binutils/NEWS

   1 -*- text -*-
   2
   3 * Add "-M entry:<addr>" switch to objdump to specify a function entry address
   4   when disassembling VAX binaries.
   5
   6 * Add "--globalize-symbol <name>" and "--globalize-symbols <filename>" switches
   7   to objcopy to convert local symbols into global symbols.
   8
   9 Changes in 2.16:
  10
  11 * objcopy recognizes two new options --strip-unneeded-symbol and
  12   --strip-unneeded-symbols, namely for use together with the wildcard
  13   matching the original --strip-symbol/--strip-symbols provided, but
  14   retaining any symbols matching but needed by relocations.
  15
  16 * readelf can now display address ranges from .debug_range sections.  This
  17   happens automatically when a DW_AT_range attribute is encountered.  The
  18   command line switch --debug-dump=Ranges (or -wR) can also be used to display
  19   the contents of the .debug_range section.
  20
  21 * nm and objdump now have a switch "--special-syms" to enable the displaying of
  22   symbols which the target considers to be special.  By default these symbols
  23   are no longer displayed.  Currently the only special symbols are the Mapping
  24   symbols used by the ARM port to mark transitions between text and data and
  25   between ARM and THUMB code.
  26
  27 * dlltool has a switch "--ext-prefix-alias <prefix>" to generate additional
  28   import and export symbols with <preifx> prepended to them.
  29
  30 Changes in 2.15:
  31
  32 * objcopy for MIPS targets now accepts "-M no-aliases" as an option to the
  33   disassembler to print the "raw" mips instruction mnemonic instead of some
  34   pseudo instruction name.  I.E. print "daddu" or "or" instead of "move",
  35   "sll" instead of "nop", etc.
  36
  37 * objcopy and strip can now take wildcard patterns in symbol names specified on
  38   the command line provided that the --wildcard switch is used to enable them.
  39
  40 * readelf can now parse archives.
  41
  42 * objdump now accepts --debugging-tags to print the debug information in a
  43   format compatible with ctags tool.
  44
  45 * objcopy and strip now accept --only-keep-debug to create a file containing
  46   those sections that would be stripped out by --strip-debug.  The idea is that
  47   this can be used in conjunction with the --add-gnu-debuglink switch to create
  48   a two part program distribution - one a stripped executable and the other the
  49   debugging info.
  50
  51 * objcopy now accepts --add-gnu-debuglink=<file> to insert a .gnu_debuglink
  52   section into a (presumably stripped) executable.  This allows the debug
  53   information for the file to be held in a separate file.
  54
  55 * BFD marks the sections .comment and .note as 'n' in the BSD/POSIX
  56   single-character representation.  This can be checked by running nm
  57   with the -a switch.
  58
  59 Changes in 2.14:
  60
  61 * Added --info switch to objcopy and strip.
  62
  63 * Support for Vitesse IQ2000 added by Red Hat.
  64
  65 * Added 'S' encoding to strings to allow the display of 8-bit characters.
  66
  67 * Added --prefix-symbols=<text>, --prefix-sections=<text> and
  68   --prefix-alloc-sections=<text> to objcopy.
  69
  70 * readelf can handle the extensions to the DWARF2 spec used by the Unified
  71   Parallel C compiler.
  72
  73 * BFD no longer declares a "boolean" type, to avoid clashes with other
  74   headers that declare the same.  Users of BFD should replace boolean,
  75   false and true, with int, 0 and 1, or define their own boolean type.
  76
  77 * Support for IP2K added by Denis Chertykov.
  78
  79 Changes in 2.13:
  80
  81 * Support for the Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat. Models for FR400
  82   and FR500 included.
  83
  84 Changes in version 2.12:
  85
  86 * Support for Don Knuth's MMIX, by Hans-Peter Nilsson.
  87
  88 * size: Add --totals to display summary of sizes (Berkeley format only).
  89
  90 * readelf: Add --wide option to not break section header or segment listing
  91   lines to fit into 80 columns.
  92
  93 * strings: Add --encoding to display wide character strings.  By Markus Kuhn.
  94
  95 * objcopy: Add --rename-section to change section names.
  96
  97 * readelf: Support added for DWARF 2.1 extensions.  Support added for
  98   displaying the contents of .debug.macinfo sections.
  99
 100 * New command line switches added to objcopy to allow symbols to be kept as
 101   global symbols, and also to specify files containing lists of such symbols.
 102   by Honda Hiroki.
 103
 104 * Support for OpenRISC by Johan Rydberg.
 105
 106 * New command line switch to objcopy --alt-machine-code which creates a binary
 107   with an alternate machine code if one is defined in the architecture
 108   description.  Only supported for ELF targets.  By Alexandre Oliva.
 109
 110 * New command line switch to objcopy -B (or --binary-architecture) which sets
 111   the architecture of the output file to the given argument.  This option only
 112   makes sense, if the input target is binary.  Otherwise it is ignored.
 113   By Stefan Geuken.
 114
 115 * Support for PDP-11 by Lars Brinkhoff.
 116
 117 Changes in binutils 2.11:
 118
 119 * Add support for ARM v5t and v5te architectures and Intel's XScale ARM
 120   extenstions.
 121
 122 * Add --srec-len and --srec-forceS3 command line switch to objcopy.
 123   By Luciano Gemme.
 124
 125 * Support for the MIPS32, by Anders Norlander.
 126
 127 * Support for the i860, by Jason Eckhardt.
 128
 129 * Support for CRIS (Axis Communications ETRAX series).
 130
 131 Changes in binutils 2.10:
 132
 133 * Support for 64-bit ELF on HPPA.
 134
 135 * New command line switch to objdump --file-start-context which shows the
 136   entire file contents up to the source line first encountered for a given
 137   file.
 138
 139 * New command line switch to objdump -M (or --disassembler-options) which takes
 140   a parameter which can then be interpreted on a per-target basis by the
 141   disassembler.  Used by ARM targets to select register name sets, ISA, APCS or
 142   raw verions.
 143
 144 * objdump support for -mi386:intel which causes disassembly to be displayed
 145   with intel syntax.
 146
 147 * New program: readelf.  This displays the contents of ELF format files,
 148   regardless of target machine.
 149
 150 * objcopy now takes --change-section-lma, --change-section-vma, and
 151   --change-section-address options.  The old --adjust-section-vma option is
 152   equivalent to --change-section-address.  The other --adjust-* options are now
 153   renamed to --change-*, although --adjust-* continues to work.
 154
 155 * objcopy has a --redefine-sym option that lets you rename symbols.
 156
 157 * objcopy now takes a -j/--only-section option to copy only the specified
 158   sections.
 159
 160 * dlltool now supports the IMPORTS command.
 161
 162 * dlltool now takes --export-all-symbols, --no-export-all-symbols,
 163   --exclude-symbols, and --no-default-excludes options.
 164
 165 Changes in binutils 2.9:
 166
 167 * Added windres program, which can be used to manipulate resources in WIN32
 168   files as used on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
 169
 170 * The objcopy --gap-fill and --pad-to options operate on the LMA rather than
 171   the VMA of the sections.
 172
 173 * Added S modifier to ar to not build a symbol table.
 174
 175 Changes in binutils 2.8:
 176
 177 * The objdump disassembly format has been changed, and hopefully improved.  Use
 178   the new --prefix-addresses option to get the old format.  There are also new
 179   --disassemble-zeroes and --no-show-raw-insn options which affect disassembler
 180   output.
 181
 182 * Formats may now be specified as configuration triplets.  For example,
 183   objdump -b i386-pc-linux.  The triplets are not passed through config.sub,
 184   so they must be in canonical form.
 185
 186 * Added new addr2line program.  This uses the debugging information to convert
 187   an address into a file name and line number within a program.
 188
 189 * Added --change-leading-char argument to objcopy.
 190
 191 * Added --weaken argument to objcopy.
 192
 193 * objdump --dynamic-reloc now works on ELF executables and shared libraries.
 194
 195 * Added --adjust-vma option to objdump.
 196
 197 * Added -C/--demangle option to objdump.
 198
 199 * Added -p/--preserve-dates option to strip and objcopy.
 200
 201 Changes in binutils 2.7:
 202
 203 * Added --enable-shared and --enable-commonbfdlib options to configure.
 204
 205 * Added --debugging argument to objdump and objcopy.
 206
 207 * Added --defined-only argument to nm.
 208
 209 * Added --remove-leading-char argument to objcopy.
 210
 211 * The objdump --line-numbers option is now meaningful with --reloc.
 212
 213 * Added --line-numbers option to nm.
 214
 215 * Added --endian/-EB/-EL option to objdump.
 216
 217 * Added support for Alpha OpenVMS/AXP.
 218
 219 Changes in binutils 2.6:
 220
 221 * Added -N/--strip-symbol and -K/--keep-symbol arguments to strip and objcopy.
 222
 223 * Added several arguments to objcopy to provide some control over how the new
 224   file is laid out in memory.  Also added binary output format to BFD to permit
 225   generating plain binary files.
 226
 227 * Added --start-address and --stop-address options to objdump.
 228
 229 * ar and ranlib now work on AIX.  The tools are now built by default on AIX.
 230
 231 Changes in binutils 2.5:
 232
 233 * Changed objdump -dr to dump the relocs interspersed with the assembly
 234   listing, for a more useful listing of relocatable files.
 235
 236 * Changed objdump -d/--disassemble to only disassemble SEC_CODE sections.
 237   Added -D/--disassemble-all option to disassemble all sections.
 238
 239 * Added --size-sort option to nm.
 240
 241 * strip and objcopy should now be able to handle dynamically linked ELF
 242   executables.
 243
 244 Changes in binutils 2.4:
 245
 246 * Support for HP-PA (by Jeff Law), i386 Mach (by David Mackenzie), RS/6000 and
 247   PowerPC (except ar and ranlib; by Ian Taylor).
 248
 249 * Support for Irix 5.
 250
 251 * Programs `strip' and `objcopy' will not attempt to write dynamically linked
 252   ELF output files, since BFD currently can't create them properly.
 253
 254 Changes in binutils 2.3:
 255
 256 * A new --stabs argument has been added to objdump to dump stabs sections in
 257   ELF and COFF files.
 258
 259 * A new program, nlmconv, has been added.  It can convert object files into
 260   Novell NetWare Loadable Modules.
 261
 262 * The strings program has been added.
 263
 264 Changes in binutils 2.2:
 265
 266 * The 'copy' program has been renamed to 'objcopy', for consistency with
 267   'objdump', and because 'copy' might more plausibly be used as a synonym for
 268   'cp'.
 269
 270 * The new stand-alone program c++filt is a filter that converts encoded
 271   (mangled) C++ assembly-level identifiers to user-level names.  (Note: This
 272   may get moved to the gcc distribution.)
 273
 274 * nm -o on an archive now prefixes each line with the archive name, matching
 275   the output from BSD nm.
 276
 277 * ar (and ld) can now read (but not write) BSD4.4-style archives.
 278
 279 * New support for H8500, Z8000, and the Hitach SH.
 280
 281 * Dis-assembler interface changed to allow sharing with gdb.
 282
 283 * There is new Elf code, but it is not yet ready for general use.
 284
 285 * There is the beginnings of a test suite.
 286
 287 Changes in binutils 2.1:
 288
 289 * There is now support for writing ECOFF files, so ld and the other utilities
 290   should work on Risc/Ultrix and Irix.  Please let us know how well this works.
 291
 292 * ar now automatically creates a symbol table (a __.SYMDEF member, in the BSD
 293   version), if there are any object files in the archive.  So running ranlib is
 294   now redundant (unless the non-standard q command is used).  This is required
 295   for Posix.2 conformance.
 296
 297 * The archive-reading code now reads both BSD-style and SYSV-style archives
 298   independently of the selected target format.  This is to encourage people to
 299   switch to SYSV-format, which has a number of advantages.
 300
 301 * The strip and copy programs now have options to remove debug-symbols only
 302   and/or local symbols only.  They now also support long options.
 303
 304 \f
 305 Local variables:
 306 fill-column: 79
 307 End: