* NEWS: Add entry mentioning thread-support on Tru64
[deliverable/binutils-gdb.git] / gdb / NEWS
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1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
3
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4*** Changes since GDB 6.8
5
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6* GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
7remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
8with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
9the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
10
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11* Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
12now complete on file names.
13
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14* When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
15completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
16For instance, consider:
17
18 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
19 # struct example variable;
20 (gdb) p variable.
21
22If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
23completions will be "f1" and "f2".
24
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25* GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
26operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
27macros.
28
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29* New remote packets
30
31qSearch:memory:
32 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
33
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34QStartNoAckMode
35 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
36 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
37 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
38
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39* Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
40
41 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
42 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
43 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
44
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45* The "disassemble" command now supports an optional /m modifier to print mixed
46source+assembly.
47
c055b101 48* GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
a0ef4274 49DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
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50
51* The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
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52and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
53`set/show sh calling-convention'.
c055b101 54
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55* GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
56with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
57
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58* 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
59
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60* Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
61
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62* Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
63which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
64
1fddbabb 65* The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
31fffb02 66list of section offsets.
1fddbabb 67
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68* On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
69conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
70have also been fixed.
71
bfb8797a 72* GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
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73From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
74are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
bfb8797a 75
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76* New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
77
78 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
79 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
80
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81 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
82 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
83 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
84
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85 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
86 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
87
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88* Python scripting
89
90 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
91 available is determined at configure time.
92
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93* New commands
94
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95find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
96 val1 [, val2, ...]
97 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
98
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99maint set python print-stack
100maint show python print-stack
101 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
102
103python [CODE]
104 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
105
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106set print symbol-loading
107show print symbol-loading
108 Control printing of symbol loading messages.
109
e0a3ce09 110set debug timestamp
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111show debug timestamp
112 Display timestamps with GDB debugging output.
113
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114set exec-wrapper
115show exec-wrapper
116unset exec-wrapper
117 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
fa4727a6 118
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119set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
120show multiple-symbols
121 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
122 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
123 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
124
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125set breakpoint always-inserted
126show breakpoint always-inserted
127 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
128 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
129 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
130
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131set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
132show arm fallback-mode
133set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
134show arm force-mode
135 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
136 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
137 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
138 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
139
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140set disable-randomization
141show disable-randomization
142 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
143 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
144 multiple debugging sessions.
145
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146set target-async
147 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
148 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
149 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
150 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
151
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152macro define
153macro list
154macro undef
155 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
156 interactively.
157
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158* New targets
159
160x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
161
75feb17d 162*** Changes in GDB 6.8
f9ed52be 163
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164* New native configurations
165
166NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
94a0e877 167Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
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168
169* New targets
170
171NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
94a0e877 172Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
af5ca30d 173
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174* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
175
176 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
177 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
178 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
179 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
180
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181* GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
182(mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
183
fe6fbf8b 184* Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
8d5f9c6f 185is resolved.
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186
187* GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
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188including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
189and in inlined functions.
fe6fbf8b 190
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191* GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
192accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
193more than one contiguous range of addresses.
194
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195* Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
196
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197* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
198registers on PowerPC targets.
199
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200* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
201targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
202
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203* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
204commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
205
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206* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
207extended-remote mode.
208
24a836bd 209* hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
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210The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
211error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
212The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
24a836bd 213
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214* GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
215building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
216target architectures.
217
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218* GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
219Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
220now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
221stored in two consecutive float registers.
222
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223* The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
224breakpoints now.
225
b93b6ca7 226* Improved support for debugging Ada
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227Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
228include:
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229 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
230 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
231 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
232 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
233 of an assignment
234 - Improved command completion in Ada
235 - Several bug fixes
236
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237* GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
238process.
239
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240* New commands
241
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242set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
243show print frame-arguments
244 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
245 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
246
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247remote put
248remote get
249remote delete
250 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
251
252* New MI commands
253
254-target-file-put
255-target-file-get
256-target-file-delete
257 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
258
259* New remote packets
260
261vFile:open:
262vFile:close:
263vFile:pread:
264vFile:pwrite:
265vFile:unlink:
266 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
d0c678e6 267
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268vAttach
269 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
270 mode.
271
272vRun
273 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
274
8d5f9c6f 275*** Changes in GDB 6.7
6dd09645 276
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277* Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
278bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
279Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
280
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281* When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
282symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
283-Bsymbolic linker option.
284
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285* When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
286recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
287is not supported.
288
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289* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
290frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
291
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292* GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
29332-bit or 64-bit register values.
294
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295* Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
296
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297* GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
298target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
299a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
300
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301* Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
302automatically displayed as character or string data.
303
304* The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
305arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
306as strings.
e1f48ead 307
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308* Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
309for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
8d5f9c6f 310only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
123dc839 311
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312* GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
313iWMMXt coprocessor.
fb1e4ffc 314
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315* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
316ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
317has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
318
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319* GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
320
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321* GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
322
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323* The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
324layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
325segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
326
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327* The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
328immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
329
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330* The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
331"library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
332packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
333where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
334Windows and SymbianOS).
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335
336* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
337(DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
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338
339* GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
340according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
cfa9d6d9 341
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342* New commands
343
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344set remoteflow
345show remoteflow
346 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
347 when debugging using remote targets.
348
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349set mem inaccessible-by-default
350show mem inaccessible-by-default
351 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
352 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
353 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
354 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
355 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
356
357set breakpoint auto-hw
358show breakpoint auto-hw
359 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
360 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
361 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
362 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
363 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
364 including "next" and "finish".
365
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366catch exception
367catch exception unhandled
368 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
369
370catch assert
371 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
372
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373set sysroot
374show sysroot
375 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
376 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
377 an alias to "set sysroot".
378
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379info spu
380 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
381 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
382 architecture.
383
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384* New native configurations
385
386OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
387
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388set tdesc filename
389unset tdesc filename
390show tdesc filename
391 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
392 not query the target for its built-in description.
393
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394* New targets
395
54fe9172 396OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
c9bb8148 397MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
c077150c 398Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
c9bb8148 399
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400* New remote packets
401
402QPassSignals:
403 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
404 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
405
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406qXfer:features:read:
407 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
408 features.
6dd09645 409
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410qXfer:spu:read:
411qXfer:spu:write:
412 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
413 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
414
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415qXfer:libraries:read:
416 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
417 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
418 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
419 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
420
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421* Removed targets
422
423Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
424
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425alpha*-*-osf1*
426alpha*-*-osf2*
7ce59000 427d10v-*-*
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428hppa*-*-hiux*
429i[34567]86-ncr-*
430i[34567]86-*-dgux*
431i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
432i[34567]86-*-netware*
433i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
434i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
435i[34567]86-*-sco*
436i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
437i[34567]86-*-sysv4*
438i[34567]86-*-sysv5*
439i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
440i[34567]86-*-unixware*
441i[34567]86-*-sysv*
442i[34567]86-*-isc*
443m68*-cisco*-*
444m68*-tandem-*
ad527d2e 445mips*-*-pe
483367ee 446rs6000-*-lynxos*
ad527d2e 447sh*-*-pe
483367ee 448
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449* Other removed features
450
451target abug
452target cpu32bug
453target est
454target rom68k
455
456 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
457
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458target hms
459target e7000
460target sh3
461target sh3e
462
463 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
464 H8/300.
465
466target ocd
467
468 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
469 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
470 interfaces.
471
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472DWARF 1 support
473
474 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
475 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
476
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477Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
478
479 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
480 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
481 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
482 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
483
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484MIPS ".pdr" sections
485
486 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
487 in debugging information.
488
489Scheme support
490
491 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
492 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
493
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494set mips stack-arg-size
495set mips saved-gpreg-size
496
497 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
498
6dd09645 499*** Changes in GDB 6.6
e374b601 500
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501* New targets
502
503Xtensa xtensa-elf
9c309e77 504Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
ca3bf3bd 505
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506* GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
507(mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
508running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
509
510* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
511Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
512supported.
513
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514* The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
515broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
516
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517* The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
518stub provides the required support.
519
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520* Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
521longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
522
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523* New commands
524
525set substitute-path
526unset substitute-path
527show substitute-path
528 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
529 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
530 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
531 between compilation and debugging.
532
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533set trace-commands
534show trace-commands
535 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
536 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
537 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
538
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539* REMOVED features
540
541The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
542
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543Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
544an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
545
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546The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
547
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548* New remote packets
549
550qSupported:
551 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
552 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
553 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
554 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
555 target.
556
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557qXfer:auxv:read:
558 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
559 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
560
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561qXfer:memory-map:read:
562 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
563 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
564
565vFlashErase:
566vFlashWrite:
567vFlashDone:
568 Erase and program a flash memory device.
569
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570* Removed remote packets
571
572qPart:auxv:read:
573 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
574 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
575
e374b601 576*** Changes in GDB 6.5
53e5f3cf 577
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578* New targets
579
580Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
581
582Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
583
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584* New commands
585
586init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
587 only if it doesn't already have a value.
588
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589The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
590
591checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
592
593restart <n> Return the program state to a
594 previously saved state.
595
596info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
597
598delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
599
600set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
601 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
602
603info forks List forks of the user program that
604 are available to be debugged.
605
606fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
607 forks of the user program that are
608 available to be debugged.
609
610delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
611 that are available to be debugged (and
612 kill the forked process).
613
614detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
615 that are available to be debugged (and
616 allow the process to continue).
617
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618* New architecture
619
620Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
621
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622* Improved Windows host support
623
624GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
625native console support, and remote communications using either
626network sockets or serial ports.
627
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628* Improved Modula-2 language support
629
630GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
631basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
632pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
633printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
634written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
635GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
636
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637* REMOVED features
638
639The ARM rdi-share module.
640
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641The Netware NLM debug server.
642
53e5f3cf 643*** Changes in GDB 6.4
156a53ca 644
e0ecbda1
MK
645* New native configurations
646
02a677ac 647OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
e0ecbda1
MK
648OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
649
d64a6579
KB
650* New targets
651
652Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
653
b33a6190
AS
654* New command line options
655
656--batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
657--return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
658 the child (debugged) program exited with.
659--eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
660 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
661 specified multiple times and in conjunction
662 with the --command (-x) option.
663
11dced61
AC
664* Deprecated commands removed
665
666The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
667removed:
668
669 Command Replacement
670 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
671 othernames set arm disassembler
672 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
673 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
674 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
675 regs info registers
676
6fe85783
MK
677* New BSD user-level threads support
678
679It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
680library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
681configurations are:
682
683FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
684FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
685OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
686
687Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
688are not yet supported.
689
5260ca71
MS
690* New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
691(Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
692
e84ecc99
AC
693* REMOVED configurations and files
694
695VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
9445aa30 696Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
9445aa30 697National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
156a53ca 698
31e35378
JB
699* New "set print array-indexes" command
700
701After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
702when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
703behavior.
704
e85e5c83
MK
705* VAX floating point support
706
707GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
708
d91e9901
AS
709* User-defined command support
710
711In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
712to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
713section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
714
f2cb65ca
MC
715*** Changes in GDB 6.3:
716
f47b1503
AS
717* New command line option
718
719GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
720debugging.
721
f2cb65ca
MC
722* GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
723
724GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
725information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
726by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
727proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
728to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
860660cb 729
d08c0230
AC
730* Internationalization
731
732When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
733internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
734continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
735
117ea3cf
PH
736* Ada
737
738Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
739implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
740into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
741
d08c0230
AC
742* New native configurations
743
744GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
745
746* Remote 'p' packet
747
748GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
749packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
750
751* END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
752
753GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
754The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
755features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
756i386 application).
757
758GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
759compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
760continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
761configurations:
762
763hppa-*-hpux
764ia64-*-aix
765mips-*-irix*
766*-*-lynx
767mips-*-linux-gnu
768sds protocol
769xdr protocol
770powerpc bdm protocol
771
772Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
773made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
774
775* OBSOLETE configurations and files
776
777Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
778been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
779configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
780permanently REMOVED.
781
782h8300-*-*
783mcore-*-*
784mn10300-*-*
785ns32k-*-*
786sh64-*-*
787v850-*-*
788
ebb7c577
AC
789*** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
790
791* MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
792
793When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
794heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
795been fixed.
796
797* MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
798
799When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
800fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
801IRIX long double values).
802
803* VAX and "next"
804
805A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
806command. This problem has been fixed.
807
860660cb 808*** Changes in GDB 6.2:
faae5abe 809
0dea2468
AC
810* Fix for ``many threads''
811
812On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
813rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
814error message:
815
816 ptrace: No such process.
817 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
818
819This problem has been fixed.
820
2c07db7a
AC
821* "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
822
823Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
824GDB to dump core).
825
c23968a2
JB
826* New ``start'' command.
827
828This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
829
71009278
MK
830* New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
831
832Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
833live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
834platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
835
836FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
837FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
838NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
839NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
840NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
841OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
842OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
843OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
844OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
845
3c0b7db2
AC
846* Signal trampoline code overhauled
847
848Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
849These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
850of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
851call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
852signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
853
73cc75f3
AC
854Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
855features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
856include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
3c0b7db2 857
7243600a
BF
858* Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
859
6f606e1c
MK
860* New native configurations
861
97dc871c 862GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
0e56aeaf 863OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
bf2ca189
MK
864OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
865OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
d195bc9f 866OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 867NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
9f076e7a 868OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 869
a1b461bf
AC
870* END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
871
872GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
873The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
874including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
875migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
876compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
877work, was also included.
878
879GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
880module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
881
882h8300-*-*
883mcore-*-*
884mn10300-*-*
885ns32k-*-*
886sh64-*-*
887v850-*-*
888xstormy16-*-*
889
890Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
891made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
892
3c7012f5
AC
893* REMOVED configurations and files
894
895Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
896Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
897Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
898Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
899Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
900AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
901Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
902decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
903riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
904sonymips mips-sony-*
905sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
906
e5fe55f7
AC
907*** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
908
909* TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
910
911The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
912GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
913command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
914program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
915with GDB".
916
917* Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
918
919Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
920libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
921cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
922GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
923shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
924the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
925are created.
926
927Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
928
929* Fixed ISO-C build problems
930
931The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
932non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
933compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
934
935* Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
936
937Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
938wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
939
940* Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
941
942The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
943permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
944systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
945
946* Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
947
948Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
949has been updated to use constant array sizes.
950
951* Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
952
953GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
954its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
955panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
956
957* Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
958
959When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
960by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
961not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
962
faae5abe 963*** Changes in GDB 6.1:
f2c06f52 964
9175c9a3
MC
965* Removed --with-mmalloc
966
967Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
968conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
969
3cc87ec0
MK
970* Changes in AMD64 configurations
971
972The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
973the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
974and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
975you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
976
f0424ef6
MK
977* Revised SPARC target
978
979The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
980FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
03cebad2
MK
981support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
982from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
983(Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
f0424ef6 984
59659be2
ILT
985* New C++ demangler
986
987GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
988names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
989with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
990programs.
991
9e08b29b
DJ
992* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
993
994GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
995arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
996encountered these.
997
8dfe8985
DC
998* C++ nested types and namespaces
999
1000GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
1001improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
1002is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
1003Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
1004namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
1005"Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
1006frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
1007if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
1008GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
1009
cced5e27
MK
1010* New native configurations
1011
1012NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
27d1e716 1013OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2031c21a 1014OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
f2cab569
MK
1015OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
1016OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
cced5e27 1017
b4b4b794
KI
1018* New debugging protocols
1019
1020M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
1021
7989c619
AC
1022* "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
1023
1024The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
1025and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
1026tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
1027
5994185b
AC
1028* OBSOLETE configurations and files
1029
1030Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1031been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1032configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1033permanently REMOVED.
1034
1035Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
1036Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
1037Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
1038Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
1039Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
1040AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
1041Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
0748d941
AC
1042decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
1043riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
1044sonymips mips-sony-*
1045sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
5994185b 1046
0ddabb4c
AC
1047* REMOVED configurations and files
1048
1049SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
1050SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4a8269c0
AC
1051Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1052Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1053H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1054HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
1055HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1056HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
1057PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
cf7c5c23 1058386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
4a8269c0
AC
1059Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
1060 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
1061 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f0424ef6
MK
1062SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
1063SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
4a8269c0
AC
1064Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1065Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
0ddabb4c 1066
c7f1390e
DJ
1067*** Changes in GDB 6.0:
1068
1fe43d45
AC
1069* Objective-C
1070
1071Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
1072integrated into GDB.
1073
e6beb428
AC
1074* New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
1075
1076DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
1077information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
1078By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
1079backtraces.
1080
1081The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
1082have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
1083DWARF 2 CFI support.
1084
1085* Hosted file I/O.
1086
1087GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
1088file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
1089remote protocol documentation for details.
1090
1091* All targets using the new architecture framework.
1092
1093All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
1094architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
1095to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
1096ppc32 on ppc64).
1097
1098* GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
1099
1100GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
1101per-thread variables.
1102
1103* GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
1104
1105GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
1106GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
1107
1108* Separate debug info.
1109
1110GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
1111automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
1112of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
1113system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
1114and optional debug files.
1115
1116* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
1117
1118DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
1119describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
1120debugger.
1121
1122GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
1123for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
1124
1125* Java
1126
1127A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
1128Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
1129considered "useable".
1130
85f8f974
DJ
1131* GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
1132
1133The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
1134commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
1135kernel.
1136
0fac0b41
DJ
1137* GDB supports logging output to a file
1138
1139There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
1140used to capture GDB's output to a file.
f2c06f52 1141
6ad8ae5c
DJ
1142* The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
1143
1144The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
1145disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
1146command.
1147
e286caf2 1148* d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
5f601589
AC
1149
1150The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
1151registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
1152
d28f9cdf
DJ
1153* Profiling support
1154
1155A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
1156be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
1157session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
1158"--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
1159data, for more informative profiling results.
1160
da0f9dcd
AC
1161* Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
1162
1163The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
1164option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
b68767c1 1165"mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
da0f9dcd
AC
1166
1167Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
1168removed.
1169
fb9b6b35
JJ
1170Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
1171Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
1172Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
1173 in a subsequent -var-update.
1174
954a4db8
MK
1175* New native configurations.
1176
1177FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1178
6760f9e6
JB
1179* Multi-arched targets.
1180
b4263afa 1181HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
85a453d5 1182Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
6760f9e6 1183
1b831c93
AC
1184* OBSOLETE configurations and files
1185
1186Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1187been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1188configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1189permanently REMOVED.
1190
8b0e5691 1191Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
67f16606 1192Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
fd2299bd 1193H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
56056df7
AC
1194HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
1195HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1196HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
78c43945 1197PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2fbce691
AC
1198Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
1199 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
1200 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f81824a9
AC
1201Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1202Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
fd2299bd 1203
5835abe7
NC
1204* REMOVED configurations and files
1205
1206V850EA ISA
1b831c93
AC
1207Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1208IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
1209i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1210i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1211i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
1212HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1213 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
1214 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
1215Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1216Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1217Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1218OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1219I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5835abe7 1220
a094c6fb
AC
1221* MIPS $fp behavior changed
1222
1223The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
1224the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
1225context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
1226address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
1227The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
1228
299ffc64 1229*** Changes in GDB 5.3:
37057839 1230
46248966
AC
1231* GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
1232
1233When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
1234`/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
1235in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
1236library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
1237shared libs like mad''.
1238
b9d14705 1239* ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
6da02953 1240
b9d14705
DJ
1241Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
1242the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
1243arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
1244powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
6da02953 1245
e0e9281e
JB
1246* GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
1247
1248GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
1249and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
1250they expand.
1251
dd73b9bb
AC
1252The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
1253invocations in expression, and shows the result.
1254
1255The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
1256macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
1257
e0e9281e
JB
1258Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
1259information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
1260your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
1261information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
1262
2250ee0c
CV
1263* Multi-arched targets.
1264
6e3ba3b8
JT
1265DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
1266DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
2250ee0c 1267NEC V850 v850-*-*
6e3ba3b8 1268National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
a1789893
GS
1269Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
1270Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
2250ee0c 1271
cd9bfe15 1272* New targets.
e33ce519 1273
456f8b9d
DB
1274Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
1275
e33ce519 1276
da8ca43d
JT
1277* New native configurations
1278
1279Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
029923d4 1280SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
45888261 1281MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
9ce5c36a 1282UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
da8ca43d 1283
cd9bfe15
AC
1284* OBSOLETE configurations and files
1285
1286Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1287been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1288configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1289permanently REMOVED.
1290
92eb23c5 1291Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
a99a9e1b 1292OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1c7cc583 1293IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
7a3085c1 1294Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
7fb623f7 1295Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
eb4c54a2 1296Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
d8ee244c
MK
1297i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1298i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1299i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
822e978b
AC
1300HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1301 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
1302 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
4d210288 1303I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
92eb23c5 1304
db034ac5
AC
1305* OBSOLETE languages
1306
1307CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
1308
cd9bfe15
AC
1309* REMOVED configurations and files
1310
1311AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1312A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1313AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1314AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1315AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1316
1317testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
1318
20f01a46
DH
1319* New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
1320
1321This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
1322commands. The default is 1024.
1323
a5941fbf
MK
1324* Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
1325
1326Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
1327
89743e04
MS
1328* New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
1329
1330These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
1331to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
1332from a file into memory (restore).
37057839 1333
9fb14e79
JB
1334* Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
1335
1336The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
1337including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
1338of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
1339
2037aebb
AC
1340*** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
1341
1342* New targets.
1343
1344Atmel AVR avr*-*-*
1345
1346* Bug fixes
1347
1348gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
1349mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
1350Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
1351
1352gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
1353dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
1354Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
1355
1356Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
1357Surprisingly enough, it works now.
1358By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
1359
1360i386 hardware watchpoint support:
1361avoid misses on second run for some targets.
1362By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
1363
37057839 1364*** Changes in GDB 5.2:
eb7cedd9 1365
1a703748
MS
1366* New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
1367
1368This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
1369really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
1370In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
1371target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
1372This can be a significant performance improvement on some
1373(notably embedded) targets.
1374
cefd4ef5
MS
1375* New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
1376
55241689
AC
1377This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
1378process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
1379GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
1380hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
cefd4ef5 1381
352ed7b4
MS
1382* New command line option
1383
1384GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
1385
1386* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
1387
1388There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
1389command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
1390a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
1391be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
1392open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
1393issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
1394a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
1395it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
1396GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
1397is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
1398
fe419ffc
RE
1399* Changes in ARM configurations.
1400
1401Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
1402configuration is fully multi-arch.
1403
eb7cedd9
MK
1404* New native configurations
1405
fe419ffc 1406ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
eb7cedd9 1407x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
55241689 1408AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
768f0842 1409Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
eb7cedd9 1410
c9f63e6b
CV
1411* New targets
1412
1413Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
1414
9b4ff276
AC
1415* OBSOLETE configurations and files
1416
1417Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1418been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1419configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1420permanently REMOVED.
1421
1422AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1423A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1424AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1425AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1426AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1427
b4ceaee6 1428testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
9b4ff276 1429
e2caac18
AC
1430* REMOVED configurations and files
1431
1432TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
7bc65f05 1433WDC 65816 w65-*-*
7768dd6c
AC
1434PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1435PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1436PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
5e734e1f 1437Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1406caf7
AC
1438Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1439 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
7e24f0b1 1440SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
9b567150 1441Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
3680c638
AC
1442Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1443ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
a752853e 1444Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
e2caac18 1445
c2a727fa
TT
1446* Changes to command line processing
1447
1448The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
1449for the inferior from gdb's command line.
1450
467d8519
TT
1451* Changes to key bindings
1452
1453There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
1454
7072a954
AC
1455*** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
1456
1457Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
1458
1459Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
1460corrupted.
1461
1462Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
1463
1464Numerous documentation fixes.
1465
1466Numerous testsuite fixes.
1467
34f47bc4 1468*** Changes in GDB 5.1:
139760b7
MK
1469
1470* New native configurations
1471
1472Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
1473x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
55241689 1474MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
e23194cb
EZ
1475MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1476ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
55241689 1477s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
139760b7 1478
bf64bfd6
AC
1479* New targets
1480
def90278 1481Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
24be5c34 1482CRIS cris-axis
55241689 1483UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
def90278 1484
17e78a56 1485* OBSOLETE configurations and files
bf64bfd6
AC
1486
1487x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
9b9c068d 1488Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
bb19ff3b
AC
1489Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1490 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
76f4ea53
AC
1491TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1492WDC 65816 w65-*-*
4a1968f4 1493Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1b2b2c16
AC
1494PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1495PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1496PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
24f89b68 1497SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
514e603d
AC
1498Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1499ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
d036b4d9 1500Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
bf64bfd6 1501
17e78a56
AC
1502stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
1503kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
1504
7fcca85b
AC
1505Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1506been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1507configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1508permanently REMOVED.
1509
a196c81c 1510* REMOVED configurations and files
7fcca85b
AC
1511
1512Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1513Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
1514Pyramid pyramid-*-*
1515ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
1516Tahoe tahoe-*-*
a196c81c 1517ser-ocd.c *-*-*
bf64bfd6 1518
6d6b80e5 1519* GDB has been converted to ISO C.
e23194cb 1520
6d6b80e5 1521GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
e23194cb
EZ
1522sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
1523present.
1524
bf64bfd6
AC
1525* Other news:
1526
e23194cb
EZ
1527* "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
1528
1529* The MI enabled by default.
1530
1531The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
1532revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
1533engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
1534using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
1535which is now deprecated.
1536
1537* Support for debugging Pascal programs.
1538
1539GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
1540main features are supported:
1541
1542 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
1543
1544 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
1545 extension;
1546
1547 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
1548
1549 - a Pascal expression parser.
1550
1551However, some important features are not yet supported.
1552
1553 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
1554
1555 - there are some problems with boolean types;
1556
1557 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
1558 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
1559
1560 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
1561
1562 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
1563
1564* Changes in completion.
1565
1566Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
1567to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
1568users expect at the shell prompt.
1569
1570Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
1571`breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
1572program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
1573files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
1574be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
1575considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
1576name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
1577
1578`set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
1579
1580* New platform-independent commands:
1581
1582It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
1583hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
1584documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
1585
1586* Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
1587
d7275149
MK
1588Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
1589revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
1590many threads as your system allows you to have.
1591
e23194cb
EZ
1592Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
1593
d7275149
MK
1594Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
1595multi-threaded programs though.
e23194cb
EZ
1596
1597* Changes in MIPS configurations.
bf64bfd6
AC
1598
1599Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
1600
e23194cb
EZ
1601GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
1602debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
1603supported.)
1604
1605* Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
1606
1607Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
1608breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
1609implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
1610put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
1611and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
1612registers.
1613
1614The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
1615debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
1616watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
1617
1618* Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
1619
1620New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
1621the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
1622
1623New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
1624display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
1625IDT.
1626
1627New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
1628from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
1629New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
1630a given linear address.
1631
1632GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
1633program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
1634which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
1635
1636DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
1637
6c56c069
EZ
1638It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
1639
e23194cb
EZ
1640* Changes in documentation.
1641
1642All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
1643Documentation License.
1644
1645Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1646manual.
1647
1648TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
1649
1650Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1651manual.
1652
1653The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
1654documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
1655hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
1656
5d6640b1
AC
1657* GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
1658
1659The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
1660``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
1661contents of this file.
1662
1a1d8446
AC
1663* gdba.el deleted
1664
1665GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
139760b7 1666
9debab2f 1667*** Changes in GDB 5.0:
7a292a7a 1668
c63ce875
EZ
1669* Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
1670
1671Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
1672programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
1673displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
1674greater level of detail.
1675
1676* Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
1677
1678It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
1679bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
1680on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
1681written.
1682
1683* Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
1684
1685The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
1686necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
1687machines ``out of the box''.
1688
1689The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
1690possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
1691signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
1692would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
1693interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
1694
1695It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
1696standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
1697even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
1698and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
1699terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
1700
1701The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
1702enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
1703also works.
1704
1705DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
1706GDB.
1707
1708It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
1709directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
1710times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
1711breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
1712
ed9a39eb
JM
1713* New native configurations
1714
1715ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
afc05dd4 1716PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
ed9a39eb 1717
7a292a7a
SS
1718* New targets
1719
96baa820 1720Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
adf40b2e
JM
1721x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
1722PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
7a292a7a
SS
1723TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1724
085dd6e6
JM
1725* OBSOLETE configurations
1726
1727Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1728Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
9846de1b 1729Pyramid pyramid-*-*
ed9a39eb 1730ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
104c1213 1731Tahoe tahoe-*-*
7a292a7a 1732
9debab2f
AC
1733Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1734but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1735these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1736be permanently REMOVED.
1737
5330533d
SS
1738* Gould support removed
1739
1740Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
1741
bc9e5bbf
AC
1742* New features for SVR4
1743
1744On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
1745without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
1746load symbols from the running process's executable file.
1747
1748* Many C++ enhancements
1749
1750C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
1751in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
1752
adf40b2e
JM
1753* Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
1754
1755A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
1756sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
1757with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
1758``|<program> <args>'' vis:
1759
1760 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
1761 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
1762
43e526b9
JM
1763* MIPS 64 remote protocol
1764
1765A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
1766expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
1767instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
1768
1769The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
1770added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
1771
96baa820
JM
1772* ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
1773
1774The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
1775``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
1776include ``set remote P-packet''.
1777
11cf8741
JM
1778* Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
1779
1780The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
1781accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
1782``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
1783
7876dd43
DB
1784* ``apropos'' command added.
1785
1786The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
1787documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
1788try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
1789
bc9e5bbf
AC
1790* New MI interface
1791
1792A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
1793interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
7162c0ca
EZ
1794process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
1795"GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
1796enabled by configuring with:
bc9e5bbf
AC
1797
1798 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
1799
c906108c
SS
1800*** Changes in GDB-4.18:
1801
1802* New native configurations
1803
1804HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
1805HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
55241689 1806M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
c906108c
SS
1807
1808* New targets
1809
1810Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1811Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
1812Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1813
1814* OBSOLETE configurations
1815
1816Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
1817
1818Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1819but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1820these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1821be permanently REMOVED.
1822
1823* ANSI/ISO C
1824
1825As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
1826buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
1827containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
1828use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
1829available. If this is not true, please report the affected
1830configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
1831information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
1832already.
1833
1834* Readline 2.2
1835
1836GDB now uses readline 2.2.
1837
1838* set extension-language
1839
1840You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
1841languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
1842you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
1843 set extension-language .c c++
1844The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
1845and their associated languages.
1846
1847* Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
1848
1849When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
1850you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
1851PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
1852
1853 set processor NAME
1854
1855sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
1856following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
1857
1858 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
1859 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
1860 403 IBM PowerPC 403
1861 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
1862 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
1863 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
1864 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
1865 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
1866 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
1867 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
1868 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
1869
1870At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
1871special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
1872registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
1873only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
1874
1875* HP-UX support
1876
1877Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
1878more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
1879library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
1880support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
1881for xdb and dbx commands.
1882
1883* Catchpoints
1884
1885HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
1886generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
1887to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
1888
1889This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
1890argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
1891output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
1892
1893* Debugging across forks
1894
1895On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
1896in the inferior.
1897
1898* TUI
1899
1900HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
1901it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
1902configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
1903
1904* GDB remote protocol additions
1905
1906A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
1907Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
1908fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
1909allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
1910
1911For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
1912full 64-bit address. The command
1913
1914 set remoteaddresssize 32
1915
1916can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
1917the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
1918will be discarded.
1919
1920In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
1921command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
1922
1923 maint packet heythere
1924
1925sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
1926disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
1927time.
1928
1929The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
1930target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
1931downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
1932
1933* Tracing can collect general expressions
1934
1935You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
1936further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
1937doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
1938
1939* mask-address variable for Mips
1940
1941For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
1942a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
1943of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
1944
1945* Higher serial baud rates
1946
1947GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
1948230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
1949to achieve all of these rates.)
1950
1951* i960 simulator
1952
1953The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
1954builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
1955
1956
1957*** Changes in GDB-4.17:
1958
1959* New native configurations
1960
1961Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
1962Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
1963Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1964PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
1965PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1966Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
1967Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
1968
1969* New targets
1970
1971Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1972Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
1973Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1974Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
1975MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
1976MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
1977MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
1978Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
1979Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
1980Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1981NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
1982
1983* New debugging protocols
1984
1985ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
1986M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
1987DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
1988PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1989PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1990Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1991
1992* DWARF 2
1993
1994All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
1995format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
1996information.
1997
1998* Java frontend
1999
2000GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
2001only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
2002
2003* solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
2004
2005For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
2006loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
2007locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
2008
2009* Live range splitting
2010
2011GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
2012range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
2013more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
2014
2015* Hurd support
2016
2017GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
2018updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
2019
2020* ARM Thumb support
2021
2022GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
2023instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
2024instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
2025accordingly.
2026
2027* MIPS16 support
2028
2029GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
2030instruction set.
2031
2032* Overlay support
2033
2034GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
2035linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
2036will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
2037control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
2038additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
2039in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
2040
2041* info symbol
2042
2043The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
2044the symbol at the specified address.
2045
2046* Trace support
2047
2048The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
2049asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
2050extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
2051includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
2052file tracepoint.c for more details.
2053
2054* MIPS simulator
2055
2056Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
2057by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
2058of most MIPS variants.
2059
2060* Sparc simulator
2061
2062Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
2063by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
2064Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
2065
2066* set architecture
2067
2068For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
2069basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
2070architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
2071the possible architectures.
2072
2073*** Changes in GDB-4.16:
2074
2075* New native configurations
2076
2077Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
2078M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
2079PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
2080PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
2081PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2082RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
2083
2084* New targets
2085
2086ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
2087I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
2088MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
2089MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
2090PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
2091Hitachi SH3 sh-*-*
2092Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2093
2094* PowerPC simulator
2095
2096The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
2097contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
2098PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
2099basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
2100performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
2101
2102* Solaris 2.5
2103
2104GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
2105
2106* Windows 95/NT native
2107
2108GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
2109To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
2110which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
2111Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
2112ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
2113
2114* dont-repeat command
2115
2116If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
2117command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
2118useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
2119extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
2120
2121* Send break instead of ^C
2122
2123The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
2124rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
2125GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
2126
2127* Remote protocol timeout
2128
2129The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
2130that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
2131to read from the target. The default value is 2.
2132
2133* Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
2134
2135By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
2136loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
2137stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
2138when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
2139in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
2140
2141Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
2142/usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
2143automatically on hpux10.
2144
2145* Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
2146
2147Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
2148
2149* Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
2150
2151When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
2152may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
2153the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
2154every character. The default value is 1050.
2155
2156* Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
2157
2158If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
2159a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
2160replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
2161details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
2162remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
2163to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
2164
2165* Speedups for remote debugging
2166
2167GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
2168the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
2169and more efficient S-record downloading.
2170
2171* Memory use reductions and statistics collection
2172
2173GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
2174Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
2175
2176*** Changes in GDB-4.15:
2177
2178* Psymtabs for XCOFF
2179
2180The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
2181can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
2182
2183* Remote targets use caching
2184
2185Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
2186remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
2187it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
2188debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
2189off' turns the the data cache off.
2190
2191* Remote targets may have threads
2192
2193The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
2194in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
2195gdb/remote.c for details.
2196
2197* NetROM support
2198
2199If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
2200support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
2201acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
2202write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
2203support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
2204another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
2205sequence is something like
2206
2207 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
2208 load <prog>
2209 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
2210
2211* Macintosh host
2212
2213GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
2214may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
2215it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
2216available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
2217device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
2218directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
2219scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
2220mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
2221
2222* Autoconf
2223
2224GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
2225but does simplify configuration and building.
2226
2227* hpux10
2228
2229GDB now supports hpux10.
2230
2231*** Changes in GDB-4.14:
2232
2233* New native configurations
2234
2235x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
2236x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
2237NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
2238Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
2239
2240* New targets
2241
2242A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2243HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
2244CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
2245PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
2246WDC 65816 w65-*-*
2247
2248* Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
2249
2250GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
2251possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
2252filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
2253the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
2254if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
2255
2256* Arguments to user-defined commands
2257
2258User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
2259Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
2260trivial example:
2261define adder
2262 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
2263
2264To execute the command use:
2265adder 1 2 3
2266
2267Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
2268Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
2269use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
2270
2271* New `if' and `while' commands
2272
2273This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
2274commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
2275expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
2276execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
2277terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
2278`else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
2279if the expression is zero.
2280
2281* Fortran source language mode
2282
2283GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
2284Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
2285variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
2286with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
2287Fortran compilers.
2288
2289* Better HPUX support
2290
2291Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
2292running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
2293processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
2294for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
2295that behavior do the following before running the program:
2296
2297 adb -w a.out
2298 __dld_flags?W 0x5
2299 control-d
2300
2301This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
2302To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
2303
2304 adb -w a.out
2305 __dld_flags?W 0x4
2306 control-d
2307
2308You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
2309the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
2310external linkage.
2311
2312GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
2313HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
2314
2315* Target byte order now dynamically selectable
2316
2317You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
2318commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
2319current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
2320"set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
2321associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
2322configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
2323
2324* New DOS host serial code
2325
2326This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
2327no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
2328a PC's serial port.
2329
2330*** Changes in GDB-4.13:
2331
2332* New "complete" command
2333
2334This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
2335were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
2336
2337* Trailing space optional in prompt
2338
2339"set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
2340allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
2341
2342* Breakpoint hit counts
2343
2344"info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
2345has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
2346can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
2347to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
2348less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
2349that breakpoint.
2350
2351* Ability to stop printing at NULL character
2352
2353"set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
2354an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
2355arrays actually contain only short strings.
2356
2357* Shared library breakpoints
2358
2359In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
2360breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
2361
2362* Hardware watchpoints
2363
2364There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
2365targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
2366
55241689 2367Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
c906108c
SS
2368
2369* Annotations
2370
2371Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
2372and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
2373
2374* Improved Irix 5 support
2375
2376GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
2377
2378* Improved HPPA support
2379
2380GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
2381
2382* New native configurations
2383
2384Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
2385HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2386Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
2387RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
2388
2389* New targets
2390
2391OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2392MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
2393Sparc64 sparc64-*-*
2394
2395* Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
2396
2397There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
2398This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
2399
2400* Fixes
2401
2402As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
2403and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
2404
2405*** Changes in GDB-4.12:
2406
2407* Irix 5 is now supported
2408
2409* HPPA support
2410
2411GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
2412to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
2413GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
2414of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
2415can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
2416
2417
2418*** Changes in GDB-4.11:
2419
2420* User visible changes:
2421
2422* Remote Debugging
2423
2424The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
2425target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
2426debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
2427integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
2428debugging info for the mips target).
2429
2430* DEC Alpha native support
2431
2432GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
2433debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
2434work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
2435Alpha-specific notes.
2436
2437* Preliminary thread implementation
2438
2439GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
2440
2441* LynxOS native and target support for 386
2442
2443This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
2444to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
2445for details).
2446
2447* Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
2448
2449This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
2450mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
2451call methods, ...etc.
2452
2453*** Changes in GDB-4.10:
2454
2455 * User visible changes:
2456
2457Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
2458supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
2459other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
2460somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
2461
2462Filename completion now works.
2463
2464When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
2465arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
2466addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
2467
2468All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
2469vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
2470should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
2471your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
2472to be on the far side of a thin network line.
2473
2474 * DEC alpha support
2475
2476This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
2477cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
2478
2479
2480*** Changes in GDB-4.9:
2481
2482 * Testsuite
2483
2484This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
2485The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
2486via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
2487
2488 * C++ demangling
2489
2490'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
2491emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
2492Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
2493disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
2494use gdb with AT&T cfront.
2495
2496 * Simulators
2497
2498GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
2499So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
2500Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
2501
2502 * New targets supported
2503
2504H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2505H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2506SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
2507Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2508IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
2509
2510Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
2511version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
2512GO32 memory extender.
2513
2514 * New remote protocols
2515
2516MIPS remote debugging protocol.
2517
2518 * New source languages supported
2519
2520This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
2521used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
2522into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
2523
2524
2525*** Changes in GDB-4.8:
2526
2527 * HP Precision Architecture supported
2528
2529GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
2530version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
2531University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
2532compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
2533format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
2534(as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
2535
2536Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
2537
2538 * Faster and better demangling
2539
2540We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
2541demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
2542character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
2543only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
2544This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
2545increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
2546symbol lookups.
2547
2548`Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
2549from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
2550compiler does not actually implement.
2551
2552 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
2553
2554In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
2555inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
2556recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
2557very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
2558The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
2559circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
2560fix.
2561
2562The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
2563release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
2564
2565 * Improved configure script
2566
2567The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
2568you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
2569host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
2570done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
2571
2572We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
2573version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
2574`--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
2575The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
2576only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
2577We hope to make this the default in a future release.
2578
2579 * Documentation improvements
2580
2581There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
2582produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
2583before submitting changes.
2584
2585The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
2586M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
2587`info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
2588you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
2589a future texinfo-X.Y release.
2590
2591*NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
2592We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
2593been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
2594or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
2595`texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
2596around this problem.
2597
2598 * New features
2599
2600GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
2601the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
2602`print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
2603the target program.
2604
2605The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
2606how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
2607
2608 * New native hosts supported
2609
2610HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
2611386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
2612
2613 * New targets supported
2614
2615AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
2616
2617 * New file formats supported
2618
2619BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
2620HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
2621
2622 * Major bug fixes
2623
2624Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
2625
2626We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
2627printf_filtered("%s") problems.
2628
2629We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
2630for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
2631release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
2632
2633You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
2634will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
2635
2636We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
2637for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
2638especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
2639libraries.
2640
2641The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
2642information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
2643command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
2644any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
2645when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
2646
2647 * Internal improvements
2648
2649GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
2650debugging of multiple languages in the future.
2651
2652GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
2653Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
2654symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
2655contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
2656shared code that handles any of them.
2657
2658 * New command line options
2659
2660We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
2661
2662 * Mmalloc licensing
2663
2664The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
2665General Public License.
2666
2667*** Changes in GDB-4.7:
2668
2669 * Host/native/target split
2670
2671GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
2672hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
2673target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
2674local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
2675ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
2676
2677The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
2678GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
2679is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
2680code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
2681any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
2682built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
2683handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
2684
2685GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
2686It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
2687plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
2688
2689 * New hosts supported
2690
2691HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
2692386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2693386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
2694
2695 * New targets supported
2696
2697Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
269868030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
2699
2700 * New native hosts supported
2701
2702386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2703 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
2704386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
2705
2706 * New file formats supported
2707
2708BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
2709supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
2710format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
2711
2712 * New commands
2713
2714`show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
2715`show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
2716These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
2717
2718`info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
2719
2720You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
2721scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
2722prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
2723executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
2724
2725 * C++ improvements
2726
2727We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
2728info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
2729symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
2730
2731Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
2732
2733 * Major bug fixes
2734
2735The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
2736fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
2737by the compiler.
2738
2739We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
2740support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
2741
2742John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
2743slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
2744that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
2745purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
2746the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
2747mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
2748
2749Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
2750about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
2751completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
2752we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
2753
2754 * AMD 29k support
2755
2756A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
2757specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
2758calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
2759usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
2760in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
2761
2762We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
2763Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
2764of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
2765resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
2766
2767 * Remote interfaces
2768
2769We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
2770with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
2771message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
2772This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
2773needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
2774breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
2775each instruction being stepped through.
2776
2777The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
2778registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
2779
2780There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
2781find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
2782Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
2783processor with a serial port.
2784
2785 * Configuration
2786
2787Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
2788`table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
2789supported, and what files each one uses.
2790
2791 * Library changes
2792
2793There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
2794disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
2795Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
2796disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
2797
2798The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
2799Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
2800can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
2801grants all the rights from the General Public License.
2802
2803 * Documentation
2804
2805The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
2806reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
2807as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
2808encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
2809system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
2810bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
2811
2812And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
2813
2814
2815*** Changes in GDB-4.6:
2816
2817 * Better support for C++ function names
2818
2819GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
2820names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
2821(using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
2822single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
2823Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
2824
2825GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
2826the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
2827You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
2828lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
2829for the list of formats.
2830
2831 * G++ symbol mangling problem
2832
2833Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
2834C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
2835directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
2836can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
2837usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
2838about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
2839this problem.)
2840
2841 * New 'maintenance' command
2842
2843All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
2844the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
2845can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
2846
2847 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
2848 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
2849 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
2850 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
2851 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
2852 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
2853
2854The following commands are new:
2855
2856 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
2857 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
2858 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
2859
2860 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
2861
2862We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
2863(e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
2864be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
2865read after argv processing.
2866
2867 * New hosts supported
2868
2869Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
2870
55241689 2871GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
c906108c
SS
2872
2873We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
2874is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
2875for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
2876masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
2877fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
2878It costs extra.
2879
2880 * New targets supported
2881
2882Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2883
2884 * More smarts about finding #include files
2885
2886GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
2887all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
2888greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
2889especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
2890the one that contains your sources.
2891
2892We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
2893breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
2894try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
2895
2896 * Interesting infernals change
2897
2898GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
2899section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
2900target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
2901stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
2902
2903 * Bug fixes (of course!)
2904
2905There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
2906 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
2907 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
2908
2909See the ChangeLog for details.
2910
2911*** Changes in GDB-4.5:
2912
2913 * New machines supported (host and target)
2914
2915IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
2916
2917SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
2918
2919 * New malloc package
2920
2921GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
2922Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
2923capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
2924This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
2925pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
2926more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
2927
2928 * info proc
2929
2930The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
2931'help info proc' for details.
2932
2933 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
2934
2935The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
2936Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
2937possible.
2938
2939 * File name changes for MS-DOS
2940
2941Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
2942support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
2943conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
2944environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
2945that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
2946in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
2947
2948 * Cross byte order fixes
2949
2950Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
2951targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
2952
2953 * New -mapped and -readnow options
2954
2955If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
2956system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
2957`symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
2958program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
2959called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
2960Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
2961and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
2962the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
2963option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
2964starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
2965
2966You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
2967the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
2968information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
2969slower, but makes future operations faster.
2970
2971The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
2972build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
2973A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
2974use is:
2975
2976 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
2977
2978The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
2979It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
2980shared across multiple host platforms.
2981
2982 * longjmp() handling
2983
2984GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
2985siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
2986all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
2987platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
2988
2989 * Solaris 2.0
2990
2991Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
2992this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
2993reading symbols.
2994
2995 * Bug fixes
2996
2997As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
2998People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
2999crashes and trashed symbol tables.
3000
3001*** Changes in GDB-4.4:
3002
3003 * New machines supported (host and target)
3004
3005SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
3006 (except core files)
3007BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
3008Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
3009
3010 * New machines supported (target)
3011
3012AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
3013
3014 * C++ support
3015
3016GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
3017The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
3018per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
3019
3020GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
3021`ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
3022extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
3023good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
3024will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
3025released.
3026
3027 * New features for SVR4
3028
3029GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
3030shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
3031only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
3032
3033The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
3034on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
3035it prints the address mappings of the process.
3036
3037If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
3038bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
3039
3040 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
3041
3042Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
3043now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
3044skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
3045make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
3046same code linked statically.
3047
3048 * New Getopt
3049
3050GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
3051version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
3052continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
3053Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
3054added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
3055future by other options that begin with the same letter.
3056
3057 * Bugs fixed
3058
3059The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
3060Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
3061See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
3062
3063
3064*** Changes in GDB-4.3:
3065
3066 * New machines supported (host and target)
3067
3068Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
3069NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
3070Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
3071
3072 * Almost SCO Unix support
3073
3074We had hoped to support:
3075SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
3076(except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
3077that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
3078about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
3079
3080 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
3081
3082GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
3083debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
3084is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
3085send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
3086reqired (if any).
3087
3088 * New Readline
3089
3090GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
3091is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
3092required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
3093
3094 * Bugs fixed
3095
3096The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
3097Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
3098See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
3099
3100 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
3101
3102GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
3103supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
3104symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
3105
3106Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
3107mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
3108debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
3109mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
3110version 2.
3111
3112Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
3113really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
3114line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
3115variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
3116situation somewhat.
3117
3118When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
3119However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
3120methods.
3121
3122We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
3123DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
3124encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
3125
3126
3127*** Changes in GDB-4.2:
3128
3129 * Improved configuration
3130
3131Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
3132Porting BFD is simpler.
3133
3134 * Stepping improved
3135
3136The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
3137of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
3138in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
3139function that has debugging information is called within the line.
3140
3141 * Bug fixing
3142
3143Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
3144
3145 * New host supported (not target)
3146
3147Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
3148
3149
3150*** Changes in GDB-4.1:
3151
3152 * Multiple source language support
3153
3154GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
3155It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
3156and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
3157language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
3158You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
3159`set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
3160
3161 * GDB and Modula-2
3162
3163GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
3164currently under development at the State University of New York at
3165Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
3166continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
3167
3168Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
3169debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
3170symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
3171
3172There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
3173in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
3174
3175 * set write on/off
3176
3177GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
3178a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
3179the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
3180by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
3181effect immediately.
3182
3183 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
3184
3185When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
3186shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
3187The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
3188examining core files.
3189
3190 * set listsize
3191
3192You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
3193The default is 10.
3194
3195 * New machines supported (host and target)
3196
3197SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
3198Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
3199Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
3200
3201 * New hosts supported (not targets)
3202
3203IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
3204
3205 * New targets supported (not hosts)
3206
3207AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
3208AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
3209Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
3210
3211 * New remote interfaces
3212
3213AMD 29000 Adapt
3214AMD 29000 Minimon
3215
3216
3217*** Changes in GDB-4.0:
3218
3219 * New Facilities
3220
3221Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
3222
3223Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
3224target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
3225is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
3226remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
3227remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
3228also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
3229using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
3230stub on the target system.
3231
3232New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
3233
3234GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
3235library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
3236object file types such as a.out and coff.
3237
3238There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
3239refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
3240
3241
3242 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
3243
3244All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
3245by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
3246
3247For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
3248``Show prompt'' produces the response:
3249Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
3250
3251What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
3252print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
3253will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
3254all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
3255
3256confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
3257 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
3258 it is already running. Default is ON.
3259
3260editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
3261 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
3262 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
3263 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
3264 Default is ON.
3265
3266history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
3267 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
3268 or the value of the environment variable
3269 GDBHISTFILE.
3270
3271history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
3272 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
3273 HISTSIZE.
3274
3275history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
3276 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
3277 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
3278
3279history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
3280 history expansion will be performed on
3281 command line input. The default is OFF.
3282
3283radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
3284 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
3285 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
3286
3287height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
3288 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
3289 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3290 variable TERM.
3291
3292width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
3293 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
3294 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3295 variable TERM.
3296
3297Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
3298``set width'' instead.
3299
3300print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
3301 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
3302 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
3303 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
3304
3305print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
3306 is OFF.
3307
3308print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
3309 "raw" form if off.
3310
3311print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
3312 like instructions.
3313
3314print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
3315
3316
3317 * Support for Epoch Environment.
3318
3319The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
3320new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
3321are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
3322window.
3323
3324
3325 * Support for Shared Libraries
3326
3327GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
3328Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
3329before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
3330happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
3331At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
3332from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
3333shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
3334It can be abbreviated ``share''.
3335
3336sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
3337 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
3338 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
3339
3340info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
3341
3342
3343 * Watchpoints
3344
3345A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
3346expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
3347tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
3348quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
3349problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
3350more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
3351
3352watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
3353
3354info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
3355
3356delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3357disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3358enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3359
3360
3361 * C++ multiple inheritance
3362
3363When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
3364for C++ programs.
3365
3366 * C++ exception handling
3367
3368Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
3369ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
3370the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
3371handler's context).
3372
3373catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
3374 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
3375 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
3376
3377info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
3378 current stack frame.
3379
3380
3381 * Minor command changes
3382
3383The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
3384command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
3385is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
3386
3387The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
3388at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
3389frames without printing.
3390
3391 * New directory command
3392
3393'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
3394The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
3395about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
3396with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
3397find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
3398
3399 * Configuring GDB for compilation
3400
3401For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
3402for more details.
3403
3404GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
3405two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
3406Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
3407where the program that you are debugging will run.
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