
726 Set individual permissions for GDB effects on the target. Note that
727 some of these settings can have undesirable or surprising
728 consequences, particularly when changed in the middle of a session.
729 For instance, disabling the writing of memory can prevent
730 breakpoints from being inserted, cause single-stepping to fail, or
731 even crash your program, if you disable after breakpoints have been
732 inserted. However, GDB should not crash.
733
734set record memory-query on|off
735show record memory-query
736 Control whether to stop the inferior if memory changes caused
737 by an instruction cannot be recorded.
738
53a71c06
CR
739* Changed commands
740
741disassemble
742 The disassemble command now supports "start,+length" form of two arguments.
743
f3e9a817
PM
744* Python scripting
745
9279c692
JB
746** GDB now provides a new directory location, called the python directory,
747 where Python scripts written for GDB can be installed. The location
748 of that directory is <data-directory>/python, where <data-directory>
749 is the GDB data directory. For more details, see section `Scripting
750 GDB using Python' in the manual.
751
adc36818 752** The GDB Python API now has access to breakpoints, symbols, symbol
595939de
PM
753 tables, program spaces, inferiors, threads and frame's code blocks.
754 Additionally, GDB Parameters can now be created from the API, and
755 manipulated via set/show in the CLI.
f870a310 756
fa33c3cd 757** New functions gdb.target_charset, gdb.target_wide_charset,
07ca107c
DE
758 gdb.progspaces, gdb.current_progspace, and gdb.string_to_argv.
759
760** New exception gdb.GdbError.
fa33c3cd
DE
761
762** Pretty-printers are now also looked up in the current program space.
f3e9a817 763
967cf477
DE
764** Pretty-printers can now be individually enabled and disabled.
765
8a1ea21f
DE
766** GDB now looks for names of Python scripts to auto-load in a
767 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts', in addition to looking
768 for a OBJFILE-gdb.py script when OBJFILE is read by the debugger.
769
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VP
770* Tracepoint actions were unified with breakpoint commands. In particular,
771there are no longer differences in "info break" output for breakpoints and
772tracepoints and the "commands" command can be used for both tracepoints and
773regular breakpoints.
774
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PA
775* New targets
776
777ARM Symbian arm*-*-symbianelf*
778
6aecb9c2
JB
779* D language support.
780 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the D programming
781 language.
782
431e49aa
TJB
783* GDB now supports the extended ptrace interface for PowerPC which is
784 available since Linux kernel version 2.6.34. This automatically enables
785 any hardware breakpoints and additional hardware watchpoints available in
786 the processor. The old ptrace interface exposes just one hardware
787 watchpoint and no hardware breakpoints.
788
789* GDB is now able to use the Data Value Compare (DVC) register available on
790 embedded PowerPC processors to implement in hardware simple watchpoint
791 conditions of the form:
792
793 watch ADDRESS|VARIABLE if ADDRESS|VARIABLE == CONSTANT EXPRESSION
794
795 This works in native GDB running on Linux kernels with the extended ptrace
796 interface mentioned above.
797
bfbf3774 798*** Changes in GDB 7.1
abc7453d 799
4eef138c
TT
800* C++ Improvements
801
802 ** Namespace Support
71dee663
SW
803
804 GDB now supports importing of namespaces in C++. This enables the
805 user to inspect variables from imported namespaces. Support for
806 namepace aliasing has also been added. So, if a namespace is
807 aliased in the current scope (e.g. namepace C=A; ) the user can
808 print variables using the alias (e.g. (gdb) print C::x).
809
4eef138c
TT
810 ** Bug Fixes
811
812 All known bugs relating to the printing of virtual base class were
813 fixed. It is now possible to call overloaded static methods using a
814 qualified name.
815
816 ** Cast Operators
817
818 The C++ cast operators static_cast<>, dynamic_cast<>, const_cast<>,
819 and reinterpret_cast<> are now handled by the C++ expression parser.
820
2d1c1221
ME
821* New targets
822
823Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze-*-*
34207b9e 824Renesas RX rx-*-elf
2d1c1221
ME
825
826* New Simulators
827
828Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze
34207b9e 829Renesas RX rx
2d1c1221 830
6c95b8df
PA
831* Multi-program debugging.
832
833 GDB now has support for multi-program (a.k.a. multi-executable or
834 multi-exec) debugging. This allows for debugging multiple inferiors
835 simultaneously each running a different program under the same GDB
836 session. See "Debugging Multiple Inferiors and Programs" in the
837 manual for more information. This implied some user visible changes
838 in the multi-inferior support. For example, "info inferiors" now
839 lists inferiors that are not running yet or that have exited
840 already. See also "New commands" and "New options" below.
841
d5551862
SS
842* New tracing features
843
844 GDB's tracepoint facility now includes several new features:
845
846 ** Trace state variables
f61e138d
SS
847
848 GDB tracepoints now include support for trace state variables, which
849 are variables managed by the target agent during a tracing
850 experiment. They are useful for tracepoints that trigger each
851 other, so for instance one tracepoint can count hits in a variable,
852 and then a second tracepoint has a condition that is true when the
853 count reaches a particular value. Trace state variables share the
854 $-syntax of GDB convenience variables, and can appear in both
855 tracepoint actions and condition expressions. Use the "tvariable"
856 command to create, and "info tvariables" to view; see "Trace State
857 Variables" in the manual for more detail.
7a697b8d 858
d5551862 859 ** Fast tracepoints
7a697b8d
SS
860
861 GDB now includes an option for defining fast tracepoints, which
862 targets may implement more efficiently, such as by installing a jump
863 into the target agent rather than a trap instruction. The resulting
864 speedup can be by two orders of magnitude or more, although the
865 tradeoff is that some program locations on some target architectures
866 might not allow fast tracepoint installation, for instance if the
867 instruction to be replaced is shorter than the jump. To request a
868 fast tracepoint, use the "ftrace" command, with syntax identical to
869 the regular trace command.
870
d5551862
SS
871 ** Disconnected tracing
872
873 It is now possible to detach GDB from the target while it is running
874 a trace experiment, then reconnect later to see how the experiment
875 is going. In addition, a new variable disconnected-tracing lets you
876 tell the target agent whether to continue running a trace if the
877 connection is lost unexpectedly.
878
00bf0b85
SS
879 ** Trace files
880
881 GDB now has the ability to save the trace buffer into a file, and
882 then use that file as a target, similarly to you can do with
883 corefiles. You can select trace frames, print data that was
884 collected in them, and use tstatus to display the state of the
885 tracing run at the moment that it was saved. To create a trace
886 file, use "tsave <filename>", and to use it, do "target tfile
887 <name>".
4daf5ac0
SS
888
889 ** Circular trace buffer
890
891 You can ask the target agent to handle the trace buffer as a
892 circular buffer, discarding the oldest trace frames to make room for
893 newer ones, by setting circular-trace-buffer to on. This feature may
894 not be available for all target agents.
895
21a0512e
PP
896* Changed commands
897
898disassemble
899 The disassemble command, when invoked with two arguments, now requires
900 the arguments to be comma-separated.
901
0fe7935b
DJ
902info variables
903 The info variables command now displays variable definitions. Files
904 which only declare a variable are not shown.
905
fb2e7cb4
JB
906source
907 The source command is now capable of sourcing Python scripts.
908 This feature is dependent on the debugger being build with Python
909 support.
910
911 Related to this enhancement is also the introduction of a new command
912 "set script-extension" (see below).
913
6c95b8df
PA
914* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
915
399cd161
MS
916record save [<FILENAME>]
917 Save a file (in core file format) containing the process record
918 execution log for replay debugging at a later time.
919
920record restore <FILENAME>
921 Restore the process record execution log that was saved at an
922 earlier time, for replay debugging.
923
6c95b8df
PA
924add-inferior [-copies <N>] [-exec <FILENAME>]
925 Add a new inferior.
926
927clone-inferior [-copies <N>] [ID]
928 Make a new inferior ready to execute the same program another
929 inferior has loaded.
930
931remove-inferior ID
932 Remove an inferior.
933
934maint info program-spaces
935 List the program spaces loaded into GDB.
936
9a7071a8
JB
937set remote interrupt-sequence [Ctrl-C | BREAK | BREAK-g]
938show remote interrupt-sequence
939 Allow the user to select one of ^C, a BREAK signal or BREAK-g
940 as the sequence to the remote target in order to interrupt the execution.
941 Ctrl-C is a default. Some system prefers BREAK which is high level of
942 serial line for some certain time. Linux kernel prefers BREAK-g, a.k.a
943 Magic SysRq g. It is BREAK signal and character 'g'.
944
945set remote interrupt-on-connect [on | off]
946show remote interrupt-on-connect
947 When interrupt-on-connect is ON, gdb sends interrupt-sequence to
948 remote target when gdb connects to it. This is needed when you debug
949 Linux kernel.
950
951set remotebreak [on | off]
952show remotebreak
953Deprecated. Use "set/show remote interrupt-sequence" instead.
954
f61e138d
SS
955tvariable $NAME [ = EXP ]
956 Create or modify a trace state variable.
957
958info tvariables
959 List trace state variables and their values.
960
961delete tvariable $NAME ...
962 Delete one or more trace state variables.
963
6da95a67
SS
964teval EXPR, ...
965 Evaluate the given expressions without collecting anything into the
966 trace buffer. (Valid in tracepoint actions only.)
967
7a697b8d
SS
968ftrace FN / FILE:LINE / *ADDR
969 Define a fast tracepoint at the given function, line, or address.
970
b0f02ee9
JK
971* New expression syntax
972
973 GDB now parses the 0b prefix of binary numbers the same way as GCC does.
974 GDB now parses 0b101010 identically with 42.
975
6c95b8df
PA
976* New options
977
978set follow-exec-mode new|same
979show follow-exec-mode
980 Control whether GDB reuses the same inferior across an exec call or
981 creates a new one. This is useful to be able to restart the old
982 executable after the inferior having done an exec call.
983
236f1d4d
SS
984set default-collect EXPR, ...
985show default-collect
986 Define a list of expressions to be collected at each tracepoint.
987 This is a useful way to ensure essential items are not overlooked,
988 such as registers or a critical global variable.
989
d5551862
SS
990set disconnected-tracing
991show disconnected-tracing
992 If set to 1, the target is instructed to continue tracing if it
993 loses its connection to GDB. If 0, the target is to stop tracing
994 upon disconnection.
995
4daf5ac0
SS
996set circular-trace-buffer
997show circular-trace-buffer
998 If set to on, the target is instructed to use a circular trace buffer
999 and discard the oldest trace frames instead of stopping the trace due
1000 to a full trace buffer. If set to off, the trace stops when the buffer
1001 fills up. Some targets may not support this.
1002
fb2e7cb4
JB
1003set script-extension off|soft|strict
1004show script-extension
1005 If set to "off", the debugger does not perform any script language
1006 recognition, and all sourced files are assumed to be GDB scripts.
1007 If set to "soft" (the default), files are sourced according to
1008 filename extension, falling back to GDB scripts if the first
1009 evaluation failed.
1010 If set to "strict", files are sourced according to filename extension.
1011
2b71fc8e
JB
1012set ada trust-PAD-over-XVS on|off
1013show ada trust-PAD-over-XVS
1014 If off, activate a workaround against a bug in the debugging information
1015 generated by the compiler for PAD types (see gcc/exp_dbug.ads in
1016 the GCC sources for more information about the GNAT encoding and
1017 PAD types in particular). It is always safe to set this option to
1018 off, but this introduces a slight performance penalty. The default
1019 is on.
1020
de2e5182
TT
1021* Python API Improvements
1022
1023 ** GDB provides the new class gdb.LazyString. This is useful in
1024 some pretty-printing cases. The new method gdb.Value.lazy_string
1025 provides a simple way to create objects of this type.
1026
1027 ** The fields returned by gdb.Type.fields now have an
1028 `is_base_class' attribute.
1029
1030 ** The new method gdb.Type.range returns the range of an array type.
1031
1032 ** The new method gdb.parse_and_eval can be used to parse and
1033 evaluate an expression.
1034
f61e138d
SS
1035* New remote packets
1036
1037QTDV
1038 Define a trace state variable.
1039
1040qTV
1041 Get the current value of a trace state variable.
1042
d5551862
SS
1043QTDisconnected
1044 Set desired tracing behavior upon disconnection.
1045
4daf5ac0
SS
1046QTBuffer:circular
1047 Set the trace buffer to be linear or circular.
1048
d5551862
SS
1049qTfP, qTsP
1050 Get data about the tracepoints currently in use.
1051
2d483d34
MS
1052* Bug fixes
1053
1054Process record now works correctly with hardware watchpoints.
1055
6e0e5977
JB
1056Multiple bug fixes have been made to the mips-irix port, making it
1057much more reliable. In particular:
1058 - Debugging threaded applications is now possible again. Previously,
1059 GDB would hang while starting the program, or while waiting for
1060 the program to stop at a breakpoint.
1061 - Attaching to a running process no longer hangs.
1062 - An error occurring while loading a core file has been fixed.
1063 - Changing the value of the PC register now works again. This fixes
1064 problems observed when using the "jump" command, or when calling
1065 a function from GDB, or even when assigning a new value to $pc.
1066 - With the "finish" and "return" commands, the return value for functions
1067 returning a small array is now correctly printed.
1068 - It is now possible to break on shared library code which gets executed
1069 during a shared library init phase (code executed while executing
1070 their .init section). Previously, the breakpoint would have no effect.
1071 - GDB is now able to backtrace through the signal handler for
1072 non-threaded programs.
1073
93c26624
JK
1074PIE (Position Independent Executable) programs debugging is now supported.
1075This includes debugging execution of PIC (Position Independent Code) shared
1076libraries although for that, it should be possible to run such libraries as an
1077executable program.
1078
abc7453d 1079*** Changes in GDB 7.0
75feb17d 1080
4efc6507
DE
1081* GDB now has an interface for JIT compilation. Applications that
1082dynamically generate code can create symbol files in memory and register
1083them with GDB. For users, the feature should work transparently, and
1084for JIT developers, the interface is documented in the GDB manual in the
1085"JIT Compilation Interface" chapter.
1086
782b2b07
SS
1087* Tracepoints may now be conditional. The syntax is as for
1088breakpoints; either an "if" clause appended to the "trace" command,
1089or the "condition" command is available. GDB sends the condition to
1090the target for evaluation using the same bytecode format as is used
1091for tracepoint actions.
1092
53a71c06
CR
1093* The disassemble command now supports: an optional /r modifier, print the
1094raw instructions in hex as well as in symbolic form, and an optional /m
1095modifier to print mixed source+assembly.
e6158f16 1096
e7a8dbfb
HZ
1097* Process record and replay
1098
1099 In a architecture environment that supports ``process record and
1100 replay'', ``process record and replay'' target can record a log of
1101 the process execution, and replay it with both forward and reverse
1102 execute commands.
1103
64644d9b
MS
1104* Reverse debugging: GDB now has new commands reverse-continue, reverse-
1105step, reverse-next, reverse-finish, reverse-stepi, reverse-nexti, and
1106set execution-direction {forward|reverse}, for targets that support
1107reverse execution.
1108
b9412953
DD
1109* GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on MIPS/Linux systems. This
1110feature is available with a native GDB running on kernel version
11112.6.28 or later.
1112
6c7a06a3
TT
1113* GDB now has support for multi-byte and wide character sets on the
1114target. Strings whose character type is wchar_t, char16_t, or
1115char32_t are now correctly printed. GDB supports wide- and unicode-
1116literals in C, that is, L'x', L"string", u'x', u"string", U'x', and
1117U"string" syntax. And, GDB allows the "%ls" and "%lc" formats in
1118`printf'. This feature requires iconv to work properly; if your
1119system does not have a working iconv, GDB can use GNU libiconv. See
1120the installation instructions for more information.
1121
f1838a98
UW
1122* GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
1123remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
1124with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
1125the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
1126
55333a84
DE
1127* "info sharedlibrary" now takes an optional regex of libraries to show,
1128and it now reports if a shared library has no debugging information.
1129
7f6a6314
PM
1130* Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
1131now complete on file names.
1132
65d12d83
TT
1133* When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
1134completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
1135For instance, consider:
1136
1137 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
1138 # struct example variable;
1139 (gdb) p variable.
1140
1141If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
1142completions will be "f1" and "f2".
1143
edb3359d
DJ
1144* Inlined functions are now supported. They show up in backtraces, and
1145the "step", "next", and "finish" commands handle them automatically.
1146
2fae03e8
TT
1147* GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
1148operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
1149macros.
1150
47a3467a 1151* GDB now supports inspecting extra signal information, exported by
58d6951d
DJ
1152the new $_siginfo convenience variable. The feature is currently
1153implemented on linux ARM, i386 and amd64.
1154
1155* GDB can now display the VFP floating point registers and NEON vector
1156registers on ARM targets. Both ARM GNU/Linux native GDB and gdbserver
1157can provide these registers (requires Linux 2.6.30 or later). Remote
1158and simulator targets may also provide them.
47a3467a 1159
08388c79
DE
1160* New remote packets
1161
1162qSearch:memory:
1163 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
1164
a6f3e723
SL
1165QStartNoAckMode
1166 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
1167 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
1168 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
1169
d7713ae0
EZ
1170vKill
1171 Kill the process with the specified process ID. Use this in preference
1172 to `k' when multiprocess protocol extensions are supported.
1173
07e059b5
VP
1174qXfer:osdata:read
1175 Obtains additional operating system information
1176
47a3467a
PA
1177qXfer:siginfo:read
1178qXfer:siginfo:write
1179 Read or write additional signal information.
1180
060871df
PA
1181* Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
1182
1183 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
1184 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
1185 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
1186
c055b101 1187* GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
a0ef4274 1188DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
c055b101
CV
1189
1190* The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
a0ef4274
DJ
1191and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
1192`set/show sh calling-convention'.
c055b101 1193
31fffb02
CS
1194* GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
1195with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
1196
88d8a8e0
JB
1197* 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
1198
7f99b190
JB
1199* Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
1200
ccd213ac
DJ
1201* Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
1202which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
1203
1fddbabb 1204* The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
31fffb02 1205list of section offsets.
1fddbabb 1206
a0ef4274
DJ
1207* On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
1208conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
1209have also been fixed.
1210
bfb8797a 1211* GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
158c7665
PH
1212From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
1213are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
bfb8797a 1214
71c25dea
TT
1215* GDB now parses C++ symbol and type names more flexibly. For
1216example, given:
1217
1218 template<typename T> class C { };
1219 C<char const *> c;
1220
1221GDB will now correctly handle all of:
1222
1223 ptype C<char const *>
1224 ptype C<char const*>
1225 ptype C<const char *>
1226 ptype C<const char*>
1227
ccd213ac
DJ
1228* New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
1229
1230 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
1231 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
1232
7ae0e2a2
UW
1233 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
1234 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
1235 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
1236
a6f3e723
SL
1237 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
1238 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
1239
da8bd9a3
DJ
1240 - Support for the sparc64-linux-gnu target is now included in
1241 gdbserver.
1242
d70e31dd
DE
1243 - The amd64-linux build of gdbserver now supports debugging both
1244 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
1245
1246 - The i386-linux, amd64-linux, and i386-win32 builds of gdbserver
1247 now support hardware watchpoints, and will use them automatically
1248 as appropriate.
1249
d57a3c85
TJB
1250* Python scripting
1251
1252 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
1253 available is determined at configure time.
1254
d8906c6f
TJB
1255 New GDB commands can now be written in Python.
1256
aadc346a
JB
1257* Ada tasking support
1258
1259 Ada tasks can now be inspected in GDB. The following commands have
1260 been introduced:
1261
1262 info tasks
1263 Print the list of Ada tasks.
1264 info task N
1265 Print detailed information about task number N.
1266 task
1267 Print the task number of the current task.
1268 task N
1269 Switch the context of debugging to task number N.
1270
adb483fe
DJ
1271* Support for user-defined prefixed commands. The "define" command can
1272add new commands to existing prefixes, e.g. "target".
1273
2277426b
PA
1274* Multi-inferior, multi-process debugging.
1275
1276 GDB now has generalized support for multi-inferior debugging. See
1277 "Debugging Multiple Inferiors" in the manual for more information.
1278 Although availability still depends on target support, the command
1279 set is more uniform now. The GNU/Linux specific multi-forks support
1280 has been migrated to this new framework. This implied some user
1281 visible changes; see "New commands" and also "Removed commands"
1282 below.
1283
08d16641
PA
1284* Target descriptions can now describe the target OS ABI. See the
1285"Target Description Format" section in the user manual for more
1286information.
1287
e35359c5
UW
1288* Target descriptions can now describe "compatible" architectures
1289to indicate that the target can execute applications for a different
1290architecture in addition to those for the main target architecture.
1291See the "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for
1292more information.
1293
85e747d2
UW
1294* Multi-architecture debugging.
1295
1296 GDB now includes general supports for debugging applications on
1297 hybrid systems that use more than one single processor architecture
1298 at the same time. Each such hybrid architecture still requires
1299 specific support to be added. The only hybrid architecture supported
1300 in this version of GDB is the Cell Broadband Engine.
1301
1302* GDB now supports integrated debugging of Cell/B.E. applications that
1303use both the PPU and SPU architectures. To enable support for hybrid
1304Cell/B.E. debugging, you need to configure GDB to support both the
1305powerpc-linux or powerpc64-linux and the spu-elf targets, using the
1306--enable-targets configure option.
1307
11ade57a
PA
1308* Non-stop mode debugging.
1309
1310 For some targets, GDB now supports an optional mode of operation in
1311 which you can examine stopped threads while other threads continue
1312 to execute freely. This is referred to as non-stop mode, with the
1313 old mode referred to as all-stop mode. See the "Non-Stop Mode"
1314 section in the user manual for more information.
1315
1316 To be able to support remote non-stop debugging, a remote stub needs
1317 to implement the non-stop mode remote protocol extensions, as
1318 described in the "Remote Non-Stop" section of the user manual. The
1319 GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been adjusted to support these
1320 extensions on linux targets.
1321
d7713ae0 1322* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
75feb17d 1323
a96d9b2e
SDJ
1324catch syscall [NAME(S) | NUMBER(S)]
1325 Catch system calls. Arguments, which should be names of system
1326 calls or their numbers, mean catch only those syscalls. Without
1327 arguments, every syscall will be caught. When the inferior issues
1328 any of the specified syscalls, GDB will stop and announce the system
1329 call, both when it is called and when its call returns. This
1330 feature is currently available with a native GDB running on the
1331 Linux Kernel, under the following architectures: x86, x86_64,
1332 PowerPC and PowerPC64.
1333
08388c79
DE
1334find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
1335 val1 [, val2, ...]
1336 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
1337
d57a3c85
TJB
1338maint set python print-stack
1339maint show python print-stack
1340 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
1341
1342python [CODE]
1343 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
1344
d7713ae0
EZ
1345macro define
1346macro list
1347macro undef
1348 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
1349 interactively.
1350
1351info os processes
1352 Show operating system information about processes.
1353
2277426b
PA
1354info inferiors
1355 List the inferiors currently under GDB's control.
1356
1357inferior NUM
1358 Switch focus to inferior number NUM.
1359
1360detach inferior NUM
1361 Detach from inferior number NUM.
1362
1363kill inferior NUM
1364 Kill inferior number NUM.
1365
d7713ae0
EZ
1366* New options
1367
3285f3fe
UW
1368set spu stop-on-load
1369show spu stop-on-load
1370 Control whether to stop for new SPE threads during Cell/B.E. debugging.
1371
ff1a52c6
UW
1372set spu auto-flush-cache
1373show spu auto-flush-cache
1374 Control whether to automatically flush the software-managed cache
1375 during Cell/B.E. debugging.
1376
d7713ae0
EZ
1377set sh calling-convention
1378show sh calling-convention
1379 Control the calling convention used when calling SH target functions.
1380
e0a3ce09 1381set debug timestamp
75feb17d 1382show debug timestamp
d7713ae0
EZ
1383 Control display of timestamps with GDB debugging output.
1384
1385set disassemble-next-line
1386show disassemble-next-line
1387 Control display of disassembled source lines or instructions when
1388 the debuggee stops.
1389
1390set remote noack-packet
1391show remote noack-packet
1392 Set/show the use of remote protocol QStartNoAckMode packet. See above
1393 under "New remote packets."
1394
1395set remote query-attached-packet
1396show remote query-attached-packet
1397 Control use of remote protocol `qAttached' (query-attached) packet.
1398
1399set remote read-siginfo-object
1400show remote read-siginfo-object
1401 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:read' (read-siginfo-object)
1402 packet.
1403
1404set remote write-siginfo-object
1405show remote write-siginfo-object
1406 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:write' (write-siginfo-object)
1407 packet.
1408
40ab02ce
MS
1409set remote reverse-continue
1410show remote reverse-continue
1411 Control use of remote protocol 'bc' (reverse-continue) packet.
1412
1413set remote reverse-step
1414show remote reverse-step
1415 Control use of remote protocol 'bs' (reverse-step) packet.
1416
d7713ae0
EZ
1417set displaced-stepping
1418show displaced-stepping
1419 Control displaced stepping mode. Displaced stepping is a way to
1420 single-step over breakpoints without removing them from the debuggee.
1421 Also known as "out-of-line single-stepping".
1422
1423set debug displaced
1424show debug displaced
1425 Control display of debugging info for displaced stepping.
1426
1427maint set internal-error
1428maint show internal-error
1429 Control what GDB does when an internal error is detected.
1430
1431maint set internal-warning
1432maint show internal-warning
1433 Control what GDB does when an internal warning is detected.
75feb17d 1434
ccd213ac
DJ
1435set exec-wrapper
1436show exec-wrapper
1437unset exec-wrapper
1438 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
fa4727a6 1439
aad4b048
JB
1440set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
1441show multiple-symbols
1442 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
1443 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
1444 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
1445
74960c60
VP
1446set breakpoint always-inserted
1447show breakpoint always-inserted
1448 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
1449 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
1450 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
1451
0428b8f5
DJ
1452set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
1453show arm fallback-mode
1454set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
1455show arm force-mode
1456 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
1457 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
1458 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
1459 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
1460
10568435
JK
1461set disable-randomization
1462show disable-randomization
1463 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
1464 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
1465 multiple debugging sessions.
1466
d7713ae0
EZ
1467set non-stop
1468show non-stop
1469 Control whether other threads are stopped or not when some thread hits
1470 a breakpoint.
1471
b3eb342c 1472set target-async
d7713ae0 1473show target-async
b3eb342c
VP
1474 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
1475 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
1476 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
1477 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
1478
6c7a06a3
TT
1479set target-wide-charset
1480show target-wide-charset
1481 The target-wide-charset is the name of the character set that GDB
1482 uses when printing characters whose type is wchar_t.
1483
84603566
SL
1484set tcp auto-retry (on|off)
1485show tcp auto-retry
1486set tcp connect-timeout
1487show tcp connect-timeout
1488 These commands allow GDB to retry failed TCP connections to a remote stub
1489 with a specified timeout period; this is useful if the stub is launched
1490 in parallel with GDB but may not be ready to accept connections immediately.
1491
17a37d48
PP
1492set libthread-db-search-path
1493show libthread-db-search-path
1494 Control list of directories which GDB will search for appropriate
1495 libthread_db.
1496
d4db2f36
PA
1497set schedule-multiple (on|off)
1498show schedule-multiple
1499 Allow GDB to resume all threads of all processes or only threads of
1500 the current process.
1501
4e5d721f
DE
1502set stack-cache
1503show stack-cache
1504 Use more aggressive caching for accesses to the stack. This improves
1505 performance of remote debugging (particularly backtraces) without
1506 affecting correctness.
1507
910c5da8
JB
1508set interactive-mode (on|off|auto)
1509show interactive-mode
1510 Control whether GDB runs in interactive mode (on) or not (off).
1511 When in interactive mode, GDB waits for the user to answer all
1512 queries. Otherwise, GDB does not wait and assumes the default
1513 answer. When set to auto (the default), GDB determines which
1514 mode to use based on the stdin settings.
1515
2277426b
PA
1516* Removed commands
1517
1518info forks
1519 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `info
1520 inferiors' command. To list checkpoints, you can still use the
1521 `info checkpoints' command, which was an alias for the `info forks'
1522 command.
1523
1524fork NUM
1525 Replaced by the new `inferior' command. To switch between
1526 checkpoints, you can still use the `restart' command, which was an
1527 alias for the `fork' command.
1528
1529process PID
1530 This is removed, since some targets don't have a notion of
1531 processes. To switch between processes, you can still use the
1532 `inferior' command using GDB's own inferior number.
1533
1534delete fork NUM
1535 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `kill
1536 inferior' command. To delete a checkpoint, you can still use the
1537 `delete checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `delete
1538 fork' command.
1539
1540detach fork NUM
1541 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `detach
1542 inferior' command. To detach a checkpoint, you can still use the
1543 `detach checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `detach
1544 fork' command.
1545
a80b95ba
TG
1546* New native configurations
1547
1548x86/x86_64 Darwin i[34567]86-*-darwin*
1549
b8bfd3ed
JB
1550x86_64 MinGW x86_64-*-mingw*
1551
75a2d5e7
TT
1552* New targets
1553
c28c63d8 1554Lattice Mico32 lm32-*
75a2d5e7 1555x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
4c1d2973 1556x86_64 DICOS x86_64-*-dicos*
5f814c3b 1557S+core 3 score-*-*
75a2d5e7 1558
6de3146c
PA
1559* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports x86 Windows CE
1560 (mingw32ce) debugging.
1561
d5cbbe6e
JB
1562* Removed commands
1563
1564catch load
1565catch unload
1566 These commands were actually not implemented on any target.
1567
75feb17d 1568*** Changes in GDB 6.8
f9ed52be 1569
af5ca30d
NH
1570* New native configurations
1571
1572NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
94a0e877 1573Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
af5ca30d
NH
1574
1575* New targets
1576
1577NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
94a0e877 1578Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
af5ca30d 1579
7a404eba
PA
1580* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
1581
1582 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
1583 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
1584 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
1585 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
1586
430ebac9
PA
1587* GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
1588(mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
1589
fe6fbf8b 1590* Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
8d5f9c6f 1591is resolved.
fe6fbf8b
VP
1592
1593* GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
8d5f9c6f
DJ
1594including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
1595and in inlined functions.
fe6fbf8b 1596
10665d76
JB
1597* GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
1598accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
1599more than one contiguous range of addresses.
1600
7cc46491
DJ
1601* Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
1602
d71340b8
DJ
1603* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
1604registers on PowerPC targets.
1605
523c4513
DJ
1606* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
1607targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
1608
a6b151f1
DJ
1609* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
1610commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
1611
2d717e4f
DJ
1612* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
1613extended-remote mode.
1614
24a836bd 1615* hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
d001be7a
DJ
1616The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
1617error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
1618The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
24a836bd 1619
d0c678e6
UW
1620* GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
1621building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
1622target architectures.
1623
d64a946d
TJB
1624* GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
1625Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
1626now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
1627stored in two consecutive float registers.
1628
ee163bf5
VP
1629* The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
1630breakpoints now.
1631
b93b6ca7 1632* Improved support for debugging Ada
d001be7a
DJ
1633Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
1634include:
b93b6ca7
JB
1635 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
1636 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
1637 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
1638 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
1639 of an assignment
1640 - Improved command completion in Ada
1641 - Several bug fixes
1642
d001be7a
DJ
1643* GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
1644process.
1645
a6b151f1
DJ
1646* New commands
1647
6d53d0af
JB
1648set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
1649show print frame-arguments
1650 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
1651 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
1652
a6b151f1
DJ
1653remote put
1654remote get
1655remote delete
1656 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
1657
1658* New MI commands
1659
1660-target-file-put
1661-target-file-get
1662-target-file-delete
1663 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
1664
1665* New remote packets
1666
1667vFile:open:
1668vFile:close:
1669vFile:pread:
1670vFile:pwrite:
1671vFile:unlink:
1672 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
d0c678e6 1673
2d717e4f
DJ
1674vAttach
1675 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
1676 mode.
1677
1678vRun
1679 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
1680
8d5f9c6f 1681*** Changes in GDB 6.7
6dd09645 1682
19d378fc
MS
1683* Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
1684bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
1685Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
1686
3a40aaa0
UW
1687* When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
1688symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
1689-Bsymbolic linker option.
1690
a6ec25f2
BW
1691* When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
1692recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
1693is not supported.
1694
6dd09645
JB
1695* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
1696frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
1697
c9bb8148
DJ
1698* GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
169932-bit or 64-bit register values.
1700
0d5de010
DJ
1701* Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
1702
23181151
DJ
1703* GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
1704target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
1705a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
1706
ea37ba09
DJ
1707* Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
1708automatically displayed as character or string data.
1709
1710* The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
1711arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
1712as strings.
e1f48ead 1713
123dc839
DJ
1714* Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
1715for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
8d5f9c6f 1716only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
123dc839 1717
05a4558a
DJ
1718* GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
1719iWMMXt coprocessor.
fb1e4ffc 1720
7c963485
PA
1721* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
1722ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
1723has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
1724
b18be20d
DJ
1725* GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
1726
0ca420ce
UW
1727* GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
1728
31d99776
DJ
1729* The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
1730layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
1731segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
1732
a4642986
MR
1733* The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
1734immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
1735
cfa9d6d9
DJ
1736* The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
1737"library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
1738packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
1739where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
1740Windows and SymbianOS).
255e7678
DJ
1741
1742* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
1743(DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
f5db8714
JK
1744
1745* GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
1746according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
cfa9d6d9 1747
c9bb8148
DJ
1748* New commands
1749
23776285
MR
1750set remoteflow
1751show remoteflow
1752 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
1753 when debugging using remote targets.
1754
c9bb8148
DJ
1755set mem inaccessible-by-default
1756show mem inaccessible-by-default
1757 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
1758 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
1759 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
1760 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
1761 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
1762
1763set breakpoint auto-hw
1764show breakpoint auto-hw
1765 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
1766 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
1767 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
1768 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
1769 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
1770 including "next" and "finish".
1771
0e420bd8
JB
1772catch exception
1773catch exception unhandled
1774 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
1775
1776catch assert
1777 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
1778
f822c95b
DJ
1779set sysroot
1780show sysroot
1781 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
1782 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
1783 an alias to "set sysroot".
1784
83cc5c53
UW
1785info spu
1786 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
1787 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
1788 architecture.
1789
bd372731
MK
1790* New native configurations
1791
1792OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
1793
23181151
DJ
1794set tdesc filename
1795unset tdesc filename
1796show tdesc filename
1797 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
1798 not query the target for its built-in description.
1799
c9bb8148
DJ
1800* New targets
1801
54fe9172 1802OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
c9bb8148 1803MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
c077150c 1804Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
c9bb8148 1805
6dd09645
JB
1806* New remote packets
1807
1808QPassSignals:
1809 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
1810 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
1811
23181151
DJ
1812qXfer:features:read:
1813 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
1814 features.
6dd09645 1815
83cc5c53
UW
1816qXfer:spu:read:
1817qXfer:spu:write:
1818 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
1819 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
1820
cfa9d6d9
DJ
1821qXfer:libraries:read:
1822 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
1823 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
1824 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
1825 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
1826
483367ee
DJ
1827* Removed targets
1828
1829Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
1830
d08950c4
UW
1831alpha*-*-osf1*
1832alpha*-*-osf2*
7ce59000 1833d10v-*-*
483367ee
DJ
1834hppa*-*-hiux*
1835i[34567]86-ncr-*
1836i[34567]86-*-dgux*
1837i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
1838i[34567]86-*-netware*
1839i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
1840i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
1841i[34567]86-*-sco*
1842i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
1843i[34567]86-*-sysv4*
1844i[34567]86-*-sysv5*
1845i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
1846i[34567]86-*-unixware*
1847i[34567]86-*-sysv*
1848i[34567]86-*-isc*
1849m68*-cisco*-*
1850m68*-tandem-*
ad527d2e 1851mips*-*-pe
483367ee 1852rs6000-*-lynxos*
ad527d2e 1853sh*-*-pe
483367ee 1854
7ce59000
DJ
1855* Other removed features
1856
1857target abug
1858target cpu32bug
1859target est
1860target rom68k
1861
1862 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
1863
ea35711c
DJ
1864target hms
1865target e7000
1866target sh3
1867target sh3e
1868
1869 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
1870 H8/300.
1871
1872target ocd
1873
1874 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
1875 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
1876 interfaces.
1877
7ce59000
DJ
1878DWARF 1 support
1879
1880 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
1881 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
1882
54d61198
DJ
1883Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
1884
1885 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
1886 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
1887 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
1888 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
1889
ea35711c
DJ
1890MIPS ".pdr" sections
1891
1892 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
1893 in debugging information.
1894
1895Scheme support
1896
1897 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
1898 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
1899
1a69e1e4
DJ
1900set mips stack-arg-size
1901set mips saved-gpreg-size
1902
1903 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
1904
6dd09645 1905*** Changes in GDB 6.6
e374b601 1906
ca3bf3bd
DJ
1907* New targets
1908
1909Xtensa xtensa-elf
9c309e77 1910Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
ca3bf3bd 1911
6aec2e11
DJ
1912* GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
1913(mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
1914running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
1915
1916* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
1917Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
1918supported.
1919
17218d91
DJ
1920* The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
1921broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
1922
9ebce043
DJ
1923* The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
1924stub provides the required support.
1925
7d3d3ece
DJ
1926* Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
1927longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
1928
4f8253f3
JB
1929* New commands
1930
1931set substitute-path
1932unset substitute-path
1933show substitute-path
1934 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
1935 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
1936 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
1937 between compilation and debugging.
1938
9fa66fd7
AS
1939set trace-commands
1940show trace-commands
1941 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
1942 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
1943 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
1944
1f5befc1
DJ
1945* REMOVED features
1946
1947The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
1948
2ec3381a
DJ
1949Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
1950an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
1951
3d00d119
DJ
1952The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
1953
be2a5f71
DJ
1954* New remote packets
1955
1956qSupported:
1957 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
1958 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
1959 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
1960 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
1961 target.
1962
0876f84a
DJ
1963qXfer:auxv:read:
1964 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
1965 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
1966
9ebce043
DJ
1967qXfer:memory-map:read:
1968 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
1969 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
1970
1971vFlashErase:
1972vFlashWrite:
1973vFlashDone:
1974 Erase and program a flash memory device.
1975
0876f84a
DJ
1976* Removed remote packets
1977
1978qPart:auxv:read:
1979 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
1980 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
1981
e374b601 1982*** Changes in GDB 6.5
53e5f3cf 1983
96309189
MS
1984* New targets
1985
1986Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
1987
1988Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
1989
53e5f3cf
AS
1990* New commands
1991
1992init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
1993 only if it doesn't already have a value.
1994
ac264b3b
MS
1995The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
1996
1997checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
1998
1999restart <n> Return the program state to a
2000 previously saved state.
2001
2002info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
2003
2004delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
2005
2006set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
2007 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
2008
2009info forks List forks of the user program that
2010 are available to be debugged.
2011
2012fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
2013 forks of the user program that are
2014 available to be debugged.
2015
2016delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
2017 that are available to be debugged (and
2018 kill the forked process).
2019
2020detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
2021 that are available to be debugged (and
2022 allow the process to continue).
2023
3950dc3f
NS
2024* New architecture
2025
2026Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
2027
0ea3f30e
DJ
2028* Improved Windows host support
2029
2030GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
2031native console support, and remote communications using either
2032network sockets or serial ports.
2033
f79daebb
GM
2034* Improved Modula-2 language support
2035
2036GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
2037basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
2038pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
2039printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
2040written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
2041GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
2042
acab6ab2
MM
2043* REMOVED features
2044
2045The ARM rdi-share module.
2046
f4267320
DJ
2047The Netware NLM debug server.
2048
53e5f3cf 2049*** Changes in GDB 6.4
156a53ca 2050
e0ecbda1
MK
2051* New native configurations
2052
02a677ac 2053OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
e0ecbda1
MK
2054OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
2055
d64a6579
KB
2056* New targets
2057
2058Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
2059
b33a6190
AS
2060* New command line options
2061
2062--batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
2063--return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
2064 the child (debugged) program exited with.
2065--eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
2066 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
2067 specified multiple times and in conjunction
2068 with the --command (-x) option.
2069
11dced61
AC
2070* Deprecated commands removed
2071
2072The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
2073removed:
2074
2075 Command Replacement
2076 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
2077 othernames set arm disassembler
2078 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
2079 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
2080 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
2081 regs info registers
2082
6fe85783
MK
2083* New BSD user-level threads support
2084
2085It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
2086library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
2087configurations are:
2088
2089FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
2090FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
2091OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
2092
2093Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
2094are not yet supported.
2095
5260ca71
MS
2096* New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
2097(Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
2098
e84ecc99
AC
2099* REMOVED configurations and files
2100
2101VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
9445aa30 2102Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
9445aa30 2103National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
156a53ca 2104
31e35378
JB
2105* New "set print array-indexes" command
2106
2107After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
2108when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
2109behavior.
2110
e85e5c83
MK
2111* VAX floating point support
2112
2113GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
2114
d91e9901
AS
2115* User-defined command support
2116
2117In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
2118to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
2119section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
2120
f2cb65ca
MC
2121*** Changes in GDB 6.3:
2122
f47b1503
AS
2123* New command line option
2124
2125GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
2126debugging.
2127
f2cb65ca
MC
2128* GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
2129
2130GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
2131information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
2132by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
2133proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
2134to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
860660cb 2135
d08c0230
AC
2136* Internationalization
2137
2138When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
2139internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
2140continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
2141
117ea3cf
PH
2142* Ada
2143
2144Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
2145implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
2146into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
2147
d08c0230
AC
2148* New native configurations
2149
2150GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
2151
2152* Remote 'p' packet
2153
2154GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
2155packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
2156
2157* END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
2158
2159GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
2160The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
2161features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
2162i386 application).
2163
2164GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
2165compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
2166continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
2167configurations:
2168
2169hppa-*-hpux
2170ia64-*-aix
2171mips-*-irix*
2172*-*-lynx
2173mips-*-linux-gnu
2174sds protocol
2175xdr protocol
2176powerpc bdm protocol
2177
2178Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
2179made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
2180
2181* OBSOLETE configurations and files
2182
2183Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2184been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2185configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2186permanently REMOVED.
2187
2188h8300-*-*
2189mcore-*-*
2190mn10300-*-*
2191ns32k-*-*
2192sh64-*-*
2193v850-*-*
2194
ebb7c577
AC
2195*** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
2196
2197* MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
2198
2199When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
2200heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
2201been fixed.
2202
2203* MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
2204
2205When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
2206fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
2207IRIX long double values).
2208
2209* VAX and "next"
2210
2211A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
2212command. This problem has been fixed.
2213
860660cb 2214*** Changes in GDB 6.2:
faae5abe 2215
0dea2468
AC
2216* Fix for ``many threads''
2217
2218On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
2219rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
2220error message:
2221
2222 ptrace: No such process.
2223 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
2224
2225This problem has been fixed.
2226
2c07db7a
AC
2227* "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
2228
2229Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
2230GDB to dump core).
2231
c23968a2
JB
2232* New ``start'' command.
2233
2234This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
2235
71009278
MK
2236* New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
2237
2238Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
2239live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
2240platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
2241
2242FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
2243FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
2244NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
2245NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
2246NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
2247OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2248OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
2249OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
2250OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
2251
3c0b7db2
AC
2252* Signal trampoline code overhauled
2253
2254Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
2255These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
2256of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
2257call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
2258signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
2259
73cc75f3
AC
2260Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
2261features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
2262include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
3c0b7db2 2263
7243600a
BF
2264* Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
2265
6f606e1c
MK
2266* New native configurations
2267
97dc871c 2268GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
0e56aeaf 2269OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
bf2ca189
MK
2270OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
2271OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
d195bc9f 2272OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 2273NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
9f076e7a 2274OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 2275
a1b461bf
AC
2276* END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
2277
2278GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
2279The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
2280including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
2281migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
2282compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
2283work, was also included.
2284
2285GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
2286module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
2287
2288h8300-*-*
2289mcore-*-*
2290mn10300-*-*
2291ns32k-*-*
2292sh64-*-*
2293v850-*-*
2294xstormy16-*-*
2295
2296Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
2297made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
2298
3c7012f5
AC
2299* REMOVED configurations and files
2300
2301Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
2302Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
2303Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
2304Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
2305Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
2306AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
2307Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
2308decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
2309riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
2310sonymips mips-sony-*
2311sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
2312
e5fe55f7
AC
2313*** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
2314
2315* TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
2316
2317The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
2318GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
2319command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
2320program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
2321with GDB".
2322
2323* Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
2324
2325Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
2326libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
2327cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
2328GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
2329shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
2330the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
2331are created.
2332
2333Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
2334
2335* Fixed ISO-C build problems
2336
2337The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
2338non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
2339compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
2340
2341* Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
2342
2343Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
2344wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
2345
2346* Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
2347
2348The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
2349permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
2350systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
2351
2352* Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
2353
2354Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
2355has been updated to use constant array sizes.
2356
2357* Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
2358
2359GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
2360its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
2361panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
2362
2363* Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
2364
2365When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
2366by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
2367not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
2368
faae5abe 2369*** Changes in GDB 6.1:
f2c06f52 2370
9175c9a3
MC
2371* Removed --with-mmalloc
2372
2373Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
2374conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
2375
3cc87ec0
MK
2376* Changes in AMD64 configurations
2377
2378The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
2379the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
2380and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
2381you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
2382
f0424ef6
MK
2383* Revised SPARC target
2384
2385The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
2386FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
03cebad2
MK
2387support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
2388from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
2389(Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
f0424ef6 2390
59659be2
ILT
2391* New C++ demangler
2392
2393GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
2394names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
2395with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
2396programs.
2397
9e08b29b
DJ
2398* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
2399
2400GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
2401arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
2402encountered these.
2403
8dfe8985
DC
2404* C++ nested types and namespaces
2405
2406GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
2407improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
2408is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
2409Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
2410namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
2411"Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
2412frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
2413if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
2414GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
2415
cced5e27
MK
2416* New native configurations
2417
2418NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
27d1e716 2419OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2031c21a 2420OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
f2cab569
MK
2421OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
2422OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
cced5e27 2423
b4b4b794
KI
2424* New debugging protocols
2425
2426M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
2427
7989c619
AC
2428* "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
2429
2430The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
2431and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
2432tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
2433
5994185b
AC
2434* OBSOLETE configurations and files
2435
2436Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2437been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2438configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2439permanently REMOVED.
2440
2441Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
2442Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
2443Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
2444Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
2445Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
2446AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
2447Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
0748d941
AC
2448decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
2449riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
2450sonymips mips-sony-*
2451sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
5994185b 2452
0ddabb4c
AC
2453* REMOVED configurations and files
2454
2455SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
2456SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4a8269c0
AC
2457Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2458Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
2459H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2460HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
2461HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2462HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
2463PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
cf7c5c23 2464386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
4a8269c0
AC
2465Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
2466 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
2467 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f0424ef6
MK
2468SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
2469SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
4a8269c0
AC
2470Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2471Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
0ddabb4c 2472
c7f1390e
DJ
2473*** Changes in GDB 6.0:
2474
1fe43d45
AC
2475* Objective-C
2476
2477Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
2478integrated into GDB.
2479
e6beb428
AC
2480* New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
2481
2482DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
2483information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
2484By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
2485backtraces.
2486
2487The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
2488have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
2489DWARF 2 CFI support.
2490
2491* Hosted file I/O.
2492
2493GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
2494file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
2495remote protocol documentation for details.
2496
2497* All targets using the new architecture framework.
2498
2499All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
2500architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
2501to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
2502ppc32 on ppc64).
2503
2504* GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
2505
2506GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
2507per-thread variables.
2508
2509* GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
2510
2511GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
2512GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
2513
2514* Separate debug info.
2515
2516GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
2517automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
2518of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
2519system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
2520and optional debug files.
2521
2522* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
2523
2524DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
2525describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
2526debugger.
2527
2528GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
2529for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
2530
2531* Java
2532
2533A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
2534Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
2535considered "useable".
2536
85f8f974
DJ
2537* GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
2538
2539The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
2540commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
2541kernel.
2542
0fac0b41
DJ
2543* GDB supports logging output to a file
2544
2545There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
2546used to capture GDB's output to a file.
f2c06f52 2547
6ad8ae5c
DJ
2548* The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
2549
2550The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
2551disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
2552command.
2553
e286caf2 2554* d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
5f601589
AC
2555
2556The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
2557registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
2558
d28f9cdf
DJ
2559* Profiling support
2560
2561A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
2562be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
2563session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
2564"--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
2565data, for more informative profiling results.
2566
da0f9dcd
AC
2567* Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
2568
2569The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
2570option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
b68767c1 2571"mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
da0f9dcd
AC
2572
2573Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
2574removed.
2575
fb9b6b35
JJ
2576Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
2577Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
2578Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
2579 in a subsequent -var-update.
2580
954a4db8
MK
2581* New native configurations.
2582
2583FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
2584
6760f9e6
JB
2585* Multi-arched targets.
2586
b4263afa 2587HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
85a453d5 2588Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
6760f9e6 2589
1b831c93
AC
2590* OBSOLETE configurations and files
2591
2592Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2593been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2594configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2595permanently REMOVED.
2596
8b0e5691 2597Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
67f16606 2598Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
fd2299bd 2599H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
56056df7
AC
2600HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
2601HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2602HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
78c43945 2603PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2fbce691
AC
2604Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
2605 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
2606 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f81824a9
AC
2607Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2608Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
fd2299bd 2609
5835abe7
NC
2610* REMOVED configurations and files
2611
2612V850EA ISA
1b831c93
AC
2613Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2614IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
2615i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
2616i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
2617i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
2618HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
2619 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
2620 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
2621Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
2622Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
2623Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
2624OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2625I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5835abe7 2626
a094c6fb
AC
2627* MIPS $fp behavior changed
2628
2629The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
2630the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
2631context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
2632address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
2633The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
2634
299ffc64 2635*** Changes in GDB 5.3:
37057839 2636
46248966
AC
2637* GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
2638
2639When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
2640`/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
2641in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
2642library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
2643shared libs like mad''.
2644
b9d14705 2645* ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
6da02953 2646
b9d14705
DJ
2647Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
2648the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
2649arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
2650powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
6da02953 2651
e0e9281e
JB
2652* GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
2653
2654GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
2655and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
2656they expand.
2657
dd73b9bb
AC
2658The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
2659invocations in expression, and shows the result.
2660
2661The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
2662macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
2663
e0e9281e
JB
2664Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
2665information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
2666your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
2667information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
2668
2250ee0c
CV
2669* Multi-arched targets.
2670
6e3ba3b8
JT
2671DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
2672DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
2250ee0c 2673NEC V850 v850-*-*
6e3ba3b8 2674National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
a1789893
GS
2675Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
2676Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
2250ee0c 2677
cd9bfe15 2678* New targets.
e33ce519 2679
456f8b9d
DB
2680Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
2681
e33ce519 2682
da8ca43d
JT
2683* New native configurations
2684
2685Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
029923d4 2686SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
45888261 2687MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
9ce5c36a 2688UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
da8ca43d 2689
cd9bfe15
AC
2690* OBSOLETE configurations and files
2691
2692Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2693been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2694configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2695permanently REMOVED.
2696
92eb23c5 2697Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
a99a9e1b 2698OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1c7cc583 2699IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
7a3085c1 2700Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
7fb623f7 2701Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
eb4c54a2 2702Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
d8ee244c
MK
2703i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
2704i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
2705i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
822e978b
AC
2706HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
2707 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
2708 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
4d210288 2709I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
92eb23c5 2710
db034ac5
AC
2711* OBSOLETE languages
2712
2713CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
2714
cd9bfe15
AC
2715* REMOVED configurations and files
2716
2717AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
2718A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2719AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2720AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2721AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2722
2723testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
2724
20f01a46
DH
2725* New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
2726
2727This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
2728commands. The default is 1024.
2729
a5941fbf
MK
2730* Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
2731
2732Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
2733
89743e04
MS
2734* New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
2735
2736These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
2737to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
2738from a file into memory (restore).
37057839 2739
9fb14e79
JB
2740* Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
2741
2742The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
2743including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
2744of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
2745
2037aebb
AC
2746*** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
2747
2748* New targets.
2749
2750Atmel AVR avr*-*-*
2751
2752* Bug fixes
2753
2754gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
2755mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
2756Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
2757
2758gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
2759dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
2760Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
2761
2762Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
2763Surprisingly enough, it works now.
2764By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
2765
2766i386 hardware watchpoint support:
2767avoid misses on second run for some targets.
2768By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
2769
37057839 2770*** Changes in GDB 5.2:
eb7cedd9 2771
1a703748
MS
2772* New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
2773
2774This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
2775really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
2776In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
2777target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
2778This can be a significant performance improvement on some
2779(notably embedded) targets.
2780
cefd4ef5
MS
2781* New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
2782
55241689
AC
2783This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
2784process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
2785GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
2786hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
cefd4ef5 2787
352ed7b4
MS
2788* New command line option
2789
2790GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
2791
2792* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
2793
2794There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
2795command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
2796a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
2797be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
2798open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
2799issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
2800a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
2801it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
2802GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
2803is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
2804
fe419ffc
RE
2805* Changes in ARM configurations.
2806
2807Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
2808configuration is fully multi-arch.
2809
eb7cedd9
MK
2810* New native configurations
2811
fe419ffc 2812ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
eb7cedd9 2813x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
55241689 2814AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
768f0842 2815Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
eb7cedd9 2816
c9f63e6b
CV
2817* New targets
2818
2819Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
2820
9b4ff276
AC
2821* OBSOLETE configurations and files
2822
2823Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2824been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2825configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2826permanently REMOVED.
2827
2828AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
2829A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2830AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2831AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2832AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2833
b4ceaee6 2834testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
9b4ff276 2835
e2caac18
AC
2836* REMOVED configurations and files
2837
2838TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
7bc65f05 2839WDC 65816 w65-*-*
7768dd6c
AC
2840PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2841PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2842PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
5e734e1f 2843Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1406caf7
AC
2844Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
2845 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
7e24f0b1 2846SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
9b567150 2847Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
3680c638
AC
2848Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
2849ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
a752853e 2850Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
e2caac18 2851
c2a727fa
TT
2852* Changes to command line processing
2853
2854The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
2855for the inferior from gdb's command line.
2856
467d8519
TT
2857* Changes to key bindings
2858
2859There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
2860
7072a954
AC
2861*** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
2862
2863Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
2864
2865Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
2866corrupted.
2867
2868Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
2869
2870Numerous documentation fixes.
2871
2872Numerous testsuite fixes.
2873
34f47bc4 2874*** Changes in GDB 5.1:
139760b7
MK
2875
2876* New native configurations
2877
2878Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
2879x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
55241689 2880MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
e23194cb
EZ
2881MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
2882ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
55241689 2883s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
139760b7 2884
bf64bfd6
AC
2885* New targets
2886
def90278 2887Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
24be5c34 2888CRIS cris-axis
55241689 2889UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
def90278 2890
17e78a56 2891* OBSOLETE configurations and files
bf64bfd6
AC
2892
2893x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
9b9c068d 2894Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
bb19ff3b
AC
2895Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
2896 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
76f4ea53
AC
2897TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2898WDC 65816 w65-*-*
4a1968f4 2899Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1b2b2c16
AC
2900PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2901PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2902PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
24f89b68 2903SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
514e603d
AC
2904Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
2905ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
d036b4d9 2906Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
bf64bfd6 2907
17e78a56
AC
2908stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
2909kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
2910
7fcca85b
AC
2911Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2912been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2913configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2914permanently REMOVED.
2915
a196c81c 2916* REMOVED configurations and files
7fcca85b
AC
2917
2918Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
2919Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
2920Pyramid pyramid-*-*
2921ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
2922Tahoe tahoe-*-*
a196c81c 2923ser-ocd.c *-*-*
bf64bfd6 2924
6d6b80e5 2925* GDB has been converted to ISO C.
e23194cb 2926
6d6b80e5 2927GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
e23194cb
EZ
2928sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
2929present.
2930
bf64bfd6
AC
2931* Other news:
2932
e23194cb
EZ
2933* "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
2934
2935* The MI enabled by default.
2936
2937The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
2938revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
2939engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
2940using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
2941which is now deprecated.
2942
2943* Support for debugging Pascal programs.
2944
2945GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
2946main features are supported:
2947
2948 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
2949
2950 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
2951 extension;
2952
2953 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
2954
2955 - a Pascal expression parser.
2956
2957However, some important features are not yet supported.
2958
2959 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
2960
2961 - there are some problems with boolean types;
2962
2963 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
2964 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
2965
2966 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
2967
2968 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
2969
2970* Changes in completion.
2971
2972Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
2973to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
2974users expect at the shell prompt.
2975
2976Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
2977`breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
2978program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
2979files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
2980be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
2981considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
2982name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
2983
2984`set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
2985
2986* New platform-independent commands:
2987
2988It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
2989hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
2990documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
2991
2992* Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
2993
d7275149
MK
2994Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
2995revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
2996many threads as your system allows you to have.
2997
e23194cb
EZ
2998Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
2999
d7275149
MK
3000Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
3001multi-threaded programs though.
e23194cb
EZ
3002
3003* Changes in MIPS configurations.
bf64bfd6
AC
3004
3005Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
3006
e23194cb
EZ
3007GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
3008debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
3009supported.)
3010
3011* Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
3012
3013Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
3014breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
3015implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
3016put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
3017and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
3018registers.
3019
3020The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
3021debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
3022watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
3023
3024* Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
3025
3026New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
3027the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
3028
3029New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
3030display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
3031IDT.
3032
3033New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
3034from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
3035New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
3036a given linear address.
3037
3038GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
3039program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
3040which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
3041
3042DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
3043
6c56c069
EZ
3044It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
3045
e23194cb
EZ
3046* Changes in documentation.
3047
3048All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
3049Documentation License.
3050
3051Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
3052manual.
3053
3054TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
3055
3056Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
3057manual.
3058
3059The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
3060documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
3061hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
3062
5d6640b1
AC
3063* GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
3064
3065The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
3066``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
3067contents of this file.
3068
1a1d8446
AC
3069* gdba.el deleted
3070
3071GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
139760b7 3072
9debab2f 3073*** Changes in GDB 5.0:
7a292a7a 3074
c63ce875
EZ
3075* Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
3076
3077Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
3078programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
3079displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
3080greater level of detail.
3081
3082* Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
3083
3084It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
3085bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
3086on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
3087written.
3088
3089* Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
3090
3091The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
3092necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
3093machines ``out of the box''.
3094
3095The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
3096possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
3097signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
3098would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
3099interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
3100
3101It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
3102standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
3103even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
3104and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
3105terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
3106
3107The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
3108enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
3109also works.
3110
3111DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
3112GDB.
3113
3114It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
3115directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
3116times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
3117breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
3118
ed9a39eb
JM
3119* New native configurations
3120
3121ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
afc05dd4 3122PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
ed9a39eb 3123
7a292a7a
SS
3124* New targets
3125
96baa820 3126Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
adf40b2e
JM
3127x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
3128PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
7a292a7a
SS
3129TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
3130
085dd6e6
JM
3131* OBSOLETE configurations
3132
3133Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
3134Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
9846de1b 3135Pyramid pyramid-*-*
ed9a39eb 3136ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
104c1213 3137Tahoe tahoe-*-*
7a292a7a 3138
9debab2f
AC
3139Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
3140but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
3141these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
3142be permanently REMOVED.
3143
5330533d
SS
3144* Gould support removed
3145
3146Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
3147
bc9e5bbf
AC
3148* New features for SVR4
3149
3150On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
3151without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
3152load symbols from the running process's executable file.
3153
3154* Many C++ enhancements
3155
3156C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
3157in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
3158
adf40b2e
JM
3159* Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
3160
3161A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
3162sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
3163with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
3164``|<program> <args>'' vis:
3165
3166 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
3167 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
3168
43e526b9
JM
3169* MIPS 64 remote protocol
3170
3171A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
3172expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
3173instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
3174
3175The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
3176added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
3177
96baa820
JM
3178* ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
3179
3180The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
3181``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
3182include ``set remote P-packet''.
3183
11cf8741
JM
3184* Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
3185
3186The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
3187accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
3188``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
3189
7876dd43
DB
3190* ``apropos'' command added.
3191
3192The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
3193documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
3194try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
3195
bc9e5bbf
AC
3196* New MI interface
3197
3198A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
3199interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
7162c0ca
EZ
3200process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
3201"GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
3202enabled by configuring with:
bc9e5bbf
AC
3203
3204 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
3205
c906108c
SS
3206*** Changes in GDB-4.18:
3207
3208* New native configurations
3209
3210HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
3211HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
55241689 3212M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
c906108c
SS
3213
3214* New targets
3215
3216Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
3217Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
3218Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
3219
3220* OBSOLETE configurations
3221
3222Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
3223
3224Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
3225but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
3226these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
3227be permanently REMOVED.
3228
3229* ANSI/ISO C
3230
3231As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
3232buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
3233containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
3234use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
3235available. If this is not true, please report the affected
3236configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
3237information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
3238already.
3239
3240* Readline 2.2
3241
3242GDB now uses readline 2.2.
3243
3244* set extension-language
3245
3246You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
3247languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
3248you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
3249 set extension-language .c c++
3250The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
3251and their associated languages.
3252
3253* Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
3254
3255When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
3256you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
3257PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
3258
3259 set processor NAME
3260
3261sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
3262following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
3263
3264 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
3265 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
3266 403 IBM PowerPC 403
3267 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
3268 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
3269 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
3270 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
3271 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
3272 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
3273 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
3274 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
3275
3276At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
3277special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
3278registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
3279only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
3280
3281* HP-UX support
3282
3283Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
3284more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
3285library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
3286support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
3287for xdb and dbx commands.
3288
3289* Catchpoints
3290
3291HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
3292generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
3293to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
3294
3295This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
3296argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
3297output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
3298
3299* Debugging across forks
3300
3301On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
3302in the inferior.
3303
3304* TUI
3305
3306HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
3307it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
3308configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
3309
3310* GDB remote protocol additions
3311
3312A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
3313Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
3314fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
3315allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
3316
3317For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
3318full 64-bit address. The command
3319
3320 set remoteaddresssize 32
3321
3322can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
3323the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
3324will be discarded.
3325
3326In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
3327command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
3328
3329 maint packet heythere
3330
3331sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
3332disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
3333time.
3334
3335The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
3336target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
3337downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
3338
3339* Tracing can collect general expressions
3340
3341You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
3342further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
3343doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
3344
3345* mask-address variable for Mips
3346
3347For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
3348a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
3349of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
3350
3351* Higher serial baud rates
3352
3353GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
3354230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
3355to achieve all of these rates.)
3356
3357* i960 simulator
3358
3359The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
3360builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
3361
3362
3363*** Changes in GDB-4.17:
3364
3365* New native configurations
3366
3367Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
3368Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
3369Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
3370PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
3371PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
3372Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
3373Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
3374
3375* New targets
3376
3377Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
3378Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
3379Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
3380Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
3381MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
3382MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
3383MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
3384Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
3385Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
3386Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
3387NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
3388
3389* New debugging protocols
3390
3391ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
3392M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
3393DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
3394PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
3395PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
3396Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
3397
3398* DWARF 2
3399
3400All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
3401format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
3402information.
3403
3404* Java frontend
3405
3406GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
3407only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
3408
3409* solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
3410
3411For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
3412loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
3413locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
3414
3415* Live range splitting
3416
3417GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
3418range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
3419more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
3420
3421* Hurd support
3422
3423GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
3424updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
3425
3426* ARM Thumb support
3427
3428GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
3429instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
3430instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
3431accordingly.
3432
3433* MIPS16 support
3434
3435GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
3436instruction set.
3437
3438* Overlay support
3439
3440GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
3441linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
3442will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
3443control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
3444additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
3445in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
3446
3447* info symbol
3448
3449The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
3450the symbol at the specified address.
3451
3452* Trace support
3453
3454The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
3455asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
3456extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
3457includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
3458file tracepoint.c for more details.
3459
3460* MIPS simulator
3461
3462Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
3463by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
3464of most MIPS variants.
3465
3466* Sparc simulator
3467
3468Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
3469by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
3470Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
3471
3472* set architecture
3473
3474For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
3475basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
3476architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
3477the possible architectures.
3478
3479*** Changes in GDB-4.16:
3480
3481* New native configurations
3482
3483Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
3484M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
3485PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
3486PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
3487PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
3488RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
3489
3490* New targets
3491
3492ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
3493I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
3494MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
3495MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
3496PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
3497Hitachi SH3 sh-*-*
3498Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
3499
3500* PowerPC simulator
3501
3502The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
3503contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
3504PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
3505basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
3506performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
3507
3508* Solaris 2.5
3509
3510GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
3511
3512* Windows 95/NT native
3513
3514GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
3515To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
3516which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
3517Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
3518ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
3519
3520* dont-repeat command
3521
3522If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
3523command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
3524useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
3525extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
3526
3527* Send break instead of ^C
3528
3529The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
3530rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
3531GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
3532
3533* Remote protocol timeout
3534
3535The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
3536that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
3537to read from the target. The default value is 2.
3538
3539* Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
3540
3541By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
3542loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
3543stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
3544when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
3545in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
3546
3547Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
3548/usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
3549automatically on hpux10.
3550
3551* Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
3552
3553Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
3554
3555* Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
3556
3557When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
3558may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
3559the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
3560every character. The default value is 1050.
3561
3562* Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
3563
3564If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
3565a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
3566replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
3567details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
3568remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
3569to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
3570
3571* Speedups for remote debugging
3572
3573GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
3574the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
3575and more efficient S-record downloading.
3576
3577* Memory use reductions and statistics collection
3578
3579GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
3580Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
3581
3582*** Changes in GDB-4.15:
3583
3584* Psymtabs for XCOFF
3585
3586The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
3587can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
3588
3589* Remote targets use caching
3590
3591Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
3592remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
3593it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
3594debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
3595off' turns the the data cache off.
3596
3597* Remote targets may have threads
3598
3599The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
3600in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
3601gdb/remote.c for details.
3602
3603* NetROM support
3604
3605If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
3606support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
3607acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
3608write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
3609support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
3610another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
3611sequence is something like
3612
3613 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
3614 load <prog>
3615 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
3616
3617* Macintosh host
3618
3619GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
3620may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
3621it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
3622available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
3623device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
3624directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
3625scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
3626mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
3627
3628* Autoconf
3629
3630GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
3631but does simplify configuration and building.
3632
3633* hpux10
3634
3635GDB now supports hpux10.
3636
3637*** Changes in GDB-4.14:
3638
3639* New native configurations
3640
3641x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
3642x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
3643NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
3644Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
3645
3646* New targets
3647
3648A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
3649HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
3650CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
3651PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
3652WDC 65816 w65-*-*
3653
3654* Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
3655
3656GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
3657possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
3658filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
3659the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
3660if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
3661
3662* Arguments to user-defined commands
3663
3664User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
3665Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
3666trivial example:
3667define adder
3668 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
3669
3670To execute the command use:
3671adder 1 2 3
3672
3673Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
3674Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
3675use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
3676
3677* New `if' and `while' commands
3678
3679This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
3680commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
3681expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
3682execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
3683terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
3684`else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
3685if the expression is zero.
3686
3687* Fortran source language mode
3688
3689GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
3690Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
3691variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
3692with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
3693Fortran compilers.
3694
3695* Better HPUX support
3696
3697Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
3698running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
3699processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
3700for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
3701that behavior do the following before running the program:
3702
3703 adb -w a.out
3704 __dld_flags?W 0x5
3705 control-d
3706
3707This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
3708To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
3709
3710 adb -w a.out
3711 __dld_flags?W 0x4
3712 control-d
3713
3714You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
3715the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
3716external linkage.
3717
3718GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
3719HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
3720
3721* Target byte order now dynamically selectable
3722
3723You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
3724commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
3725current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
3726"set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
3727associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
3728configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
3729
3730* New DOS host serial code
3731
3732This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
3733no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
3734a PC's serial port.
3735
3736*** Changes in GDB-4.13:
3737
3738* New "complete" command
3739
3740This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
3741were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
3742
3743* Trailing space optional in prompt
3744
3745"set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
3746allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
3747
3748* Breakpoint hit counts
3749
3750"info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
3751has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
3752can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
3753to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
3754less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
3755that breakpoint.
3756
3757* Ability to stop printing at NULL character
3758
3759"set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
3760an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
3761arrays actually contain only short strings.
3762
3763* Shared library breakpoints
3764
3765In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
3766breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
3767
3768* Hardware watchpoints
3769
3770There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
3771targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
3772
55241689 3773Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
c906108c
SS
3774
3775* Annotations
3776
3777Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
3778and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
3779
3780* Improved Irix 5 support
3781
3782GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
3783
3784* Improved HPPA support
3785
3786GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
3787
3788* New native configurations
3789
3790Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
3791HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
3792Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
3793RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
3794
3795* New targets
3796
3797OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
3798MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
3799Sparc64 sparc64-*-*
3800
3801* Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
3802
3803There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
3804This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
3805
3806* Fixes
3807
3808As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
3809and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
3810
3811*** Changes in GDB-4.12:
3812
3813* Irix 5 is now supported
3814
3815* HPPA support
3816
3817GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
3818to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
3819GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
3820of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
3821can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
3822
3823
3824*** Changes in GDB-4.11:
3825
3826* User visible changes:
3827
3828* Remote Debugging
3829
3830The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
3831target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
3832debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
3833integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
3834debugging info for the mips target).
3835
3836* DEC Alpha native support
3837
3838GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
3839debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
3840work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
3841Alpha-specific notes.
3842
3843* Preliminary thread implementation
3844
3845GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
3846
3847* LynxOS native and target support for 386
3848
3849This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
3850to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
3851for details).
3852
3853* Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
3854
3855This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
3856mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
3857call methods, ...etc.
3858
3859*** Changes in GDB-4.10:
3860
3861 * User visible changes:
3862
3863Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
3864supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
3865other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
3866somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
3867
3868Filename completion now works.
3869
3870When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
3871arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
3872addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
3873
3874All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
3875vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
3876should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
3877your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
3878to be on the far side of a thin network line.
3879
3880 * DEC alpha support
3881
3882This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
3883cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
3884
3885
3886*** Changes in GDB-4.9:
3887
3888 * Testsuite
3889
3890This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
3891The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
3892via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
3893
3894 * C++ demangling
3895
3896'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
3897emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
3898Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
3899disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
3900use gdb with AT&T cfront.
3901
3902 * Simulators
3903
3904GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
3905So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
3906Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
3907
3908 * New targets supported
3909
3910H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
3911H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
3912SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
3913Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
3914IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
3915
3916Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
3917version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
3918GO32 memory extender.
3919
3920 * New remote protocols
3921
3922MIPS remote debugging protocol.
3923
3924 * New source languages supported
3925
3926This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
3927used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
3928into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
3929
3930
3931*** Changes in GDB-4.8:
3932
3933 * HP Precision Architecture supported
3934
3935GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
3936version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
3937University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
3938compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
3939format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
3940(as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
3941
3942Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
3943
3944 * Faster and better demangling
3945
3946We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
3947demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
3948character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
3949only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
3950This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
3951increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
3952symbol lookups.
3953
3954`Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
3955from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
3956compiler does not actually implement.
3957
3958 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
3959
3960In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
3961inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
3962recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
3963very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
3964The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
3965circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
3966fix.
3967
3968The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
3969release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
3970
3971 * Improved configure script
3972
3973The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
3974you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
3975host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
3976done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
3977
3978We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
3979version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
3980`--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
3981The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
3982only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
3983We hope to make this the default in a future release.
3984
3985 * Documentation improvements
3986
3987There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
3988produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
3989before submitting changes.
3990
3991The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
3992M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
3993`info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
3994you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
3995a future texinfo-X.Y release.
3996
3997*NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
3998We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
3999been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
4000or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
4001`texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
4002around this problem.
4003
4004 * New features
4005
4006GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
4007the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
4008`print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
4009the target program.
4010
4011The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
4012how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
4013
4014 * New native hosts supported
4015
4016HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
4017386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
4018
4019 * New targets supported
4020
4021AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
4022
4023 * New file formats supported
4024
4025BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
4026HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
4027
4028 * Major bug fixes
4029
4030Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
4031
4032We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
4033printf_filtered("%s") problems.
4034
4035We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
4036for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
4037release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
4038
4039You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
4040will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
4041
4042We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
4043for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
4044especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
4045libraries.
4046
4047The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
4048information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
4049command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
4050any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
4051when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
4052
4053 * Internal improvements
4054
4055GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
4056debugging of multiple languages in the future.
4057
4058GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
4059Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
4060symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
4061contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
4062shared code that handles any of them.
4063
4064 * New command line options
4065
4066We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
4067
4068 * Mmalloc licensing
4069
4070The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
4071General Public License.
4072
4073*** Changes in GDB-4.7:
4074
4075 * Host/native/target split
4076
4077GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
4078hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
4079target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
4080local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
4081ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
4082
4083The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
4084GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
4085is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
4086code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
4087any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
4088built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
4089handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
4090
4091GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
4092It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
4093plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
4094
4095 * New hosts supported
4096
4097HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
4098386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
4099386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
4100
4101 * New targets supported
4102
4103Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
410468030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
4105
4106 * New native hosts supported
4107
4108386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
4109 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
4110386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
4111
4112 * New file formats supported
4113
4114BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
4115supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
4116format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
4117
4118 * New commands
4119
4120`show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
4121`show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
4122These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
4123
4124`info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
4125
4126You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
4127scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
4128prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
4129executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
4130
4131 * C++ improvements
4132
4133We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
4134info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
4135symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
4136
4137Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
4138
4139 * Major bug fixes
4140
4141The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
4142fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
4143by the compiler.
4144
4145We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
4146support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
4147
4148John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
4149slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
4150that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
4151purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
4152the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
4153mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
4154
4155Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
4156about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
4157completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
4158we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
4159
4160 * AMD 29k support
4161
4162A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
4163specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
4164calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
4165usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
4166in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
4167
4168We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
4169Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
4170of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
4171resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
4172
4173 * Remote interfaces
4174
4175We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
4176with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
4177message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
4178This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
4179needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
4180breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
4181each instruction being stepped through.
4182
4183The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
4184registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
4185
4186There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
4187find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
4188Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
4189processor with a serial port.
4190
4191 * Configuration
4192
4193Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
4194`table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
4195supported, and what files each one uses.
4196
4197 * Library changes
4198
4199There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
4200disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
4201Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
4202disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
4203
4204The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
4205Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
4206can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
4207grants all the rights from the General Public License.
4208
4209 * Documentation
4210
4211The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
4212reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
4213as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
4214encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
4215system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
4216bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
4217
4218And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
4219
4220
4221*** Changes in GDB-4.6:
4222
4223 * Better support for C++ function names
4224
4225GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
4226names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
4227(using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
4228single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
4229Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
4230
4231GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
4232the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
4233You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
4234lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
4235for the list of formats.
4236
4237 * G++ symbol mangling problem
4238
4239Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
4240C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
4241directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
4242can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
4243usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
4244about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
4245this problem.)
4246
4247 * New 'maintenance' command
4248
4249All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
4250the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
4251can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
4252
4253 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
4254 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
4255 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
4256 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
4257 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
4258 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
4259
4260The following commands are new:
4261
4262 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
4263 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
4264 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
4265
4266 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
4267
4268We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
4269(e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
4270be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
4271read after argv processing.
4272
4273 * New hosts supported
4274
4275Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
4276
55241689 4277GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
c906108c
SS
4278
4279We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
4280is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
4281for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
4282masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
4283fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
4284It costs extra.
4285
4286 * New targets supported
4287
4288Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
4289
4290 * More smarts about finding #include files
4291
4292GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
4293all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
4294greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
4295especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
4296the one that contains your sources.
4297
4298We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
4299breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
4300try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
4301
4302 * Interesting infernals change
4303
4304GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
4305section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
4306target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
4307stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
4308
4309 * Bug fixes (of course!)
4310
4311There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
4312 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
4313 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
4314
4315See the ChangeLog for details.
4316
4317*** Changes in GDB-4.5:
4318
4319 * New machines supported (host and target)
4320
4321IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
4322
4323SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
4324
4325 * New malloc package
4326
4327GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
4328Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
4329capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
4330This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
4331pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
4332more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
4333
4334 * info proc
4335
4336The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
4337'help info proc' for details.
4338
4339 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
4340
4341The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
4342Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
4343possible.
4344
4345 * File name changes for MS-DOS
4346
4347Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
4348support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
4349conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
4350environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
4351that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
4352in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
4353
4354 * Cross byte order fixes
4355
4356Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
4357targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
4358
4359 * New -mapped and -readnow options
4360
4361If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
4362system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
4363`symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
4364program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
4365called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
4366Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
4367and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
4368the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
4369option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
4370starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
4371
4372You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
4373the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
4374information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
4375slower, but makes future operations faster.
4376
4377The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
4378build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
4379A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
4380use is:
4381
4382 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
4383
4384The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
4385It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
4386shared across multiple host platforms.
4387
4388 * longjmp() handling
4389
4390GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
4391siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
4392all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
4393platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
4394
4395 * Solaris 2.0
4396
4397Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
4398this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
4399reading symbols.
4400
4401 * Bug fixes
4402
4403As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
4404People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
4405crashes and trashed symbol tables.
4406
4407*** Changes in GDB-4.4:
4408
4409 * New machines supported (host and target)
4410
4411SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
4412 (except core files)
4413BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
4414Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
4415
4416 * New machines supported (target)
4417
4418AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
4419
4420 * C++ support
4421
4422GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
4423The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
4424per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
4425
4426GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
4427`ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
4428extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
4429good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
4430will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
4431released.
4432
4433 * New features for SVR4
4434
4435GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
4436shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
4437only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
4438
4439The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
4440on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
4441it prints the address mappings of the process.
4442
4443If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
4444bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
4445
4446 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
4447
4448Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
4449now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
4450skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
4451make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
4452same code linked statically.
4453
4454 * New Getopt
4455
4456GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
4457version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
4458continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
4459Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
4460added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
4461future by other options that begin with the same letter.
4462
4463 * Bugs fixed
4464
4465The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
4466Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
4467See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
4468
4469
4470*** Changes in GDB-4.3:
4471
4472 * New machines supported (host and target)
4473
4474Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
4475NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
4476Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
4477
4478 * Almost SCO Unix support
4479
4480We had hoped to support:
4481SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
4482(except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
4483that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
4484about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
4485
4486 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
4487
4488GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
4489debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
4490is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
4491send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
4492reqired (if any).
4493
4494 * New Readline
4495
4496GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
4497is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
4498required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
4499
4500 * Bugs fixed
4501
4502The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
4503Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
4504See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
4505
4506 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
4507
4508GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
4509supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
4510symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
4511
4512Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
4513mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
4514debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
4515mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
4516version 2.
4517
4518Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
4519really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
4520line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
4521variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
4522situation somewhat.
4523
4524When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
4525However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
4526methods.
4527
4528We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
4529DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
4530encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
4531
4532
4533*** Changes in GDB-4.2:
4534
4535 * Improved configuration
4536
4537Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
4538Porting BFD is simpler.
4539
4540 * Stepping improved
4541
4542The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
4543of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
4544in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
4545function that has debugging information is called within the line.
4546
4547 * Bug fixing
4548
4549Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
4550
4551 * New host supported (not target)
4552
4553Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
4554
4555
4556*** Changes in GDB-4.1:
4557
4558 * Multiple source language support
4559
4560GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
4561It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
4562and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
4563language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
4564You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
4565`set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
4566
4567 * GDB and Modula-2
4568
4569GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
4570currently under development at the State University of New York at
4571Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
4572continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
4573
4574Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
4575debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
4576symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
4577
4578There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
4579in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
4580
4581 * set write on/off
4582
4583GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
4584a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
4585the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
4586by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
4587effect immediately.
4588
4589 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
4590
4591When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
4592shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
4593The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
4594examining core files.
4595
4596 * set listsize
4597
4598You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
4599The default is 10.
4600
4601 * New machines supported (host and target)
4602
4603SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4604Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
4605Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
4606
4607 * New hosts supported (not targets)
4608
4609IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
4610
4611 * New targets supported (not hosts)
4612
4613AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
4614AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
4615Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
4616
4617 * New remote interfaces
4618
4619AMD 29000 Adapt
4620AMD 29000 Minimon
4621
4622
4623*** Changes in GDB-4.0:
4624
4625 * New Facilities
4626
4627Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
4628
4629Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
4630target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
4631is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
4632remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
4633remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
4634also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
4635using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
4636stub on the target system.
4637
4638New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
4639
4640GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
4641library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
4642object file types such as a.out and coff.
4643
4644There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
4645refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
4646
4647
4648 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
4649
4650All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
4651by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
4652
4653For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
4654``Show prompt'' produces the response:
4655Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
4656
4657What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
4658print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
4659will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
4660all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
4661
4662confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
4663 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
4664 it is already running. Default is ON.
4665
4666editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
4667 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
4668 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
4669 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
4670 Default is ON.
4671
4672history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
4673 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
4674 or the value of the environment variable
4675 GDBHISTFILE.
4676
4677history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
4678 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
4679 HISTSIZE.
4680
4681history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
4682 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
4683 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
4684
4685history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
4686 history expansion will be performed on
4687 command line input. The default is OFF.
4688
4689radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
4690 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
4691 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
4692
4693height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
4694 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
4695 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
4696 variable TERM.
4697
4698width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
4699 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
4700 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
4701 variable TERM.
4702
4703Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
4704``set width'' instead.
4705
4706print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
4707 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
4708 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
4709 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
4710
4711print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
4712 is OFF.
4713
4714print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
4715 "raw" form if off.
4716
4717print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
4718 like instructions.
4719
4720print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
4721
4722
4723 * Support for Epoch Environment.
4724
4725The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
4726new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
4727are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
4728window.
4729
4730
4731 * Support for Shared Libraries
4732
4733GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
4734Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
4735before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
4736happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
4737At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
4738from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
4739shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
4740It can be abbreviated ``share''.
4741
4742sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
4743 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
4744 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
4745
4746info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
4747
4748
4749 * Watchpoints
4750
4751A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
4752expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
4753tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
4754quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
4755problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
4756more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
4757
4758watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
4759
4760info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
4761
4762delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4763disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4764enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4765
4766
4767 * C++ multiple inheritance
4768
4769When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
4770for C++ programs.
4771
4772 * C++ exception handling
4773
4774Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
4775ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
4776the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
4777handler's context).
4778
4779catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
4780 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
4781 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
4782
4783info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
4784 current stack frame.
4785
4786
4787 * Minor command changes
4788
4789The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
4790command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
4791is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
4792
4793The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
4794at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
4795frames without printing.
4796
4797 * New directory command
4798
4799'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
4800The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
4801about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
4802with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
4803find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
4804
4805 * Configuring GDB for compilation
4806
4807For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
4808for more details.
4809
4810GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
4811two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
4812Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
4813where the program that you are debugging will run.
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