1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB-4.18:
11 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
13 * New native configurations
15 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
16 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
17 M68K Linux m68*-*-linux*
21 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
22 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
23 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
25 * OBSOLETE configurations
27 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
29 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
30 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
31 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
32 be permanently REMOVED.
36 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
37 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
38 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
39 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
40 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
41 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
42 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
47 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
49 * set extension-language
51 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
52 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
53 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
54 set extension-language .c c++
55 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
56 and their associated languages.
58 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
60 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
61 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
62 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
66 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
67 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
69 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
70 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
72 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
73 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
74 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
75 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
76 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
77 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
78 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
79 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
81 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
82 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
83 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
84 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
88 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
89 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
90 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
91 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
92 for xdb and dbx commands.
96 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
97 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
98 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
100 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
101 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
102 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
104 * Debugging across forks
106 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
111 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
112 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
113 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
115 * GDB remote protocol additions
117 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
118 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
119 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
120 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
122 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
123 full 64-bit address. The command
125 set remoteaddresssize 32
127 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
128 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
131 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
132 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
134 maint packet heythere
136 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
137 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
140 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
141 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
142 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
144 * Tracing can collect general expressions
146 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
147 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
148 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
150 * mask-address variable for Mips
152 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
153 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
154 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
156 * Higher serial baud rates
158 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
159 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
160 to achieve all of these rates.)
164 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
165 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
168 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
170 * New native configurations
172 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
173 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
174 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
175 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
176 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
177 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
178 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
182 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
183 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
184 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
185 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
186 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
187 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
188 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
189 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
190 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
191 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
192 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
194 * New debugging protocols
196 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
197 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
198 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
199 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
200 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
201 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
205 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
206 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
211 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
212 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
214 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
216 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
217 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
218 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
220 * Live range splitting
222 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
223 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
224 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
228 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
229 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
233 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
234 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
235 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
240 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
245 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
246 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
247 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
248 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
249 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
250 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
254 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
255 the symbol at the specified address.
259 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
260 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
261 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
262 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
263 file tracepoint.c for more details.
267 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
268 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
269 of most MIPS variants.
273 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
274 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
275 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
279 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
280 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
281 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
282 the possible architectures.
284 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
286 * New native configurations
288 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
289 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
290 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
291 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
292 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
293 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
297 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
298 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
299 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
300 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
301 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
303 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
307 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
308 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
309 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
310 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
311 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
315 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
317 * Windows 95/NT native
319 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
320 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
321 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
322 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
323 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
325 * dont-repeat command
327 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
328 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
329 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
330 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
332 * Send break instead of ^C
334 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
335 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
336 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
338 * Remote protocol timeout
340 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
341 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
342 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
344 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
346 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
347 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
348 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
349 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
350 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
352 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
353 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
354 automatically on hpux10.
356 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
358 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
360 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
362 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
363 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
364 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
365 every character. The default value is 1050.
367 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
369 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
370 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
371 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
372 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
373 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
374 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
376 * Speedups for remote debugging
378 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
379 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
380 and more efficient S-record downloading.
382 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
384 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
385 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
387 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
391 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
392 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
394 * Remote targets use caching
396 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
397 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
398 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
399 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
400 off' turns the the data cache off.
402 * Remote targets may have threads
404 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
405 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
406 gdb/remote.c for details.
410 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
411 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
412 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
413 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
414 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
415 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
416 sequence is something like
418 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
420 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
424 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
425 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
426 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
427 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
428 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
429 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
430 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
431 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
435 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
436 but does simplify configuration and building.
440 GDB now supports hpux10.
442 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
444 * New native configurations
446 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
447 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
448 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
449 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
453 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
454 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
455 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
456 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
459 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
461 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
462 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
463 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
464 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
465 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
467 * Arguments to user-defined commands
469 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
470 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
473 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
475 To execute the command use:
478 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
479 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
480 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
482 * New `if' and `while' commands
484 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
485 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
486 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
487 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
488 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
489 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
490 if the expression is zero.
492 * Fortran source language mode
494 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
495 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
496 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
497 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
500 * Better HPUX support
502 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
503 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
504 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
505 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
506 that behavior do the following before running the program:
512 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
513 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
519 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
520 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
523 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
524 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
526 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
528 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
529 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
530 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
531 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
532 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
533 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
535 * New DOS host serial code
537 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
538 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
541 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
543 * New "complete" command
545 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
546 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
548 * Trailing space optional in prompt
550 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
551 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
553 * Breakpoint hit counts
555 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
556 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
557 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
558 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
559 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
562 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
564 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
565 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
566 arrays actually contain only short strings.
568 * Shared library breakpoints
570 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
571 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
573 * Hardware watchpoints
575 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
576 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
578 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under Linux.
582 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
583 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
585 * Improved Irix 5 support
587 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
589 * Improved HPPA support
591 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
593 * New native configurations
595 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
596 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
597 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
598 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
602 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
603 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
606 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
608 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
609 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
613 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
614 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
616 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
618 * Irix 5 is now supported
622 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
623 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
624 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
625 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
626 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
629 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
631 * User visible changes:
635 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
636 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
637 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
638 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
639 debugging info for the mips target).
641 * DEC Alpha native support
643 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
644 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
645 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
646 Alpha-specific notes.
648 * Preliminary thread implementation
650 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
652 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
654 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
655 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
658 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
660 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
661 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
662 call methods, ...etc.
664 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
666 * User visible changes:
668 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
669 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
670 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
671 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
673 Filename completion now works.
675 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
676 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
677 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
679 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
680 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
681 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
682 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
683 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
687 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
688 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
691 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
695 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
696 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
697 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
701 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
702 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
703 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
704 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
705 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
709 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
710 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
711 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
713 * New targets supported
715 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
716 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
717 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
718 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
719 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
721 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
722 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
723 GO32 memory extender.
725 * New remote protocols
727 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
729 * New source languages supported
731 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
732 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
733 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
736 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
738 * HP Precision Architecture supported
740 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
741 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
742 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
743 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
744 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
745 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
747 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
749 * Faster and better demangling
751 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
752 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
753 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
754 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
755 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
756 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
759 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
760 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
761 compiler does not actually implement.
763 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
765 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
766 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
767 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
768 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
769 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
770 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
773 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
774 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
776 * Improved configure script
778 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
779 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
780 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
781 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
783 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
784 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
785 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
786 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
787 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
788 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
790 * Documentation improvements
792 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
793 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
794 before submitting changes.
796 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
797 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
798 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
799 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
800 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
802 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
803 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
804 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
805 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
806 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
811 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
812 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
813 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
816 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
817 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
819 * New native hosts supported
821 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
822 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
824 * New targets supported
826 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
828 * New file formats supported
830 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
831 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
835 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
837 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
838 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
840 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
841 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
842 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
844 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
845 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
847 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
848 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
849 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
852 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
853 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
854 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
855 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
856 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
858 * Internal improvements
860 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
861 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
863 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
864 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
865 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
866 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
867 shared code that handles any of them.
869 * New command line options
871 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
875 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
876 General Public License.
878 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
880 * Host/native/target split
882 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
883 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
884 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
885 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
886 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
888 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
889 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
890 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
891 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
892 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
893 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
894 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
896 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
897 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
898 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
900 * New hosts supported
902 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
903 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
904 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
906 * New targets supported
908 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
909 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
911 * New native hosts supported
913 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
914 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
915 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
917 * New file formats supported
919 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
920 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
921 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
925 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
926 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
927 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
929 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
931 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
932 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
933 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
934 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
938 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
939 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
940 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
942 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
946 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
947 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
950 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
951 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
953 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
954 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
955 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
956 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
957 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
958 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
960 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
961 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
962 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
963 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
967 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
968 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
969 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
970 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
971 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
973 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
974 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
975 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
976 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
980 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
981 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
982 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
983 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
984 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
985 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
986 each instruction being stepped through.
988 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
989 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
991 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
992 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
993 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
994 processor with a serial port.
998 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
999 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
1000 supported, and what files each one uses.
1004 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
1005 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
1006 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
1007 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
1009 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
1010 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
1011 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
1012 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
1016 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
1017 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
1018 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
1019 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
1020 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
1021 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
1023 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
1026 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
1028 * Better support for C++ function names
1030 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
1031 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
1032 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
1033 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
1034 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
1036 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
1037 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
1038 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
1039 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
1040 for the list of formats.
1042 * G++ symbol mangling problem
1044 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
1045 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
1046 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
1047 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
1048 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
1049 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
1052 * New 'maintenance' command
1054 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
1055 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
1056 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
1058 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
1059 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
1060 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
1061 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
1062 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
1063 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
1065 The following commands are new:
1067 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
1068 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
1069 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
1071 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
1073 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
1074 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
1075 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
1076 read after argv processing.
1078 * New hosts supported
1080 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
1082 Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
1084 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
1085 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
1086 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
1087 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
1088 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
1091 * New targets supported
1093 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
1095 * More smarts about finding #include files
1097 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
1098 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
1099 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
1100 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
1101 the one that contains your sources.
1103 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
1104 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
1105 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
1107 * Interesting infernals change
1109 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
1110 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
1111 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
1112 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
1114 * Bug fixes (of course!)
1116 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
1117 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
1118 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
1120 See the ChangeLog for details.
1122 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
1124 * New machines supported (host and target)
1126 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
1128 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
1130 * New malloc package
1132 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
1133 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
1134 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
1135 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
1136 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
1137 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
1141 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
1142 'help info proc' for details.
1144 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
1146 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
1147 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
1150 * File name changes for MS-DOS
1152 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
1153 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
1154 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
1155 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
1156 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
1157 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
1159 * Cross byte order fixes
1161 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
1162 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
1164 * New -mapped and -readnow options
1166 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
1167 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
1168 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
1169 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
1170 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
1171 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
1172 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
1173 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
1174 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
1175 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
1177 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
1178 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
1179 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
1180 slower, but makes future operations faster.
1182 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
1183 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
1184 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
1187 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
1189 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
1190 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
1191 shared across multiple host platforms.
1193 * longjmp() handling
1195 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
1196 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
1197 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
1198 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
1202 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
1203 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
1208 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
1209 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
1210 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
1212 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
1214 * New machines supported (host and target)
1216 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
1218 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
1219 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
1221 * New machines supported (target)
1223 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1227 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
1228 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
1229 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
1231 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
1232 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
1233 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
1234 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
1235 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
1238 * New features for SVR4
1240 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
1241 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
1242 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
1244 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
1245 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
1246 it prints the address mappings of the process.
1248 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
1249 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
1251 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
1253 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
1254 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
1255 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
1256 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
1257 same code linked statically.
1261 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
1262 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
1263 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
1264 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
1265 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
1266 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
1270 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
1271 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
1272 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
1275 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
1277 * New machines supported (host and target)
1279 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
1280 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
1281 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1283 * Almost SCO Unix support
1285 We had hoped to support:
1286 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
1287 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
1288 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
1289 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
1291 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
1293 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
1294 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
1295 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
1296 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
1301 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
1302 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
1303 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
1307 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
1308 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
1309 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
1311 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
1313 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
1314 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
1315 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
1317 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
1318 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
1319 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
1320 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
1323 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
1324 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
1325 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
1326 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
1329 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
1330 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
1333 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
1334 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
1335 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
1338 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
1340 * Improved configuration
1342 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
1343 Porting BFD is simpler.
1347 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
1348 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
1349 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
1350 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
1354 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
1356 * New host supported (not target)
1358 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
1361 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
1363 * Multiple source language support
1365 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
1366 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
1367 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
1368 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
1369 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
1370 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
1374 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
1375 currently under development at the State University of New York at
1376 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
1377 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
1379 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
1380 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
1381 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
1383 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
1384 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
1388 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
1389 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
1390 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
1391 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
1394 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
1396 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
1397 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
1398 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
1399 examining core files.
1403 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
1406 * New machines supported (host and target)
1408 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
1409 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
1410 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
1412 * New hosts supported (not targets)
1414 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
1416 * New targets supported (not hosts)
1418 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1419 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1420 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
1422 * New remote interfaces
1428 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
1432 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
1434 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
1435 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
1436 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
1437 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
1438 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
1439 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
1440 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
1441 stub on the target system.
1443 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
1445 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
1446 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
1447 object file types such as a.out and coff.
1449 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
1450 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
1453 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
1455 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
1456 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
1458 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
1459 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
1460 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
1462 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
1463 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
1464 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
1465 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
1467 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
1468 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
1469 it is already running. Default is ON.
1471 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
1472 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
1473 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
1474 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
1477 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
1478 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
1479 or the value of the environment variable
1482 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
1483 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
1486 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
1487 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
1488 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
1490 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
1491 history expansion will be performed on
1492 command line input. The default is OFF.
1494 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
1495 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
1496 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
1498 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
1499 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
1500 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
1503 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
1504 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
1505 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
1508 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
1509 ``set width'' instead.
1511 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
1512 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
1513 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
1514 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
1516 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
1519 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
1522 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
1525 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
1528 * Support for Epoch Environment.
1530 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
1531 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
1532 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
1536 * Support for Shared Libraries
1538 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
1539 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
1540 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
1541 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
1542 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
1543 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
1544 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
1545 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
1547 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
1548 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
1549 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
1551 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
1556 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
1557 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
1558 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
1559 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
1560 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
1561 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
1563 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
1565 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
1567 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
1568 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
1569 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
1572 * C++ multiple inheritance
1574 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
1577 * C++ exception handling
1579 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
1580 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
1581 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
1584 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
1585 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
1586 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
1588 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
1589 current stack frame.
1592 * Minor command changes
1594 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
1595 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
1596 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
1598 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
1599 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
1600 frames without printing.
1602 * New directory command
1604 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
1605 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
1606 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
1607 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
1608 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
1610 * Configuring GDB for compilation
1612 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
1615 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
1616 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
1617 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
1618 where the program that you are debugging will run.
projects / deliverable / binutils-gdb.git / blob