Removing java sanitization!
[deliverable/binutils-gdb.git] / gdb / NEWS
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95618211
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1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
3
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4*** Changes since GDB-4.17:
5
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6* New native configurations
7
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8HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
9HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
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10M68K Linux m68*-*-linux*
11
12* New targets
13
14Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
15Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
16
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17* OBSOLETE configurations
18
19Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
20
21Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
22but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
23these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
24be permanently REMOVED.
25
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26* Readline 2.2
27
28GDB now uses readline 2.2.
29
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30** The PowerPC and RS6000 targets now have a `set processor' command.
31
32When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
33you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
34PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
35
36 set processor NAME
37
38sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
39following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
40
41 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
42 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
43 403 IBM PowerPC 403
44 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
45 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
46 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
47 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
48 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
49 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
50 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
51 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
52
53At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
54special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
55registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
56only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
57
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58* HP-UX Support
59
60Thanks to a major code donation from HP, GDB now has much more
61extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared library
62support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00, support
63for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and compatibility mode for xdb
64commands.
65
66* Catchpoints
67
68HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
69generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
70to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
71
72* Debugging Across Forks
73
74On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
75in the inferior.
76
77* TUI
78
79HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
80it, build with --enable-tui.
81
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82* GDB Remote protocol
83
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84A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
85Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
86fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
87allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
88
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89For 64 bit targets, the memory packets ("M" and "m") can now contain a
90full 64 bit address. The class-obscure gdb command:
91 set targetaddresssize 32
92can be used to revert to the old behavour. For existing remote stubs
93the change should not be noticed as the additional address information
ab796a3d 94will be discarded.
8456141b 95
8741159f 96* Changes to particular targets
8456141b 97
dfbb701a 98*** Changes in GDB-4.17:
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99
100* New native configurations
101
e3147bf2 102Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
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103Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
104Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
e3147bf2 105PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
dfbb701a 106PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
e3147bf2 107Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
32e3c8b8 108Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
9391c997 109
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110* New targets
111
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112Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
113Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
114Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
115Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
116MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
117MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
118MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
119Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
120Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
121Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
122NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
123
124* New debugging protocols
125
126ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
4db54939 127M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
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128DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
129PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
130PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
131Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
132
133* DWARF 2
134
135All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
136format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
137information.
138
139* Java frontend
140
141GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
142only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
143
144* solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
145
146For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
147loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
148locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
149
150* Live range splitting
151
152GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
153range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
154more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
155
156* Hurd support
157
158GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
159updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
160
161* ARM Thumb support
162
163GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
164instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
165instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
166accordingly.
167
168* MIPS16 support
169
170GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
171instruction set.
172
173* Overlay support
174
175GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
176linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
177will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
178control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
179additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
180in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
181
182* info symbol
183
184The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
185the symbol at the specified address.
186
187* Trace support
188
189The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
190asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
191extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
192includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
193file tracepoint.c for more details.
194
195* MIPS simulator
196
197Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
198by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
199of most MIPS variants.
200
201* Sparc simulator
202
203Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
204by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
205Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
206
207* set architecture
208
209For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
210basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
211architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
212the possible architectures.
4db54939 213
a0e1eb42 214*** Changes in GDB-4.16:
2ad5709f 215
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216* New native configurations
217
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218Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
219M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
220PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
221PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
222PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
223RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
bf4e0fe7 224
972821a3 225* New targets
bf4e0fe7 226
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227ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
228I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
229MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
230MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
231PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
232Hitachi SH3 sh-*-*
233Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
234
235* PowerPC simulator
236
237The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
238contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
239PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
240basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
241performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
242
243* Solaris 2.5
244
245GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
246
247* Windows 95/NT native
248
249GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
250To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
251which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
252Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
253ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
254
255* dont-repeat command
256
257If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
258command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
259useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
260extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
bf4e0fe7 261
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262* Send break instead of ^C
263
264The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
265rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
266GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
267
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268* Remote protocol timeout
269
270The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
271that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
272to read from the target. The default value is 2.
273
274* Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
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275
276By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
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277loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
278stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
279when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
280in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
281
282Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
283/usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
284automatically on hpux10.
285
286* Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
287
288Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
289
290* Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
87273c71 291
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292When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
293may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
294the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
295every character. The default value is 1050.
87273c71 296
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297* Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
298
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299If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
300a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
301replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
302details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
303remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
304to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
305
306* Speedups for remote debugging
307
308GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
309the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
310and more efficient S-record downloading.
311
312* Memory use reductions and statistics collection
313
314GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
315Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
e8f1ad9a 316
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317*** Changes in GDB-4.15:
318
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319* Psymtabs for XCOFF
320
321The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
322can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
323
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324* Remote targets use caching
325
326Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
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327remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
328it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
329debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
330off' turns the the data cache off.
0764fb04 331
bf4e0fe7 332* Remote targets may have threads
24e60978 333
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334The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
335in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
336gdb/remote.c for details.
24e60978 337
bf4e0fe7 338* NetROM support
24e60978 339
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340If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
341support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
342acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
343write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
344support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
345another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
346sequence is something like
347
348 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
349 load <prog>
350 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
351
352* Macintosh host
353
354GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
355may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
356it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
357available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
358device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
359directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
360scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
361mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
362
363* Autoconf
364
365GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
366but does simplify configuration and building.
367
368* hpux10
369
cd857a2d 370GDB now supports hpux10.
24e60978 371
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372*** Changes in GDB-4.14:
373
374* New native configurations
375
376x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
377x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
378NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
379Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
380
381* New targets
382
383A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
384HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
385CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
386PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
387WDC 65816 w65-*-*
3ddcdc59 388
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389* Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
390
391GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
392possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
393filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
394the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
395if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
396
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397* Arguments to user-defined commands
398
399User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
400Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
401trivial example:
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402define adder
403 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
404
405To execute the command use:
406adder 1 2 3
407
408Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
409Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
410use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
411
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412* New `if' and `while' commands
413
414This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
415commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
416expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
417execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
418terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
419`else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
420if the expression is zero.
421
422* Fortran source language mode
423
424GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
425Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
426variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
427with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
428Fortran compilers.
429
430* Better HPUX support
431
432Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
433running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
434processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
435for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
436that behavior do the following before running the program:
437
438 adb -w a.out
439 __dld_flags?W 0x5
440 control-d
441
442This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
443To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
444
445 adb -w a.out
446 __dld_flags?W 0x4
447 control-d
448
449You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
450the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
451external linkage.
452
453GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
454HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
455
456* Target byte order now dynamically selectable
457
458You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
459commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
460current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
461"set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
462associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
463configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
7de5c5e2 464
95618211 465* New DOS host serial code
e3581971 466
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467This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
468no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
469a PC's serial port.
2848f793 470
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471*** Changes in GDB-4.13:
472
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473* New "complete" command
474
475This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
476were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
72e35288 477
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478* Trailing space optional in prompt
479
480"set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
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481allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
482
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483* Breakpoint hit counts
484
485"info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
486has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
487can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
488to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
489less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
490that breakpoint.
491
492* Ability to stop printing at NULL character
493
494"set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
495an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
496arrays actually contain only short strings.
497
498* Shared library breakpoints
499
500In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
501breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
502
503* Hardware watchpoints
504
505There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
506targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
507
508Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under Linux.
509
510* Annotations
511
512Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
513and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
514
515* Improved Irix 5 support
516
517GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
518
519* Improved HPPA support
520
521GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
522
523* New native configurations
524
525Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
526HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
527Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
528RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
529
530* New targets
531
532OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
533MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
534Sparc64 sparc64-*-*
535
536* Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
537
538There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
539This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
540
541* Fixes
542
543As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
544and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
545
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546*** Changes in GDB-4.12:
547
548* Irix 5 is now supported
549
550* HPPA support
551
552GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
553to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
554GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
555of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
556can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
557
558
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559*** Changes in GDB-4.11:
560
561* User visible changes:
562
563* Remote Debugging
803f7af5 564
41a6194d 565The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
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566target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
567debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
568integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
569debugging info for the mips target).
41a6194d 570
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571* DEC Alpha native support
572
573GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
574debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
575work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
576Alpha-specific notes.
577
578* Preliminary thread implementation
579
580GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
581
582* LynxOS native and target support for 386
583
584This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
585to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
586for details).
587
588* Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
589
590This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
591mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
592call methods, ...etc.
593
41a6194d 594*** Changes in GDB-4.10:
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595
596 * User visible changes:
597
5b336d29 598Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
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599supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
600other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
601somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
5b336d29 602
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603Filename completion now works.
604
605When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
606arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
be9af13c 607addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
a32ebcfd 608
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609All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
610vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
611should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
612your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
613to be on the far side of a thin network line.
614
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615 * DEC alpha support
616
617This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
618cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
619
620
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621*** Changes in GDB-4.9:
622
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623 * Testsuite
624
625This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
626The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
627via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
628
629 * C++ demangling
630
45364c8a 631'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
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632emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
633Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
634disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
635use gdb with AT&T cfront.
45364c8a 636
c787ca55 637 * Simulators
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638
639GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
640So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
641Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
642
643 * New targets supported
644
645H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
646H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
647SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
648Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
8b946797 649IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
8ae56378 650
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651Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
652version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
0a4a0f09 653GO32 memory extender.
cb46c402 654
0a4a0f09 655 * New remote protocols
cb46c402 656
0a4a0f09 657MIPS remote debugging protocol.
cb46c402 658
0a4a0f09 659 * New source languages supported
cb46c402 660
0a4a0f09
FF
661This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
662used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
663into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
cb46c402 664
cb46c402 665
c5cc95b1
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666*** Changes in GDB-4.8:
667
3421ec35 668 * HP Precision Architecture supported
c5cc95b1 669
3421ec35
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670GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
671version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
672University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
673compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
6d0380ee 674format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
3421ec35 675(as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
c5cc95b1 676
3421ec35 677Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
c5cc95b1
SG
678
679 * Faster and better demangling
680
681We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
682demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
683character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
684only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
3421ec35
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685This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
686increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
c5cc95b1
SG
687symbol lookups.
688
689`Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
690from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
691compiler does not actually implement.
692
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693 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
694
695In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
696inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
697recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
698very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
699The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
700circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
701fix.
702
703The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
704release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
705
c5cc95b1
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706 * Improved configure script
707
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708The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
709you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
710host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
711done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
c5cc95b1
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712
713We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
714version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
3421ec35
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715`--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
716The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
717only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
718We hope to make this the default in a future release.
719
720 * Documentation improvements
721
722There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
723produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
724before submitting changes.
725
726The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
727M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
728`info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
729you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
730a future texinfo-X.Y release.
731
732*NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
733We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
734been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
735or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
736`texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
737around this problem.
c5cc95b1 738
3421ec35 739 * New features
c5cc95b1 740
3421ec35
JG
741GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
742the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
743`print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
744the target program.
c5cc95b1 745
3421ec35
JG
746The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
747how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
c5cc95b1
SG
748
749 * New native hosts supported
750
751HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
c5cc95b1
SG
752386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
753
754 * New targets supported
755
756AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
757
758 * New file formats supported
759
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760BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
761HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
762
763 * Major bug fixes
764
765Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
766
767We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
768printf_filtered("%s") problems.
769
770We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
771for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
772release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
773
774You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
775will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
776
777We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
778for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
779especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
780libraries.
c5cc95b1 781
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782The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
783information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
784command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
785any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
786when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
787
788 * Internal improvements
789
790GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
791debugging of multiple languages in the future.
792
793GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
794Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
795symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
796contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
797shared code that handles any of them.
798
799 * New command line options
c5cc95b1
SG
800
801We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
802
3421ec35 803 * Mmalloc licensing
c5cc95b1 804
3421ec35
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805The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
806General Public License.
c5cc95b1 807
76ba9b5b
SG
808*** Changes in GDB-4.7:
809
c00d8242
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810 * Host/native/target split
811
812GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
813hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
814target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
815local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
816ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
817
818The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
819GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
820is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
821code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
822any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
823built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
824handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
825
826GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
827It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
828plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
829
830 * New hosts supported
831
832HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
833386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
834386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
835
836 * New targets supported
76ba9b5b 837
c00d8242
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838Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
83968030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
5f5be54c 840
c00d8242 841 * New native hosts supported
5f5be54c 842
c00d8242
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843386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
844 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
845386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
5f5be54c 846
c00d8242 847 * New file formats supported
5f5be54c 848
c00d8242
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849BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
850supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
851format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
5f5be54c 852
c00d8242 853 * New commands
5f5be54c 854
c00d8242
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855`show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
856`show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
857These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
5f5be54c 858
c00d8242 859`info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
5f5be54c 860
c00d8242
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861You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
862scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
863prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
864executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
865
866 * C++ improvements
867
868We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
869info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
870symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
871
872Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
5f5be54c
SG
873
874 * Major bug fixes
875
c00d8242
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876The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
877fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
878by the compiler.
5f5be54c 879
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880We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
881support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
882
883John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
884slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
885that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
886purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
887the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
888mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
889
890Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
891about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
892completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
893we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
894
895 * AMD 29k support
5f5be54c 896
c00d8242
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897A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
898specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
899calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
900usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
901in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
902
903We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
904Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
905of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
906resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
907
908 * Remote interfaces
909
910We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
911with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
912message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
913This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
914needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
915breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
916each instruction being stepped through.
917
918The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
919registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
920
921There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
922find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
923Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
924processor with a serial port.
925
926 * Configuration
927
928Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
929`table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
930supported, and what files each one uses.
931
932 * Library changes
933
934There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
935disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
936Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
937disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
938
939The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
940Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
941can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
942grants all the rights from the General Public License.
943
944 * Documentation
945
946The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
947reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
948as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
949encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
950system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
951bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
5f5be54c
SG
952
953And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
76ba9b5b 954
c00d8242 955
3ddcdc59
SG
956*** Changes in GDB-4.6:
957
958 * Better support for C++ function names
959
960GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
961names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
962(using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
963single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
964Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
965
966GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
967the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
968You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
969lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
970for the list of formats.
971
972 * G++ symbol mangling problem
973
974Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
975C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
976directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
977can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
978usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
979about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
980this problem.)
981
982 * New 'maintenance' command
983
984All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
985the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
986can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
987
988 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
989 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
990 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
991 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
992 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
993 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
994
995The following commands are new:
996
997 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
998 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
999 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
1000
1001 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
1002
1003We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
1004(e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
1005be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
1006read after argv processing.
1007
1008 * New hosts supported
1009
1010Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
1011
1012Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
1013
1014We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
1015is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
1016for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
1017masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
1018fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
1019It costs extra.
1020
1021 * New targets supported
1022
1023Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
1024
1025 * More smarts about finding #include files
1026
1027GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
1028all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
1029greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
1030especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
1031the one that contains your sources.
1032
1033We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
1034breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
1035try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
1036
1037 * Interesting infernals change
1038
1039GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
1040section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
1041target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
1042stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
1043
1044 * Bug fixes (of course!)
1045
1046There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
1047 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
1048 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
1049
1050See the ChangeLog for details.
1051
1052*** Changes in GDB-4.5:
1053
1054 * New machines supported (host and target)
1055
1056IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
1057
1058SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
1059
1060 * New malloc package
1061
1062GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
1063Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
1064capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
1065This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
1066pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
1067more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
1068
1069 * info proc
1070
1071The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
1072'help info proc' for details.
1073
1074 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
1075
1076The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
1077Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
1078possible.
1079
1080 * File name changes for MS-DOS
1081
1082Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
1083support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
1084conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
1085environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
1086that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
1087in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
1088
1089 * Cross byte order fixes
1090
1091Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
1092targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
1093
1094 * New -mapped and -readnow options
1095
1096If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
1097system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
1098`symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
1099program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
1100called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
1101Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
1102and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
1103the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
1104option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
1105starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
1106
1107You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
1108the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
1109information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
1110slower, but makes future operations faster.
1111
1112The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
1113build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
1114A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
1115use is:
1116
1117 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
1118
1119The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
1120It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
1121shared across multiple host platforms.
1122
1123 * longjmp() handling
1124
1125GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
1126siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
1127all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
1128platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
1129
1130 * Solaris 2.0
1131
1132Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
1133this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
1134reading symbols.
1135
1136 * Bug fixes
1137
1138As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
1139People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
1140crashes and trashed symbol tables.
1141
1142*** Changes in GDB-4.4:
1143
1144 * New machines supported (host and target)
1145
1146SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
1147 (except core files)
1148BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
1149Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
1150
1151 * New machines supported (target)
1152
1153AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1154
1155 * C++ support
1156
1157GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
1158The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
1159per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
1160
1161GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
1162`ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
1163extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
1164good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
1165will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
1166released.
1167
1168 * New features for SVR4
1169
1170GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
1171shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
1172only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
1173
1174The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
1175on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
1176it prints the address mappings of the process.
1177
1178If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
1179bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
1180
1181 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
1182
1183Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
1184now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
1185skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
1186make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
1187same code linked statically.
1188
1189 * New Getopt
1190
1191GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
1192version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
1193continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
1194Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
1195added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
1196future by other options that begin with the same letter.
1197
1198 * Bugs fixed
1199
1200The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
1201Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
1202See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
1203
1204
1205*** Changes in GDB-4.3:
1206
1207 * New machines supported (host and target)
1208
1209Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
1210NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
1211Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1212
1213 * Almost SCO Unix support
1214
1215We had hoped to support:
1216SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
1217(except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
1218that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
1219about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
1220
1221 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
1222
1223GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
1224debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
1225is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
1226send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
1227reqired (if any).
1228
1229 * New Readline
1230
1231GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
1232is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
1233required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
1234
1235 * Bugs fixed
1236
1237The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
1238Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
1239See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
1240
1241 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
1242
1243GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
1244supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
1245symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
1246
1247Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
1248mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
1249debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
1250mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
1251version 2.
1252
1253Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
1254really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
1255line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
1256variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
1257situation somewhat.
1258
1259When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
1260However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
1261methods.
1262
1263We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
1264DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
1265encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
1266
1267
1268*** Changes in GDB-4.2:
1269
1270 * Improved configuration
1271
1272Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
1273Porting BFD is simpler.
1274
1275 * Stepping improved
1276
1277The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
1278of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
1279in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
1280function that has debugging information is called within the line.
1281
1282 * Bug fixing
1283
1284Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
1285
1286 * New host supported (not target)
1287
1288Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
1289
1290
1291*** Changes in GDB-4.1:
1292
1293 * Multiple source language support
1294
1295GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
1296It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
1297and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
1298language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
1299You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
1300`set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
1301
1302 * GDB and Modula-2
1303
1304GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
1305currently under development at the State University of New York at
1306Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
1307continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
1308
1309Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
1310debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
1311symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
1312
1313There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
1314in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
1315
1316 * set write on/off
1317
1318GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
1319a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
1320the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
1321by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
1322effect immediately.
1323
1324 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
1325
1326When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
1327shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
1328The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
1329examining core files.
1330
1331 * set listsize
1332
1333You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
1334The default is 10.
1335
1336 * New machines supported (host and target)
1337
1338SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
1339Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
1340Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
1341
1342 * New hosts supported (not targets)
1343
1344IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
1345
1346 * New targets supported (not hosts)
1347
1348AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1349AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1350Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
1351
1352 * New remote interfaces
1353
1354AMD 29000 Adapt
1355AMD 29000 Minimon
1356
1357
1358*** Changes in GDB-4.0:
1359
1360 * New Facilities
1361
1362Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
1363
1364Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
1365target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
1366is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
1367remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
1368remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
1369also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
1370using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
1371stub on the target system.
1372
1373New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
1374
1375GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
1376library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
1377object file types such as a.out and coff.
1378
1379There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
1380refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
1381
1382
1383 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
1384
1385All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
1386by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
1387
1388For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
1389``Show prompt'' produces the response:
1390Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
1391
1392What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
1393print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
1394will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
1395all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
1396
1397confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
1398 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
1399 it is already running. Default is ON.
1400
1401editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
1402 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
1403 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
1404 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
1405 Default is ON.
1406
1407history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
1408 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
1409 or the value of the environment variable
1410 GDBHISTFILE.
1411
1412history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
1413 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
1414 HISTSIZE.
1415
1416history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
1417 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
1418 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
1419
1420history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
1421 history expansion will be performed on
1422 command line input. The default is OFF.
1423
1424radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
1425 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
1426 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
1427
1428height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
1429 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
1430 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
1431 variable TERM.
1432
1433width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
1434 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
1435 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
1436 variable TERM.
1437
1438Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
1439``set width'' instead.
1440
1441print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
1442 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
1443 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
1444 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
1445
1446print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
1447 is OFF.
1448
1449print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
1450 "raw" form if off.
1451
1452print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
1453 like instructions.
1454
1455print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
1456
1457
1458 * Support for Epoch Environment.
1459
1460The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
1461new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
1462are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
1463window.
1464
1465
1466 * Support for Shared Libraries
1467
1468GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
1469Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
1470before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
1471happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
1472At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
1473from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
1474shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
1475It can be abbreviated ``share''.
1476
1477sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
1478 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
1479 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
1480
1481info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
1482
1483
1484 * Watchpoints
1485
1486A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
1487expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
1488tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
1489quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
1490problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
1491more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
1492
1493watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
1494
1495info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
1496
1497delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
1498disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
1499enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
1500
1501
1502 * C++ multiple inheritance
1503
1504When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
1505for C++ programs.
1506
1507 * C++ exception handling
1508
1509Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
1510ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
1511the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
1512handler's context).
1513
1514catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
1515 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
1516 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
1517
1518info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
1519 current stack frame.
1520
1521
1522 * Minor command changes
1523
1524The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
1525command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
1526is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
1527
1528The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
1529at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
1530frames without printing.
1531
1532 * New directory command
1533
1534'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
1535The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
1536about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
1537with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
1538find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
1539
1540 * Configuring GDB for compilation
1541
1542For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
1543for more details.
1544
1545GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
1546two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
1547Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
1548where the program that you are debugging will run.
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