1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB 6.8
6 * Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
7 which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
9 * The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
10 list of section offsets.
12 * New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
14 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
15 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
21 Display timestamps with GDB debugging output.
26 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
28 *** Changes in GDB 6.8
30 * New native configurations
32 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
33 Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
37 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
38 Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
40 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
42 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
43 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
44 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
45 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
47 * GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
48 (mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
50 * Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
53 * GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
54 including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
55 and in inlined functions.
57 * GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
58 accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
59 more than one contiguous range of addresses.
61 * Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
63 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
64 registers on PowerPC targets.
66 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
67 targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
69 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
70 commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
72 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
75 * hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
76 The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
77 error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
78 The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
80 * GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
81 building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
84 * GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
85 Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
86 now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
87 stored in two consecutive float registers.
89 * The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
92 * Improved support for debugging Ada
93 Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
95 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
96 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
97 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
98 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
100 - Improved command completion in Ada
105 set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
106 show print frame-arguments
107 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
108 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
113 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
120 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
129 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
131 * GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
135 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
139 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
141 *** Changes in GDB 6.7
143 * Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
144 bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
145 Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
147 * When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
148 symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
149 -Bsymbolic linker option.
151 * When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
152 recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
155 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
156 frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
158 * GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
159 32-bit or 64-bit register values.
161 * Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
163 * GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
164 target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
165 a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
167 * Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
168 automatically displayed as character or string data.
170 * The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
171 arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
174 * Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
175 for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
176 only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
178 * GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
181 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
182 ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
183 has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
185 * GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
187 * GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
189 * The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
190 layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
191 segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
193 * The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
194 immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
196 * The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
197 "library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
198 packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
199 where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
200 Windows and SymbianOS).
202 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
203 (DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
205 * GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
206 according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
212 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
213 when debugging using remote targets.
215 set mem inaccessible-by-default
216 show mem inaccessible-by-default
217 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
218 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
219 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
220 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
221 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
223 set breakpoint auto-hw
224 show breakpoint auto-hw
225 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
226 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
227 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
228 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
229 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
230 including "next" and "finish".
233 catch exception unhandled
234 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
237 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
241 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
242 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
243 an alias to "set sysroot".
246 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
247 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
250 * New native configurations
252 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
257 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
258 not query the target for its built-in description.
262 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
263 MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
264 Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
269 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
270 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
273 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
278 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
279 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
281 qXfer:libraries:read:
282 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
283 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
284 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
285 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
289 Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
298 i[34567]86-*-netware*
299 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
300 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
302 i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
305 i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
306 i[34567]86-*-unixware*
315 * Other removed features
322 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
329 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
334 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
335 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
340 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
341 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
343 Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
345 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
346 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
347 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
348 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
352 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
353 in debugging information.
357 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
358 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
360 set mips stack-arg-size
361 set mips saved-gpreg-size
363 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
365 *** Changes in GDB 6.6
370 Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
372 * GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
373 (mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
374 running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
376 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
377 Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
380 * The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
381 broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
383 * The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
384 stub provides the required support.
386 * Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
387 longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
392 unset substitute-path
394 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
395 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
396 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
397 between compilation and debugging.
401 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
402 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
403 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
407 The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
409 Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
410 an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
412 The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
417 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
418 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
419 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
420 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
424 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
425 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
427 qXfer:memory-map:read:
428 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
429 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
434 Erase and program a flash memory device.
436 * Removed remote packets
439 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
440 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
442 *** Changes in GDB 6.5
446 Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
448 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
452 init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
453 only if it doesn't already have a value.
455 The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
457 checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
459 restart <n> Return the program state to a
460 previously saved state.
462 info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
464 delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
466 set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
467 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
469 info forks List forks of the user program that
470 are available to be debugged.
472 fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
473 forks of the user program that are
474 available to be debugged.
476 delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
477 that are available to be debugged (and
478 kill the forked process).
480 detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
481 that are available to be debugged (and
482 allow the process to continue).
486 Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
488 * Improved Windows host support
490 GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
491 native console support, and remote communications using either
492 network sockets or serial ports.
494 * Improved Modula-2 language support
496 GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
497 basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
498 pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
499 printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
500 written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
501 GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
505 The ARM rdi-share module.
507 The Netware NLM debug server.
509 *** Changes in GDB 6.4
511 * New native configurations
513 OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
514 OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
518 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
520 * New command line options
522 --batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
523 --return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
524 the child (debugged) program exited with.
525 --eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
526 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
527 specified multiple times and in conjunction
528 with the --command (-x) option.
530 * Deprecated commands removed
532 The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
536 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
537 othernames set arm disassembler
538 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
539 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
540 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
543 * New BSD user-level threads support
545 It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
546 library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
549 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
550 FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
551 OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
553 Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
554 are not yet supported.
556 * New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
557 (Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
559 * REMOVED configurations and files
561 VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
562 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
563 National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
565 * New "set print array-indexes" command
567 After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
568 when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
571 * VAX floating point support
573 GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
575 * User-defined command support
577 In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
578 to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
579 section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
581 *** Changes in GDB 6.3:
583 * New command line option
585 GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
588 * GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
590 GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
591 information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
592 by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
593 proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
594 to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
596 * Internationalization
598 When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
599 internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
600 continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
604 Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
605 implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
606 into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
608 * New native configurations
610 GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
614 GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
615 packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
617 * END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
619 GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
620 The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
621 features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
624 GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
625 compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
626 continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
638 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
639 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
641 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
643 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
644 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
645 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
655 *** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
657 * MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
659 When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
660 heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
663 * MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
665 When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
666 fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
667 IRIX long double values).
671 A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
672 command. This problem has been fixed.
674 *** Changes in GDB 6.2:
676 * Fix for ``many threads''
678 On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
679 rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
682 ptrace: No such process.
683 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
685 This problem has been fixed.
687 * "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
689 Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
692 * New ``start'' command.
694 This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
696 * New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
698 Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
699 live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
700 platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
702 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
703 FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
704 NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
705 NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
706 NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
707 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
708 OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
709 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
710 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
712 * Signal trampoline code overhauled
714 Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
715 These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
716 of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
717 call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
718 signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
720 Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
721 features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
722 include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
724 * Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
726 * New native configurations
728 GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
729 OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
730 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
731 OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
732 OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
733 NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
734 OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
736 * END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
738 GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
739 The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
740 including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
741 migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
742 compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
743 work, was also included.
745 GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
746 module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
756 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
757 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
759 * REMOVED configurations and files
761 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
762 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
763 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
764 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
765 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
766 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
767 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
768 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
769 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
771 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
773 *** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
775 * TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
777 The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
778 GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
779 command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
780 program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
783 * Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
785 Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
786 libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
787 cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
788 GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
789 shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
790 the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
793 Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
795 * Fixed ISO-C build problems
797 The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
798 non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
799 compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
801 * Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
803 Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
804 wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
806 * Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
808 The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
809 permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
810 systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
812 * Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
814 Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
815 has been updated to use constant array sizes.
817 * Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
819 GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
820 its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
821 panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
823 * Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
825 When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
826 by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
827 not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
829 *** Changes in GDB 6.1:
831 * Removed --with-mmalloc
833 Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
834 conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
836 * Changes in AMD64 configurations
838 The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
839 the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
840 and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
841 you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
843 * Revised SPARC target
845 The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
846 FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
847 support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
848 from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
849 (Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
853 GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
854 names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
855 with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
858 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
860 GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
861 arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
864 * C++ nested types and namespaces
866 GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
867 improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
868 is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
869 Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
870 namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
871 "Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
872 frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
873 if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
874 GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
876 * New native configurations
878 NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
879 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
880 OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
881 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
882 OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
884 * New debugging protocols
886 M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
888 * "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
890 The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
891 and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
892 tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
894 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
896 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
897 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
898 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
901 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
902 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
903 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
904 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
905 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
906 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
907 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
908 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
909 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
911 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
913 * REMOVED configurations and files
915 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
916 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
917 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
918 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
919 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
920 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
921 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
922 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
923 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
924 386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
925 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
926 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
927 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
928 SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
929 SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
930 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
931 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
933 *** Changes in GDB 6.0:
937 Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
940 * New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
942 DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
943 information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
944 By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
947 The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
948 have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
953 GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
954 file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
955 remote protocol documentation for details.
957 * All targets using the new architecture framework.
959 All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
960 architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
961 to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
964 * GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
966 GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
967 per-thread variables.
969 * GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
971 GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
972 GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
974 * Separate debug info.
976 GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
977 automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
978 of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
979 system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
980 and optional debug files.
982 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
984 DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
985 describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
988 GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
989 for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
993 A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
994 Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
995 considered "useable".
997 * GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
999 The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
1000 commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
1003 * GDB supports logging output to a file
1005 There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
1006 used to capture GDB's output to a file.
1008 * The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
1010 The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
1011 disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
1014 * d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
1016 The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
1017 registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
1021 A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
1022 be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
1023 session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
1024 "--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
1025 data, for more informative profiling results.
1027 * Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
1029 The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
1030 option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
1031 "mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
1033 Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
1036 Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
1037 Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
1038 Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
1039 in a subsequent -var-update.
1041 * New native configurations.
1043 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1045 * Multi-arched targets.
1047 HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
1048 Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
1050 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1052 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1053 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1054 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1055 permanently REMOVED.
1057 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1058 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1059 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1060 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
1061 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1062 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
1063 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
1064 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
1065 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
1066 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
1067 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1068 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
1070 * REMOVED configurations and files
1073 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1074 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
1075 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1076 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1077 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
1078 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1080 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
1081 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1082 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1083 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1084 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1085 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1087 * MIPS $fp behavior changed
1089 The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
1090 the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
1091 context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
1092 address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
1093 The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
1095 *** Changes in GDB 5.3:
1097 * GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
1099 When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
1100 `/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
1101 in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
1102 library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
1103 shared libs like mad''.
1105 * ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
1107 Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
1108 the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
1109 arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
1110 powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
1112 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
1114 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
1115 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
1118 The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
1119 invocations in expression, and shows the result.
1121 The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
1122 macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
1124 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
1125 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
1126 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
1127 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
1129 * Multi-arched targets.
1131 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
1132 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
1134 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
1135 Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
1136 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
1140 Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
1143 * New native configurations
1145 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
1146 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
1147 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
1148 UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
1150 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1152 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1153 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1154 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1155 permanently REMOVED.
1157 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1158 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1159 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
1160 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1161 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1162 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1163 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1164 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1165 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
1166 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1168 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
1169 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1171 * OBSOLETE languages
1173 CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
1175 * REMOVED configurations and files
1177 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1178 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1179 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1180 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1181 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1183 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
1185 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
1187 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
1188 commands. The default is 1024.
1190 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
1192 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
1194 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
1196 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
1197 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
1198 from a file into memory (restore).
1200 * Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
1202 The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
1203 including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
1204 of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
1206 *** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
1214 gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
1215 mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
1216 Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
1218 gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
1219 dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
1220 Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
1222 Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
1223 Surprisingly enough, it works now.
1224 By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
1226 i386 hardware watchpoint support:
1227 avoid misses on second run for some targets.
1228 By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
1230 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
1232 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
1234 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
1235 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
1236 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
1237 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
1238 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
1239 (notably embedded) targets.
1241 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
1243 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
1244 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
1245 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
1246 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
1248 * New command line option
1250 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
1252 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
1254 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
1255 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
1256 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
1257 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
1258 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
1259 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
1260 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
1261 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
1262 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
1263 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
1265 * Changes in ARM configurations.
1267 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
1268 configuration is fully multi-arch.
1270 * New native configurations
1272 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
1273 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
1274 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
1275 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
1279 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
1281 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1283 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1284 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1285 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1286 permanently REMOVED.
1288 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1289 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1290 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1291 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1292 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1294 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
1296 * REMOVED configurations and files
1298 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1300 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1301 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1302 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
1303 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1304 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1305 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
1306 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
1307 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1308 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1309 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
1310 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
1312 * Changes to command line processing
1314 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
1315 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
1317 * Changes to key bindings
1319 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
1321 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
1323 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
1325 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
1328 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
1330 Numerous documentation fixes.
1332 Numerous testsuite fixes.
1334 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
1336 * New native configurations
1338 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
1339 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
1340 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
1341 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1342 ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
1343 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
1347 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
1349 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
1351 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1353 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
1354 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1355 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1356 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
1357 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1359 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1360 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1361 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1362 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
1363 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
1364 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1365 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
1366 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
1368 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
1369 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
1371 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1372 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1373 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1374 permanently REMOVED.
1376 * REMOVED configurations and files
1378 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1379 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
1381 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
1385 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
1387 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
1388 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
1393 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
1395 * The MI enabled by default.
1397 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
1398 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
1399 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
1400 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
1401 which is now deprecated.
1403 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
1405 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
1406 main features are supported:
1408 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
1410 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
1413 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
1415 - a Pascal expression parser.
1417 However, some important features are not yet supported.
1419 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
1421 - there are some problems with boolean types;
1423 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
1424 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
1426 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
1428 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
1430 * Changes in completion.
1432 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
1433 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
1434 users expect at the shell prompt.
1436 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
1437 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
1438 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
1439 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
1440 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
1441 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
1442 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
1444 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
1446 * New platform-independent commands:
1448 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
1449 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
1450 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
1452 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
1454 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
1455 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
1456 many threads as your system allows you to have.
1458 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
1460 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
1461 multi-threaded programs though.
1463 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
1465 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
1467 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
1468 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
1471 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
1473 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
1474 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
1475 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
1476 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
1477 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
1480 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
1481 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
1482 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
1484 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
1486 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
1487 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
1489 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
1490 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
1493 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
1494 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
1495 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
1496 a given linear address.
1498 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
1499 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
1500 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
1502 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
1504 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
1506 * Changes in documentation.
1508 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
1509 Documentation License.
1511 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1514 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
1516 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1519 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
1520 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
1521 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
1523 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
1525 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
1526 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
1527 contents of this file.
1531 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
1533 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
1535 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
1537 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
1538 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
1539 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
1540 greater level of detail.
1542 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
1544 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
1545 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
1546 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
1549 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
1551 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
1552 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
1553 machines ``out of the box''.
1555 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
1556 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
1557 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
1558 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
1559 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
1561 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
1562 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
1563 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
1564 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
1565 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
1567 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
1568 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
1571 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
1574 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
1575 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
1576 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
1577 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
1579 * New native configurations
1581 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
1582 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
1586 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
1587 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
1588 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
1589 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1591 * OBSOLETE configurations
1593 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1594 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
1596 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
1599 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1600 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1601 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1602 be permanently REMOVED.
1604 * Gould support removed
1606 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
1608 * New features for SVR4
1610 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
1611 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
1612 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
1614 * Many C++ enhancements
1616 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
1617 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
1619 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
1621 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
1622 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
1623 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
1624 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
1626 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
1627 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
1629 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
1631 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
1632 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
1633 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
1635 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
1636 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
1638 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
1640 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
1641 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
1642 include ``set remote P-packet''.
1644 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
1646 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
1647 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
1648 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
1650 * ``apropos'' command added.
1652 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
1653 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
1654 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
1658 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
1659 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
1660 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
1661 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
1662 enabled by configuring with:
1664 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
1666 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
1668 * New native configurations
1670 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
1671 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
1672 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
1676 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1677 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
1678 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1680 * OBSOLETE configurations
1682 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
1684 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1685 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1686 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1687 be permanently REMOVED.
1691 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
1692 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
1693 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
1694 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
1695 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
1696 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
1697 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
1702 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
1704 * set extension-language
1706 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
1707 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
1708 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
1709 set extension-language .c c++
1710 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
1711 and their associated languages.
1713 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
1715 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
1716 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
1717 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
1721 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
1722 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
1724 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
1725 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
1727 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
1728 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
1729 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
1730 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
1731 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
1732 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
1733 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
1734 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
1736 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
1737 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
1738 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
1739 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
1743 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
1744 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
1745 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
1746 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
1747 for xdb and dbx commands.
1751 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
1752 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
1753 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
1755 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
1756 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
1757 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
1759 * Debugging across forks
1761 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
1766 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
1767 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
1768 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
1770 * GDB remote protocol additions
1772 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
1773 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
1774 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
1775 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
1777 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
1778 full 64-bit address. The command
1780 set remoteaddresssize 32
1782 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
1783 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
1786 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
1787 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
1789 maint packet heythere
1791 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
1792 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
1795 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
1796 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
1797 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
1799 * Tracing can collect general expressions
1801 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
1802 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
1803 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
1805 * mask-address variable for Mips
1807 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
1808 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
1809 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
1811 * Higher serial baud rates
1813 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
1814 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
1815 to achieve all of these rates.)
1819 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
1820 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
1823 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
1825 * New native configurations
1827 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
1828 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
1829 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1830 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
1831 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1832 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
1833 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
1837 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1838 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
1839 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1840 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
1841 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
1842 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
1843 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
1844 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
1845 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
1846 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1847 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
1849 * New debugging protocols
1851 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
1852 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
1853 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
1854 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1855 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1856 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1860 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
1861 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
1866 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
1867 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
1869 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
1871 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
1872 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
1873 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
1875 * Live range splitting
1877 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
1878 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
1879 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
1883 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
1884 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
1888 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
1889 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
1890 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
1895 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
1900 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
1901 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
1902 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
1903 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
1904 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
1905 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
1909 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
1910 the symbol at the specified address.
1914 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
1915 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
1916 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
1917 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
1918 file tracepoint.c for more details.
1922 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
1923 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
1924 of most MIPS variants.
1928 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
1929 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
1930 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
1934 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
1935 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
1936 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
1937 the possible architectures.
1939 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
1941 * New native configurations
1943 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
1944 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
1945 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
1946 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
1947 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1948 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
1952 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
1953 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1954 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
1955 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
1956 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
1958 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1962 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
1963 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
1964 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
1965 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
1966 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
1970 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
1972 * Windows 95/NT native
1974 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
1975 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
1976 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
1977 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
1978 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
1980 * dont-repeat command
1982 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
1983 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
1984 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
1985 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
1987 * Send break instead of ^C
1989 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
1990 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
1991 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
1993 * Remote protocol timeout
1995 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
1996 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
1997 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
1999 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
2001 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
2002 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
2003 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
2004 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
2005 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
2007 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
2008 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
2009 automatically on hpux10.
2011 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
2013 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
2015 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
2017 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
2018 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
2019 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
2020 every character. The default value is 1050.
2022 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
2024 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
2025 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
2026 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
2027 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
2028 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
2029 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
2031 * Speedups for remote debugging
2033 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
2034 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
2035 and more efficient S-record downloading.
2037 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
2039 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
2040 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
2042 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
2044 * Psymtabs for XCOFF
2046 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
2047 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
2049 * Remote targets use caching
2051 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
2052 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
2053 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
2054 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
2055 off' turns the the data cache off.
2057 * Remote targets may have threads
2059 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
2060 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
2061 gdb/remote.c for details.
2065 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
2066 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
2067 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
2068 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
2069 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
2070 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
2071 sequence is something like
2073 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
2075 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
2079 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
2080 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
2081 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
2082 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
2083 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
2084 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
2085 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
2086 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
2090 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
2091 but does simplify configuration and building.
2095 GDB now supports hpux10.
2097 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
2099 * New native configurations
2101 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
2102 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
2103 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
2104 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
2108 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2109 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
2110 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
2111 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
2114 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
2116 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
2117 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
2118 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
2119 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
2120 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
2122 * Arguments to user-defined commands
2124 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
2125 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
2128 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
2130 To execute the command use:
2133 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
2134 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
2135 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
2137 * New `if' and `while' commands
2139 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
2140 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
2141 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
2142 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
2143 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
2144 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
2145 if the expression is zero.
2147 * Fortran source language mode
2149 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
2150 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
2151 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
2152 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
2155 * Better HPUX support
2157 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
2158 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
2159 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
2160 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
2161 that behavior do the following before running the program:
2167 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
2168 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
2174 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
2175 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
2178 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
2179 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
2181 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
2183 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
2184 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
2185 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
2186 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
2187 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
2188 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
2190 * New DOS host serial code
2192 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
2193 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
2196 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
2198 * New "complete" command
2200 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
2201 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
2203 * Trailing space optional in prompt
2205 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
2206 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
2208 * Breakpoint hit counts
2210 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
2211 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
2212 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
2213 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
2214 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
2217 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
2219 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
2220 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
2221 arrays actually contain only short strings.
2223 * Shared library breakpoints
2225 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
2226 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
2228 * Hardware watchpoints
2230 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
2231 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
2233 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
2237 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
2238 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
2240 * Improved Irix 5 support
2242 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
2244 * Improved HPPA support
2246 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
2248 * New native configurations
2250 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
2251 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2252 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
2253 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
2257 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2258 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
2261 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
2263 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
2264 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
2268 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
2269 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
2271 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
2273 * Irix 5 is now supported
2277 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
2278 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
2279 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
2280 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
2281 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
2284 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
2286 * User visible changes:
2290 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
2291 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
2292 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
2293 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
2294 debugging info for the mips target).
2296 * DEC Alpha native support
2298 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
2299 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
2300 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
2301 Alpha-specific notes.
2303 * Preliminary thread implementation
2305 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
2307 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
2309 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
2310 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
2313 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
2315 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
2316 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
2317 call methods, ...etc.
2319 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
2321 * User visible changes:
2323 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
2324 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
2325 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
2326 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
2328 Filename completion now works.
2330 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
2331 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
2332 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
2334 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
2335 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
2336 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
2337 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
2338 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
2342 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
2343 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
2346 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
2350 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
2351 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
2352 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
2356 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
2357 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
2358 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
2359 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
2360 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
2364 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
2365 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
2366 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
2368 * New targets supported
2370 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2371 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2372 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
2373 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2374 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
2376 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
2377 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
2378 GO32 memory extender.
2380 * New remote protocols
2382 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
2384 * New source languages supported
2386 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
2387 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
2388 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
2391 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
2393 * HP Precision Architecture supported
2395 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
2396 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
2397 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
2398 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
2399 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
2400 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
2402 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
2404 * Faster and better demangling
2406 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
2407 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
2408 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
2409 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
2410 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
2411 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
2414 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
2415 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
2416 compiler does not actually implement.
2418 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
2420 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
2421 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
2422 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
2423 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
2424 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
2425 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
2428 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
2429 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
2431 * Improved configure script
2433 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
2434 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
2435 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
2436 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
2438 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
2439 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
2440 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
2441 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
2442 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
2443 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
2445 * Documentation improvements
2447 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
2448 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
2449 before submitting changes.
2451 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
2452 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
2453 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
2454 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
2455 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
2457 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
2458 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
2459 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
2460 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
2461 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
2462 around this problem.
2466 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
2467 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
2468 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
2471 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
2472 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
2474 * New native hosts supported
2476 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
2477 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
2479 * New targets supported
2481 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
2483 * New file formats supported
2485 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
2486 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
2490 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
2492 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
2493 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
2495 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
2496 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
2497 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
2499 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
2500 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
2502 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
2503 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
2504 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
2507 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
2508 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
2509 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
2510 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
2511 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
2513 * Internal improvements
2515 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
2516 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
2518 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
2519 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
2520 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
2521 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
2522 shared code that handles any of them.
2524 * New command line options
2526 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
2530 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
2531 General Public License.
2533 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
2535 * Host/native/target split
2537 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
2538 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
2539 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
2540 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
2541 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
2543 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
2544 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
2545 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
2546 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
2547 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
2548 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
2549 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
2551 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
2552 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
2553 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
2555 * New hosts supported
2557 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
2558 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2559 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
2561 * New targets supported
2563 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
2564 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
2566 * New native hosts supported
2568 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2569 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
2570 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
2572 * New file formats supported
2574 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
2575 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
2576 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
2580 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
2581 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
2582 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
2584 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
2586 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
2587 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
2588 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
2589 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
2593 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
2594 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
2595 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
2597 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
2601 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
2602 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
2605 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
2606 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
2608 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
2609 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
2610 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
2611 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
2612 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
2613 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
2615 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
2616 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
2617 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
2618 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
2622 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
2623 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
2624 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
2625 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
2626 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
2628 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
2629 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
2630 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
2631 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
2635 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
2636 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
2637 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
2638 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
2639 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
2640 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
2641 each instruction being stepped through.
2643 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
2644 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
2646 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
2647 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
2648 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
2649 processor with a serial port.
2653 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
2654 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
2655 supported, and what files each one uses.
2659 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
2660 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
2661 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
2662 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
2664 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
2665 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
2666 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
2667 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
2671 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
2672 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
2673 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
2674 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
2675 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
2676 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
2678 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
2681 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
2683 * Better support for C++ function names
2685 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
2686 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
2687 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
2688 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
2689 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
2691 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
2692 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
2693 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
2694 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
2695 for the list of formats.
2697 * G++ symbol mangling problem
2699 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
2700 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
2701 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
2702 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
2703 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
2704 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
2707 * New 'maintenance' command
2709 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
2710 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
2711 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
2713 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
2714 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
2715 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
2716 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
2717 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
2718 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
2720 The following commands are new:
2722 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
2723 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
2724 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
2726 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
2728 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
2729 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
2730 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
2731 read after argv processing.
2733 * New hosts supported
2735 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
2737 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
2739 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
2740 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
2741 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
2742 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
2743 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
2746 * New targets supported
2748 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2750 * More smarts about finding #include files
2752 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
2753 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
2754 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
2755 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
2756 the one that contains your sources.
2758 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
2759 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
2760 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
2762 * Interesting infernals change
2764 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
2765 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
2766 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
2767 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
2769 * Bug fixes (of course!)
2771 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
2772 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
2773 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
2775 See the ChangeLog for details.
2777 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
2779 * New machines supported (host and target)
2781 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
2783 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
2785 * New malloc package
2787 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
2788 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
2789 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
2790 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
2791 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
2792 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
2796 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
2797 'help info proc' for details.
2799 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
2801 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
2802 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
2805 * File name changes for MS-DOS
2807 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
2808 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
2809 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
2810 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
2811 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
2812 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
2814 * Cross byte order fixes
2816 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
2817 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
2819 * New -mapped and -readnow options
2821 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
2822 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
2823 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
2824 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
2825 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
2826 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
2827 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
2828 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
2829 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
2830 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
2832 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
2833 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
2834 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
2835 slower, but makes future operations faster.
2837 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
2838 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
2839 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
2842 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
2844 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
2845 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
2846 shared across multiple host platforms.
2848 * longjmp() handling
2850 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
2851 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
2852 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
2853 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
2857 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
2858 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
2863 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
2864 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
2865 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
2867 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
2869 * New machines supported (host and target)
2871 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2873 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
2874 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
2876 * New machines supported (target)
2878 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2882 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
2883 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
2884 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
2886 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
2887 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
2888 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
2889 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
2890 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
2893 * New features for SVR4
2895 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
2896 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
2897 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
2899 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
2900 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
2901 it prints the address mappings of the process.
2903 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
2904 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
2906 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
2908 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
2909 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
2910 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
2911 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
2912 same code linked statically.
2916 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
2917 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
2918 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
2919 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
2920 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
2921 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
2925 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
2926 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
2927 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
2930 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
2932 * New machines supported (host and target)
2934 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
2935 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
2936 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2938 * Almost SCO Unix support
2940 We had hoped to support:
2941 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2942 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
2943 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
2944 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
2946 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
2948 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
2949 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
2950 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
2951 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
2956 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
2957 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
2958 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
2962 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
2963 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
2964 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
2966 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
2968 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
2969 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
2970 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
2972 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
2973 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
2974 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
2975 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
2978 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
2979 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
2980 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
2981 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
2984 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
2985 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
2988 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
2989 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
2990 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
2993 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
2995 * Improved configuration
2997 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
2998 Porting BFD is simpler.
3002 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
3003 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
3004 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
3005 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
3009 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
3011 * New host supported (not target)
3013 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
3016 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
3018 * Multiple source language support
3020 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
3021 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
3022 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
3023 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
3024 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
3025 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
3029 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
3030 currently under development at the State University of New York at
3031 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
3032 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
3034 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
3035 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
3036 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
3038 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
3039 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
3043 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
3044 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
3045 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
3046 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
3049 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
3051 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
3052 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
3053 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
3054 examining core files.
3058 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
3061 * New machines supported (host and target)
3063 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
3064 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
3065 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
3067 * New hosts supported (not targets)
3069 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
3071 * New targets supported (not hosts)
3073 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
3074 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
3075 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
3077 * New remote interfaces
3083 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
3087 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
3089 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
3090 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
3091 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
3092 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
3093 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
3094 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
3095 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
3096 stub on the target system.
3098 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
3100 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
3101 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
3102 object file types such as a.out and coff.
3104 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
3105 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
3108 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
3110 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
3111 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
3113 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
3114 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
3115 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
3117 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
3118 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
3119 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
3120 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
3122 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
3123 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
3124 it is already running. Default is ON.
3126 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
3127 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
3128 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
3129 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
3132 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
3133 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
3134 or the value of the environment variable
3137 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
3138 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
3141 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
3142 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
3143 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
3145 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
3146 history expansion will be performed on
3147 command line input. The default is OFF.
3149 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
3150 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
3151 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
3153 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
3154 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
3155 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3158 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
3159 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
3160 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3163 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
3164 ``set width'' instead.
3166 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
3167 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
3168 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
3169 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
3171 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
3174 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
3177 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
3180 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
3183 * Support for Epoch Environment.
3185 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
3186 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
3187 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
3191 * Support for Shared Libraries
3193 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
3194 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
3195 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
3196 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
3197 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
3198 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
3199 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
3200 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
3202 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
3203 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
3204 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
3206 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
3211 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
3212 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
3213 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
3214 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
3215 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
3216 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
3218 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
3220 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
3222 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3223 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3224 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3227 * C++ multiple inheritance
3229 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
3232 * C++ exception handling
3234 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
3235 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
3236 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
3239 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
3240 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
3241 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
3243 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
3244 current stack frame.
3247 * Minor command changes
3249 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
3250 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
3251 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
3253 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
3254 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
3255 frames without printing.
3257 * New directory command
3259 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
3260 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
3261 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
3262 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
3263 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
3265 * Configuring GDB for compilation
3267 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
3270 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
3271 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
3272 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
3273 where the program that you are debugging will run.
projects / deliverable / binutils-gdb.git / blob