gas/NEWS

   1 -*- text -*-
   2
   3 * Added a .nop directive to generate a single no-op instruction in a target
   4   neutral manner.  This instruction does have an effect on DWARF line number
   5   generation, if that is active.
   6
   7 * Removed --reduce-memory-overheads and --hash-size as gas now
   8   uses hash tables that can be expand and shrink automatically.
   9
  10 * Add {disp16} pseudo prefix to x86 assembler.
  11
  12 * Add support for Intel AMX instructions.
  13
  14 * Configure with --enable-x86-used-note by default for Linux/x86.
  15
  16 Changes in 2.35:
  17
  18 * X86 NaCl target support is removed.
  19
  20 * Extend .symver directive to update visibility of the original symbol
  21   and assign one original symbol to different versioned symbols.
  22
  23 * Add support for Intel SERIALIZE and TSXLDTRK instructions.
  24
  25 * Add -mlfence-after-load=, -mlfence-before-indirect-branch= and
  26   -mlfence-before-ret= options to x86 assembler to help mitigate
  27   CVE-2020-0551.
  28
  29 * Add --gdwarf-5 option to the assembler to generate DWARF 5 debug output
  30   (if such output is being generated).  Added the ability to generate
  31   version 5 .debug_line sections.
  32
  33 * Add -mbig-obj support to i386 MingW targets.
  34
  35 Changes in 2.34:
  36
  37 * Add -malign-branch-boundary=NUM, -malign-branch=TYPE[+TYPE...],
  38   -malign-branch-prefix-size=NUM and -mbranches-within-32B-boundaries
  39   options to x86 assembler to align branches within a fixed boundary
  40   with segment prefixes or NOPs.
  41
  42 * Add support for Zilog eZ80 and Zilog Z180 CPUs.
  43
  44 * Add support for z80-elf target.
  45
  46 * Add support for relocation of each byte or word of multibyte value to Z80
  47   targets (just use right shift to 0, 8, 16, or 24 bits or AND operation
  48   with 0xff/0xffff mask): ld a, label >> 16 \ ld hl, label & 0xffff
  49
  50 * Add SDCC support for Z80 targets.
  51
  52 Changes in 2.33:
  53
  54 * Add support for the Arm Scalable Vector Extension version 2 (SVE2)
  55   instructions.
  56
  57 * Add support for the Arm Transactional Memory Extension (TME)
  58   instructions.
  59
  60 * Add support for the Armv8.1-M Mainline and M-profile Vector Extension (MVE)
  61   instructions.
  62
  63 * For MIPS, Add -m[no-]fix-loongson3-llsc option to fix (or not) Loongson3
  64   LLSC Errata.  Add a --enable-mips-fix-loongson3-llsc=[yes|no] configure
  65   time option to set the default behavior. Set the default if the configure
  66   option is not used to "no".
  67
  68 * Add support for the Arm Cortex-A76AE, Cortex-A77 and Cortex-M35P
  69   processors.
  70
  71 * Add support for the AArch64 Cortex-A34, Cortex-A65, Cortex-A65AE,
  72   Cortex-A76AE, and Cortex-A77 processors.
  73
  74 * Add .float16 directive for both Arm and AArch64 to allow encoding of 16-bit
  75   floating point literals.  Add .float16_format directive and
  76   -mfp16-format=[ieee|alternative] option for Arm to control the format of the
  77   encoding.
  78
  79 * Add --gdwarf-cie-version command line flag.  This allows control over which
  80   version of DWARF CIE the assembler creates.
  81
  82 Changes in 2.32:
  83
  84 * Add -mvexwig=[0|1] option to x86 assembler to control encoding of
  85   VEX.W-ignored (WIG) VEX instructions.
  86
  87 * Add -mx86-used-note=[yes|no] option to generate (or not) x86 GNU property
  88   notes.  Add a --enable-x86-used-note configure time option to set the
  89   default behavior.  Set the default if the configure option is not used
  90   to "no".
  91
  92 * Add support for the MIPS Loongson EXTensions R2 (EXT2) instructions.
  93
  94 * Add support for the MIPS Loongson EXTensions (EXT) instructions.
  95
  96 * Add support for the MIPS Loongson Content Address Memory (CAM) ASE.
  97
  98 * Add support for the C-SKY processor series.
  99
 100 * Add support for the MIPS Loongson MultiMedia extensions Instructions (MMI)
 101   ASE.
 102
 103 Changes in 2.31:
 104
 105 * The ADR and ADRL pseudo-instructions supported by the ARM assembler
 106   now only set the bottom bit of the address of thumb function symbols
 107   if the -mthumb-interwork command line option is active.
 108
 109 * Add support for the MIPS Global INValidate (GINV) ASE.
 110
 111 * Add support for the MIPS Cyclic Redudancy Check (CRC) ASE.
 112
 113 * Add support for the Freescale S12Z architecture.
 114
 115 * Add --generate-missing-build-notes=[yes|no] option to create (or not) GNU
 116   Build Attribute notes if none are present in the input sources.  Add a
 117   --enable-generate-build-notes=[yes|no] configure time option to set the
 118   default behaviour.  Set the default if the configure option is not used
 119   to "no".
 120
 121 * Remove -mold-gcc command-line option for x86 targets.
 122
 123 * Add -O[2|s] command-line options to x86 assembler to enable alternate
 124   shorter instruction encoding.
 125
 126 * Add support for .nops directive.  It is currently supported only for
 127   x86 targets.
 128
 129 Changes in 2.30:
 130
 131 * Add support for loaction views in DWARF debug line information.
 132
 133 Changes in 2.29:
 134
 135 * Add support for ELF SHF_GNU_MBIND.
 136
 137 * Add support for the WebAssembly file format and wasm32 ELF conversion.
 138
 139 * PowerPC gas now checks that the correct register class is used in
 140   instructions.  For instance, "addi %f4,%cr3,%r31" warns three times
 141   that the registers are invalid.
 142
 143 * Add support for the Texas Instruments PRU processor.
 144
 145 * Support for the ARMv8-R architecture and Cortex-R52 processor has been
 146   added to the ARM port.
 147
 148 Changes in 2.28:
 149
 150 * Add support for the RISC-V architecture.
 151
 152 * Add support for the ARM Cortex-M23 and Cortex-M33 processors.
 153
 154 Changes in 2.27:
 155
 156 * Default to --enable-compressed-debug-sections=gas for Linux/x86 targets.
 157
 158 * Add --no-pad-sections to stop the assembler from padding the end of output
 159   sections up to their alignment boundary.
 160
 161 * Support for the ARMv8-M architecture has been added to the ARM port.  Support
 162   for the ARMv8-M Security and DSP Extensions has also been added to the ARM
 163   port.
 164
 165 * ARC backend accepts .extInstruction, .extCondCode, .extAuxRegister, and
 166   .extCoreRegister pseudo-ops that allow an user to define custom
 167   instructions, conditional codes, auxiliary and core registers.
 168
 169 * Add a configure option --enable-elf-stt-common to decide whether ELF
 170   assembler should generate common symbols with the STT_COMMON type by
 171   default.  Default to no.
 172
 173 * New command-line option --elf-stt-common= for ELF targets to control
 174   whether to generate common symbols with the STT_COMMON type.
 175
 176 * Add ability to set section flags and types via numeric values for ELF
 177   based targets.
 178
 179 * Add a configure option --enable-x86-relax-relocations to decide whether
 180   x86 assembler should generate relax relocations by default.  Default to
 181   yes, except for x86 Solaris targets older than Solaris 12.
 182
 183 * New command-line option -mrelax-relocations= for x86 target to control
 184   whether to generate relax relocations.
 185
 186 * New command-line option -mfence-as-lock-add=yes for x86 target to encode
 187   lfence, mfence and sfence as "lock addl $0x0, (%[re]sp)".
 188
 189 * Add assembly-time relaxation option for ARC cpus.
 190
 191 * Add --with-cpu=TYPE configure option for ARC gas.  This allows the default
 192   cpu type to be adjusted at configure time.
 193
 194 Changes in 2.26:
 195
 196 * Add a configure option --enable-compressed-debug-sections={all,gas} to
 197   decide whether DWARF debug sections should be compressed by default.
 198
 199 * Add support for the ARC EM/HS, and ARC600/700 architectures.  Remove
 200   assembler support for Argonaut RISC architectures.
 201
 202 * Symbol and label names can now be enclosed in double quotes (") which allows
 203   them to contain characters that are not part of valid symbol names in high
 204   level languages.
 205
 206 * Added the correctly spelled -march=armv6kz, for ARMv6KZ support.  The
 207   previous spelling, -march=armv6zk, is still accepted.
 208
 209 * Support for the ARMv8.1 architecture has been added to the Aarch64 port.
 210   Support for the individual ARMv8.1 Adv.SIMD, LOR and PAN architecture
 211   extensions has also been added to the Aarch64 port.
 212
 213 * Support for the ARMv8.1 architecture has been added to the ARM port.  Support
 214   for the individual ARMv8.1 Adv.SIMD and PAN architecture extensions has also
 215   been added to the ARM port.
 216
 217 * Extend --compress-debug-sections option to support
 218   --compress-debug-sections=[none|zlib|zlib-gnu|zlib-gabi] for ELF
 219   targets.
 220
 221 * --compress-debug-sections is turned on for Linux/x86 by default.
 222
 223 Changes in 2.25:
 224
 225 * Add support for the AVR Tiny microcontrollers.
 226
 227 * Replace support for openrisc and or32 with support for or1k.
 228
 229 * Enhanced the ARM port to accept the assembler output from the CodeComposer
 230   Studio tool.  Support is enabled via the new command-line option -mccs.
 231
 232 * Add support for the Andes NDS32.
 233
 234 Changes in 2.24:
 235
 236 * Add support for the Texas Instruments MSP430X processor.
 237
 238 * Add -gdwarf-sections command-line option to enable per-code-section
 239   generation of DWARF .debug_line sections.
 240
 241 * Add support for Altera Nios II.
 242
 243 * Add support for the Imagination Technologies Meta processor.
 244
 245 * Add support for the v850e3v5.
 246
 247 * Remove assembler support for MIPS ECOFF targets.
 248
 249 Changes in 2.23:
 250
 251 * Add support for the 64-bit ARM architecture: AArch64.
 252
 253 * Add support for S12X processor.
 254
 255 * Add support for the VLE extension to the PowerPC architecture.
 256
 257 * Add support for the Freescale XGATE architecture.
 258
 259 * Add support for .bundle_align_mode, .bundle_lock, and .bundle_unlock
 260   directives.  These are currently available only for x86 and ARM targets.
 261
 262 * Add support for the Renesas RL78 architecture.
 263
 264 * Add support for the Adapteva EPIPHANY architecture.
 265
 266 * For x86, allow 'rep bsf', 'rep bsr', and 'rep ret' syntax.
 267
 268 Changes in 2.22:
 269
 270 * Add support for the Tilera TILEPro and TILE-Gx architectures.
 271
 272 Changes in 2.21:
 273
 274 * Gas no longer requires doubling of ampersands in macros.
 275
 276 * Add support for the TMS320C6000 (TI C6X) processor family.
 277
 278 * GAS now understands an extended syntax in the .section directive flags
 279   for COFF targets that allows the section's alignment to be specified.  This
 280   feature has also been backported to the 2.20 release series, starting with
 281   2.20.1.
 282
 283 * Add support for the Renesas RX processor.
 284
 285 * New command-line option, --compress-debug-sections, which requests
 286   compression of DWARF debug information sections in the relocatable output
 287   file.  Compressed debug sections are supported by readelf, objdump, and
 288   gold, but not currently by Gnu ld.
 289
 290 Changes in 2.20:
 291
 292 * Added support for v850e2 and v850e2v3.
 293
 294 * GNU/Linux targets now supports "gnu_unique_object" as a value in the .type
 295   pseudo op.  It marks the symbol as being globally unique in the entire
 296   process.
 297
 298 * ARM assembler now supports .inst[.nw] pseudo-ops to insert opcodes specified
 299   in binary rather than text.
 300
 301 * Add support for common symbol alignment to PE formats.
 302
 303 * Add support for the new discriminator column in the DWARF line table,
 304   with a discriminator operand for the .loc directive.
 305
 306 * Add support for Sunplus score architecture.
 307
 308 * The .type pseudo-op now accepts a type of STT_GNU_IFUNC which can be used to
 309   indicate that if the symbol is the target of a relocation, its value should
 310   not be use.  Instead the function should be invoked and its result used as
 311   the value.
 312
 313 * Add support for Lattice Mico32 (lm32) architecture.
 314
 315 * Add support for Xilinx MicroBlaze architecture.
 316
 317 Changes in 2.19:
 318
 319 * New pseudo op .cfi_val_encoded_addr, to record constant addresses in unwind
 320   tables without runtime relocation.
 321
 322 * New command-line option, -h-tick-hex, for sh, m32c, and h8/300 targets, which
 323   adds compatibility with H'00 style hex constants.
 324
 325 * New command-line option, -msse-check=[none|error|warning], for x86
 326   targets.
 327
 328 * New sub-option added to the assembler's -a command-line switch to
 329   generate a listing output.  The 'g' sub-option will insert into the listing
 330   various information about the assembly, such as assembler version, the
 331   command-line options used, and a time stamp.
 332
 333 * New command-line option -msse2avx for x86 target to encode SSE
 334   instructions with VEX prefix.
 335
 336 * Add Intel XSAVE, EPT, MOVBE, AES, PCLMUL, AVX/FMA support for x86 target.
 337
 338 * New command-line options, -march=CPU[,+EXTENSION...], -mtune=CPU,
 339   -mmnemonic=[att|intel], -msyntax=[att|intel], -mindex-reg,
 340   -mnaked-reg and -mold-gcc, for x86 targets.
 341
 342 * Support for generating wide character strings has been added via the new
 343   pseudo ops: .string16, .string32 and .string64.
 344
 345 * Support for SSE5 has been added to the i386 port.
 346
 347 Changes in 2.18:
 348
 349 * The GAS sources are now released under the GPLv3.
 350
 351 * Support for the National Semiconductor CR16 target has been added.
 352
 353 * Added gas .reloc pseudo.  This is a low-level interface for creating
 354   relocations.
 355
 356 * Add support for x86_64 PE+ target.
 357
 358 * Add support for Score target.
 359
 360 Changes in 2.17:
 361
 362 * Support for the Infineon XC16X has been added by KPIT Cummins Infosystems.
 363
 364 * Support for ms2 architecture has been added.
 365
 366 * Support for the Z80 processor family has been added.
 367
 368 * Add support for the "@<file>" syntax to the command line, so that extra
 369   switches can be read from <file>.
 370
 371 * The SH target supports a new command-line switch --enable-reg-prefix which,
 372   if enabled, will allow register names to be optionally prefixed with a $
 373   character.  This allows register names to be distinguished from label names.
 374
 375 * Macros with a variable number of arguments are now supported. See the
 376   documentation for how this works.
 377
 378 * Added --reduce-memory-overheads switch to reduce the size of the hash
 379   tables used, at the expense of longer assembly times, and
 380   --hash-size=<NUMBER> to set the size of the hash tables used by gas.
 381
 382 * Macro names and macro parameter names can now be any identifier that would
 383   also be legal as a symbol elsewhere. For macro parameter names, this is
 384   known to cause problems in certain sources when the respective target uses
 385   characters inconsistently, and thus macro parameter references may no longer
 386   be recognized as such (see the documentation for details).
 387
 388 * Support the .f_floating, .d_floating, .g_floating and .h_floating directives
 389   for the VAX target in order to be more compatible with the VAX MACRO
 390   assembler.
 391
 392 * New command-line option -mtune=[itanium1|itanium2] for IA64 targets.
 393
 394 Changes in 2.16:
 395
 396 * Redefinition of macros now results in an error.
 397
 398 * New command-line option -mhint.b=[ok|warning|error] for IA64 targets.
 399
 400 * New command-line option -munwind-check=[warning|error] for IA64
 401   targets.
 402
 403 * The IA64 port now uses automatic dependency violation removal as its default
 404   mode.
 405
 406 * Port to MAXQ processor contributed by HCL Tech.
 407
 408 * Added support for generating unwind tables for ARM ELF targets.
 409
 410 * Add a -g command-line option to generate debug information in the target's
 411   preferred debug format.
 412
 413 * Support for the crx-elf target added.
 414
 415 * Support for the sh-symbianelf target added.
 416
 417 * Added a pseudo-op (.secrel32) to generate 32 bit section relative relocations
 418   on pe[i]-i386; required for this target's DWARF 2 support.
 419
 420 * Support for Motorola MCF521x/5249/547x/548x added.
 421
 422 * Support for ColdFire EMAC instructions added and Motorola syntax for MAC/EMAC
 423   instrucitons.
 424
 425 * New command-line option -mno-shared for MIPS ELF targets.
 426
 427 * New command-line option --alternate and pseudo-ops .altmacro and .noaltmacro
 428   added to enter (and leave) alternate macro syntax mode.
 429
 430 Changes in 2.15:
 431
 432 * The MIPS -membedded-pic option (Embedded-PIC code generation) is
 433   deprecated and will be removed in a future release.
 434
 435 * Added PIC m32r Linux (ELF) and support to M32R assembler.
 436
 437 * Added support for ARM V6.
 438
 439 * Added support for sh4a and variants.
 440
 441 * Support for Renesas M32R2 added.
 442
 443 * Limited support for Mapping Symbols as specified in the ARM ELF
 444   specification has been added to the arm assembler.
 445
 446 * On ARM architectures, added a new gas directive ".unreq" that undoes
 447   definitions created by ".req".
 448
 449 * Support for Motorola ColdFire MCF528x added.
 450
 451 * Added --gstabs+ switch to enable the generation of STABS debug format
 452   information with GNU extensions.
 453
 454 * Added support for MIPS64 Release 2.
 455
 456 * Added support for v850e1.
 457
 458 * Added -n switch for x86 assembler.  By default, x86 GAS replaces
 459   multiple nop instructions used for alignment within code sections
 460   with multi-byte nop instructions such as leal 0(%esi,1),%esi.  This
 461   switch disables the optimization.
 462
 463 * Removed -n option from MIPS assembler.  It was not useful, and confused the
 464   existing -non_shared option.
 465
 466 Changes in 2.14:
 467
 468 * Added support for MIPS32 Release 2.
 469
 470 * Added support for Xtensa architecture.
 471
 472 * Support for Intel's iWMMXt processor (an ARM variant) added.
 473
 474 * An assembler test generator has been contributed and an example file that
 475   uses it (gas/testsuite/gas/all/test-gen.c and test-exmaple.c).
 476
 477 * Support for SH2E added.
 478
 479 * GASP has now been removed.
 480
 481 * Support for Texas Instruments TMS320C4x and TMS320C3x series of
 482   DSP's contributed by Michael Hayes and Svein E. Seldal.
 483
 484 * Support for the Ubicom IP2xxx microcontroller added.
 485
 486 Changes in 2.13:
 487
 488 * Support for the Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat. Models for FR400
 489   and FR500 included.
 490
 491 * Support for DLX processor added.
 492
 493 * GASP has now been deprecated and will be removed in a future release.  Use
 494   the macro facilities in GAS instead.
 495
 496 * GASP now correctly parses floating point numbers. Unless the base is
 497   explicitly specified, they are interpreted as decimal numbers regardless of
 498   the currently specified base.
 499
 500 Changes in 2.12:
 501
 502 * Support for Don Knuth's MMIX, by Hans-Peter Nilsson.
 503
 504 * Support for the OpenRISC 32-bit embedded processor by OpenCores.
 505
 506 * The ARM assembler now accepts -march=..., -mcpu=... and -mfpu=... for
 507   specifying the target instruction set.  The old method of specifying the
 508   target processor has been deprecated, but is still accepted for
 509   compatibility.
 510
 511 * Support for the VFP floating-point instruction set has been added to
 512   the ARM assembler.
 513
 514 * New psuedo op: .incbin to include a set of binary data at a given point
 515   in the assembly.  Contributed by Anders Norlander.
 516
 517 * The MIPS assembler now accepts -march/-mtune. -mcpu has been deprecated
 518   but still works for compatability.
 519
 520 * The MIPS assembler no longer issues a warning by default when it
 521   generates a nop instruction from a macro. The new command-line option
 522   -n will turn on the warning.
 523
 524 Changes in 2.11:
 525
 526 * Support for PDP-11 and 2.11BSD a.out format, by Lars Brinkhoff.
 527
 528 * x86 gas now supports the full Pentium4 instruction set.
 529
 530 * Support for AMD x86-64 architecture, by Jan Hubicka, SuSE Labs.
 531
 532 * Support for Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12.
 533
 534 * Support for Texas Instruments TMS320C54x (tic54x).
 535
 536 * Support for IA-64.
 537
 538 * Support for i860, by Jason Eckhardt.
 539
 540 * Support for CRIS (Axis Communications ETRAX series).
 541
 542 * x86 gas has a new .arch pseudo op to specify the target CPU architecture.
 543
 544 * x86 gas -q command-line option quietens warnings about register size changes
 545   due to suffix, indirect jmp/call without `*', stand-alone prefixes, and
 546   translating various deprecated floating point instructions.
 547
 548 Changes in 2.10:
 549
 550 * Support for the ARM msr instruction was changed to only allow an immediate
 551   operand when altering the flags field.
 552
 553 * Support for ATMEL AVR.
 554
 555 * Support for IBM 370 ELF.  Somewhat experimental.
 556
 557 * Support for numbers with suffixes.
 558
 559 * Added support for breaking to the end of repeat loops.
 560
 561 * Added support for parallel instruction syntax (DOUBLEBAR_PARALLEL).
 562
 563 * New .elseif pseudo-op added.
 564
 565 * New --fatal-warnings option.
 566
 567 * picoJava architecture support added.
 568
 569 * Motorola MCore 210 processor support added.
 570
 571 * A new pseudo-op .intel_syntax has been implemented to allow gas to parse i386
 572   assembly programs with intel syntax.
 573
 574 * New pseudo-ops .func,.endfunc to aid in debugging user-written assembler code.
 575
 576 * Added -gdwarf2 option to generate DWARF 2 debugging information.
 577
 578 * Full 16-bit mode support for i386.
 579
 580 * Greatly improved instruction operand checking for i386.  This change will
 581   produce errors or warnings on incorrect assembly code that previous versions
 582   of gas accepted.  If you get unexpected messages from code that worked with
 583   older versions of gas, please double check the code before reporting a bug.
 584
 585 * Weak symbol support added for COFF targets.
 586
 587 * Mitsubishi D30V support added.
 588
 589 * Texas Instruments c80 (tms320c80) support added.
 590
 591 * i960 ELF support added.
 592
 593 * ARM ELF support added.
 594
 595 Changes in 2.9:
 596
 597 * Texas Instruments c30 (tms320c30) support added.
 598
 599 * The assembler now optimizes the exception frame information generated by egcs
 600   and gcc 2.8.  The new --traditional-format option disables this optimization.
 601
 602 * Added --gstabs option to generate stabs debugging information.
 603
 604 * The -a option takes a new suboption, m (e.g., -alm) to expand macros in a
 605   listing.
 606
 607 * Added -MD option to print dependencies.
 608
 609 Changes in 2.8:
 610
 611 * BeOS support added.
 612
 613 * MIPS16 support added.
 614
 615 * Motorola ColdFire 5200 support added (configure for m68k and use -m5200).
 616
 617 * Alpha/VMS support added.
 618
 619 * m68k options --base-size-default-16, --base-size-default-32,
 620   --disp-size-default-16, and --disp-size-default-32 added.
 621
 622 * The alignment directives now take an optional third argument, which is the
 623   maximum number of bytes to skip.  If doing the alignment would require
 624   skipping more than the given number of bytes, the alignment is not done at
 625   all.
 626
 627 * The ELF assembler has a new pseudo-op, .symver, used for symbol versioning.
 628
 629 * The -a option takes a new suboption, c (e.g., -alc), to skip false
 630   conditionals in listings.
 631
 632 * Added new pseudo-op, .equiv; it's like .equ, except that it is an error if
 633   the symbol is already defined.
 634
 635 Changes in 2.7:
 636
 637 * The PowerPC assembler now allows the use of symbolic register names (r0,
 638   etc.) if -mregnames is used.  Symbolic names preceded by a '%' (%r0, etc.)
 639   can be used any time.  PowerPC 860 move to/from SPR instructions have been
 640   added.
 641
 642 * Alpha Linux (ELF) support added.
 643
 644 * PowerPC ELF support added.
 645
 646 * m68k Linux (ELF) support added.
 647
 648 * i960 Hx/Jx support added.
 649
 650 * i386/PowerPC gnu-win32 support added.
 651
 652 * SCO ELF support added.  For OpenServer 5 targets (i386-unknown-sco3.2v5) the
 653   default is to build COFF-only support.  To get a set of tools that generate
 654   ELF (they'll understand both COFF and ELF), you must configure with
 655   target=i386-unknown-sco3.2v5elf.
 656
 657 * m88k-motorola-sysv3* support added.
 658
 659 Changes in 2.6:
 660
 661 * Gas now directly supports macros, without requiring GASP.
 662
 663 * Gas now has an MRI assembler compatibility mode.  Use -M or --mri to select
 664   MRI mode.  The pseudo-op ``.mri 1'' will switch into the MRI mode until the
 665   ``.mri 0'' is seen; this can be convenient for inline assembler code.
 666
 667 * Added --defsym SYM=VALUE option.
 668
 669 * Added -mips4 support to MIPS assembler.
 670
 671 * Added PIC support to Solaris and SPARC SunOS 4 assembler.
 672
 673 Changes in 2.4:
 674
 675 * Converted this directory to use an autoconf-generated configure script.
 676
 677 * ARM support, from Richard Earnshaw.
 678
 679 * Updated VMS support, from Pat Rankin, including considerably improved
 680   debugging support.
 681
 682 * Support for the control registers in the 68060.
 683
 684 * Handles (ignores) a new directive ".this_GCC_requires_the_GNU_assembler", to
 685   provide for possible future gcc changes, for targets where gas provides some
 686   features not available in the native assembler.  If the native assembler is
 687   used, it should become obvious pretty quickly what the problem is.
 688
 689 * Usage message is available with "--help".
 690
 691 * The GNU Assembler Preprocessor (gasp) is included.  (Actually, it was in 2.3
 692   also, but didn't get into the NEWS file.)
 693
 694 * Weak symbol support for a.out.
 695
 696 * A bug in the listing code which could cause an infinite loop has been fixed.
 697   Bugs in listings when generating a COFF object file have also been fixed.
 698
 699 * Initial i386-svr4 PIC implementation from Eric Youngdale, based on code by
 700   Paul Kranenburg.
 701
 702 * Improved Alpha support.  Immediate constants can have a much larger range
 703   now. Support for the 21164 has been contributed by Digital.
 704
 705 * Updated ns32k (pc532-mach, netbsd532) support from Ian Dall.
 706
 707 Changes in 2.3:
 708
 709 * Mach i386 support, by David Mackenzie and Ken Raeburn.
 710
 711 * RS/6000 and PowerPC support by Ian Taylor.
 712
 713 * VMS command scripts (make-gas.com, config-gas.com) have been worked on a bit,
 714   based on mail received from various people.  The `-h#' option should work
 715   again too.
 716
 717 * HP-PA work, by Jeff Law.  Note, for the PA, gas-2.3 has been designed to work
 718   with gdb-4.12 and gcc-2.6.  As gcc-2.6 has not been released yet, a special
 719   version of gcc-2.5.8 has been patched to work with gas-2.3.  You can retrieve
 720   this special version of gcc-2.5.8 via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu
 721   in the "dist" directory.
 722
 723 * Vax support in gas fixed for BSD, so it builds and seems to run a couple
 724   simple tests okay.  I haven't put it through extensive testing.  (GNU make is
 725   currently required for BSD 4.3 builds.)
 726
 727 * Support for the DEC Alpha, running OSF/1 (ECOFF format).  The gas support is
 728   based on code donated by CMU, which used an a.out-based format.  I'm afraid
 729   the alpha-a.out support is pretty badly mangled, and much of it removed;
 730   making it work will require rewriting it as BFD support for the format anyways.
 731
 732 * Irix 5 support.
 733
 734 * The test suites have been fixed up a bit, so that they should work with a
 735   couple different versions of expect and dejagnu.
 736
 737 * Symbols' values are now handled internally as expressions, permitting more
 738   flexibility in evaluating them in some cases.  Some details of relocation
 739   handling have also changed, and simple constant pool management has been
 740   added, to make the Alpha port easier.
 741
 742 * New option "--statistics" for printing out program run times.  This is
 743   intended to be used with the gcc "-Q" option, which prints out times spent in
 744   various phases of compilation.  (You should be able to get all of them
 745   printed out with "gcc -Q -Wa,--statistics", I think.)
 746
 747 Changes in 2.2:
 748
 749 * RS/6000 AIX and MIPS SGI Irix 5 support has been added.
 750
 751 * Configurations that are still in development (and therefore are convenient to
 752   have listed in configure.in) still get rejected without a minor change to
 753   gas/Makefile.in, so people not doing development work shouldn't get the
 754   impression that support for such configurations is actually believed to be
 755   reliable.
 756
 757 * The program name (usually "as") is printed when a fatal error message is
 758   displayed.  This should prevent some confusion about the source of occasional
 759   messages about "internal errors".
 760
 761 * ELF support is falling into place.  Support for the 386 should be working.
 762   Support for SPARC Solaris is in.  HPPA support from Utah is being integrated.
 763
 764 * Symbol values are maintained as expressions instead of being immediately
 765   boiled down to add-symbol, sub-symbol, and constant.  This permits slightly
 766   more complex calculations involving symbols whose values are not alreadey
 767   known.
 768
 769 * DBX-style debugging info ("stabs") is now supported for COFF formats.
 770   If any stabs directives are seen in the source, GAS will create two new
 771   sections: a ".stab" and a ".stabstr" section.  The format of the .stab
 772   section is nearly identical to the a.out symbol format, and .stabstr is
 773   its string table.  For this to be useful, you must have configured GCC
 774   to generate stabs (by defining DBX_DEBUGGING_INFO), and must have a GDB
 775   that can use the stab sections (4.11 or later).
 776
 777 * LynxOS, on i386 and m68k platforms, is now supported.  SPARC LynxOS
 778   support is in progress.
 779
 780 Changes in 2.1:
 781
 782 * Several small fixes for i386-aix (PS/2) support from Minh Tran-Le have been
 783   incorporated, but not well tested yet.
 784
 785 * Altered the opcode table split for m68k; it should require less VM to compile
 786   with gcc now.
 787
 788 * Some minor adjustments to add (Convergent Technologies') Miniframe support,
 789   suggested by Ronald Cole.
 790
 791 * HPPA support (running OSF only, not HPUX) has been contributed by Utah.  This
 792   includes improved ELF support, which I've started adapting for SPARC Solaris
 793   2.x.  Integration isn't completely, so it probably won't work.
 794
 795 * HP9000/300 support, donated by HP, has been merged in.
 796
 797 * Ian Taylor has finished the MIPS ECOFF (Ultrix, Irix) support.
 798
 799 * Better error messages for unsupported configurations (e.g., hppa-hpux).
 800
 801 * Test suite framework is starting to become reasonable.
 802
 803 Changes in 2.0:
 804
 805 * Mostly bug fixes.
 806
 807 * Some more merging of BFD and ELF code, but ELF still doesn't work.
 808
 809 Changes in 1.94:
 810
 811 * BFD merge is partly done.  Adventurous souls may try giving configure the
 812   "--with-bfd-assembler" option.  Currently, ELF format requires it, a.out
 813   format accepts it; SPARC CPU accepts it.  It's the default only for OS "elf"
 814   or "solaris".  (ELF isn't really supported yet.  It needs work.  I've got
 815   some code from Utah for HP-PA ELF, and from DG for m88k ELF, but they're not
 816   fully merged yet.)
 817
 818 * The 68K opcode table has been split in half.  It should now compile under gcc
 819   without consuming ridiculous amounts of memory.
 820
 821 * A couple data structures have been reduced in size.  This should result in
 822   saving a little bit of space at runtime.
 823
 824 * Support for MIPS, from OSF and Ralph Campbell, has been merged in.  The OSF
 825   code provided ROSE format support, which I haven't merged in yet.  (I can
 826   make it available, if anyone wants to try it out.)  Ralph's code, for BSD
 827   4.4, supports a.out format.  We don't have ECOFF support in just yet; it's
 828   coming.
 829
 830 * Support for the Hitachi H8/500 has been added.
 831
 832 * VMS host and target support should be working now, thanks chiefly to Eric
 833   Youngdale.
 834
 835 Changes in 1.93.01:
 836
 837 * For m68k, support for more processors has been added: 68040, CPU32, 68851.
 838
 839 * For i386, .align is now power-of-two; was number-of-bytes.
 840
 841 * For m68k, "%" is now accepted before register names.  For COFF format, which
 842   doesn't use underscore prefixes for C labels, it is required, so variable "a0"
 843   can be distinguished from the register.
 844
 845 * Last public release was 1.38.  Lots of configuration changes since then, lots
 846   of new CPUs and formats, lots of bugs fixed.
 847
 848 \f
 849 Copyright (C) 2012-2020 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
 850
 851 Copying and distribution of this file, with or without modification,
 852 are permitted in any medium without royalty provided the copyright
 853 notice and this notice are preserved.
 854
 855 Local variables:
 856 fill-column: 79
 857 End: