1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB 5.0:
6 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
8 * New native configurations
10 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
11 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
15 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
17 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
18 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
19 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
20 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
21 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
23 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
24 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
25 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
26 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
27 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
28 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
29 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
30 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
32 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
33 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
35 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
36 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
37 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
40 * REMOVED configurations and files
42 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
45 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
51 * All MIPS configurations are multi-arched.
53 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
55 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
57 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
58 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
59 contents of this file.
63 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
65 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
67 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
69 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
70 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
71 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
72 greater level of detail.
74 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
76 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
77 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
78 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
81 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
83 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
84 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
85 machines ``out of the box''.
87 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
88 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
89 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
90 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
91 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
93 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
94 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
95 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
96 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
97 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
99 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
100 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
103 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
106 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
107 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
108 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
109 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
111 * New native configurations
113 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
114 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
118 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
119 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
120 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
121 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
123 * OBSOLETE configurations
125 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
126 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
128 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
131 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
132 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
133 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
134 be permanently REMOVED.
136 * Gould support removed
138 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
140 * New features for SVR4
142 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
143 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
144 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
146 * Many C++ enhancements
148 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
149 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
151 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
153 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
154 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
155 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
156 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
158 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
159 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
161 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
163 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
164 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
165 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
167 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
168 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
170 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
172 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
173 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
174 include ``set remote P-packet''.
176 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
178 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
179 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
180 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
182 * ``apropos'' command added.
184 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
185 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
186 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
190 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
191 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
192 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
193 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
194 enabled by configuring with:
196 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
198 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
200 * New native configurations
202 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
203 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
204 M68K Linux m68*-*-linux*
208 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
209 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
210 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
212 * OBSOLETE configurations
214 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
216 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
217 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
218 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
219 be permanently REMOVED.
223 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
224 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
225 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
226 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
227 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
228 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
229 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
234 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
236 * set extension-language
238 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
239 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
240 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
241 set extension-language .c c++
242 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
243 and their associated languages.
245 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
247 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
248 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
249 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
253 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
254 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
256 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
257 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
259 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
260 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
261 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
262 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
263 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
264 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
265 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
266 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
268 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
269 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
270 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
271 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
275 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
276 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
277 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
278 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
279 for xdb and dbx commands.
283 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
284 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
285 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
287 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
288 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
289 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
291 * Debugging across forks
293 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
298 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
299 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
300 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
302 * GDB remote protocol additions
304 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
305 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
306 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
307 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
309 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
310 full 64-bit address. The command
312 set remoteaddresssize 32
314 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
315 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
318 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
319 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
321 maint packet heythere
323 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
324 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
327 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
328 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
329 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
331 * Tracing can collect general expressions
333 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
334 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
335 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
337 * mask-address variable for Mips
339 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
340 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
341 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
343 * Higher serial baud rates
345 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
346 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
347 to achieve all of these rates.)
351 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
352 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
355 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
357 * New native configurations
359 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
360 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
361 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
362 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
363 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
364 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
365 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
369 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
370 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
371 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
372 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
373 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
374 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
375 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
376 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
377 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
378 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
379 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
381 * New debugging protocols
383 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
384 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
385 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
386 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
387 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
388 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
392 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
393 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
398 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
399 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
401 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
403 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
404 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
405 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
407 * Live range splitting
409 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
410 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
411 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
415 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
416 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
420 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
421 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
422 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
427 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
432 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
433 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
434 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
435 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
436 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
437 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
441 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
442 the symbol at the specified address.
446 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
447 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
448 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
449 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
450 file tracepoint.c for more details.
454 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
455 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
456 of most MIPS variants.
460 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
461 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
462 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
466 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
467 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
468 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
469 the possible architectures.
471 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
473 * New native configurations
475 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
476 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
477 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
478 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
479 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
480 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
484 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
485 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
486 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
487 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
488 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
490 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
494 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
495 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
496 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
497 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
498 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
502 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
504 * Windows 95/NT native
506 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
507 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
508 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
509 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
510 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
512 * dont-repeat command
514 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
515 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
516 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
517 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
519 * Send break instead of ^C
521 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
522 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
523 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
525 * Remote protocol timeout
527 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
528 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
529 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
531 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
533 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
534 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
535 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
536 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
537 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
539 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
540 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
541 automatically on hpux10.
543 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
545 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
547 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
549 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
550 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
551 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
552 every character. The default value is 1050.
554 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
556 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
557 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
558 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
559 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
560 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
561 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
563 * Speedups for remote debugging
565 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
566 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
567 and more efficient S-record downloading.
569 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
571 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
572 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
574 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
578 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
579 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
581 * Remote targets use caching
583 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
584 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
585 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
586 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
587 off' turns the the data cache off.
589 * Remote targets may have threads
591 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
592 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
593 gdb/remote.c for details.
597 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
598 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
599 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
600 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
601 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
602 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
603 sequence is something like
605 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
607 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
611 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
612 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
613 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
614 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
615 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
616 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
617 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
618 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
622 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
623 but does simplify configuration and building.
627 GDB now supports hpux10.
629 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
631 * New native configurations
633 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
634 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
635 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
636 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
640 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
641 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
642 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
643 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
646 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
648 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
649 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
650 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
651 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
652 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
654 * Arguments to user-defined commands
656 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
657 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
660 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
662 To execute the command use:
665 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
666 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
667 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
669 * New `if' and `while' commands
671 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
672 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
673 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
674 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
675 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
676 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
677 if the expression is zero.
679 * Fortran source language mode
681 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
682 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
683 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
684 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
687 * Better HPUX support
689 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
690 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
691 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
692 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
693 that behavior do the following before running the program:
699 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
700 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
706 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
707 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
710 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
711 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
713 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
715 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
716 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
717 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
718 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
719 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
720 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
722 * New DOS host serial code
724 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
725 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
728 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
730 * New "complete" command
732 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
733 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
735 * Trailing space optional in prompt
737 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
738 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
740 * Breakpoint hit counts
742 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
743 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
744 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
745 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
746 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
749 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
751 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
752 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
753 arrays actually contain only short strings.
755 * Shared library breakpoints
757 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
758 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
760 * Hardware watchpoints
762 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
763 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
765 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under Linux.
769 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
770 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
772 * Improved Irix 5 support
774 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
776 * Improved HPPA support
778 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
780 * New native configurations
782 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
783 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
784 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
785 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
789 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
790 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
793 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
795 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
796 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
800 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
801 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
803 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
805 * Irix 5 is now supported
809 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
810 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
811 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
812 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
813 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
816 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
818 * User visible changes:
822 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
823 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
824 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
825 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
826 debugging info for the mips target).
828 * DEC Alpha native support
830 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
831 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
832 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
833 Alpha-specific notes.
835 * Preliminary thread implementation
837 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
839 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
841 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
842 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
845 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
847 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
848 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
849 call methods, ...etc.
851 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
853 * User visible changes:
855 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
856 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
857 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
858 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
860 Filename completion now works.
862 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
863 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
864 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
866 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
867 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
868 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
869 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
870 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
874 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
875 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
878 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
882 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
883 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
884 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
888 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
889 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
890 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
891 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
892 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
896 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
897 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
898 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
900 * New targets supported
902 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
903 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
904 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
905 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
906 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
908 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
909 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
910 GO32 memory extender.
912 * New remote protocols
914 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
916 * New source languages supported
918 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
919 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
920 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
923 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
925 * HP Precision Architecture supported
927 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
928 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
929 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
930 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
931 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
932 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
934 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
936 * Faster and better demangling
938 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
939 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
940 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
941 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
942 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
943 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
946 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
947 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
948 compiler does not actually implement.
950 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
952 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
953 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
954 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
955 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
956 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
957 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
960 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
961 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
963 * Improved configure script
965 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
966 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
967 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
968 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
970 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
971 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
972 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
973 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
974 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
975 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
977 * Documentation improvements
979 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
980 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
981 before submitting changes.
983 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
984 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
985 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
986 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
987 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
989 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
990 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
991 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
992 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
993 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
998 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
999 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
1000 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
1003 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
1004 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
1006 * New native hosts supported
1008 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
1009 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
1011 * New targets supported
1013 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
1015 * New file formats supported
1017 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
1018 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
1022 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
1024 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
1025 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
1027 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
1028 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
1029 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
1031 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
1032 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
1034 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
1035 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
1036 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
1039 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
1040 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
1041 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
1042 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
1043 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
1045 * Internal improvements
1047 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
1048 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
1050 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
1051 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
1052 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
1053 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
1054 shared code that handles any of them.
1056 * New command line options
1058 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
1062 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
1063 General Public License.
1065 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
1067 * Host/native/target split
1069 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
1070 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
1071 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
1072 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
1073 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
1075 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
1076 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
1077 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
1078 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
1079 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
1080 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
1081 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
1083 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
1084 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
1085 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
1087 * New hosts supported
1089 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
1090 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
1091 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
1093 * New targets supported
1095 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
1096 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
1098 * New native hosts supported
1100 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
1101 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
1102 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
1104 * New file formats supported
1106 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
1107 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
1108 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
1112 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
1113 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
1114 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
1116 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
1118 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
1119 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
1120 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
1121 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
1125 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
1126 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
1127 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
1129 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
1133 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
1134 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
1137 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
1138 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
1140 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
1141 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
1142 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
1143 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
1144 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
1145 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
1147 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
1148 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
1149 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
1150 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
1154 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
1155 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
1156 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
1157 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
1158 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
1160 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
1161 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
1162 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
1163 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
1167 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
1168 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
1169 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
1170 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
1171 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
1172 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
1173 each instruction being stepped through.
1175 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
1176 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
1178 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
1179 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
1180 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
1181 processor with a serial port.
1185 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
1186 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
1187 supported, and what files each one uses.
1191 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
1192 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
1193 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
1194 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
1196 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
1197 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
1198 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
1199 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
1203 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
1204 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
1205 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
1206 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
1207 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
1208 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
1210 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
1213 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
1215 * Better support for C++ function names
1217 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
1218 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
1219 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
1220 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
1221 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
1223 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
1224 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
1225 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
1226 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
1227 for the list of formats.
1229 * G++ symbol mangling problem
1231 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
1232 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
1233 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
1234 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
1235 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
1236 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
1239 * New 'maintenance' command
1241 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
1242 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
1243 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
1245 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
1246 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
1247 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
1248 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
1249 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
1250 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
1252 The following commands are new:
1254 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
1255 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
1256 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
1258 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
1260 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
1261 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
1262 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
1263 read after argv processing.
1265 * New hosts supported
1267 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
1269 Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
1271 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
1272 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
1273 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
1274 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
1275 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
1278 * New targets supported
1280 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
1282 * More smarts about finding #include files
1284 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
1285 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
1286 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
1287 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
1288 the one that contains your sources.
1290 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
1291 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
1292 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
1294 * Interesting infernals change
1296 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
1297 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
1298 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
1299 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
1301 * Bug fixes (of course!)
1303 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
1304 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
1305 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
1307 See the ChangeLog for details.
1309 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
1311 * New machines supported (host and target)
1313 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
1315 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
1317 * New malloc package
1319 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
1320 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
1321 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
1322 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
1323 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
1324 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
1328 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
1329 'help info proc' for details.
1331 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
1333 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
1334 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
1337 * File name changes for MS-DOS
1339 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
1340 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
1341 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
1342 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
1343 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
1344 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
1346 * Cross byte order fixes
1348 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
1349 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
1351 * New -mapped and -readnow options
1353 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
1354 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
1355 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
1356 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
1357 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
1358 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
1359 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
1360 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
1361 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
1362 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
1364 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
1365 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
1366 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
1367 slower, but makes future operations faster.
1369 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
1370 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
1371 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
1374 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
1376 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
1377 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
1378 shared across multiple host platforms.
1380 * longjmp() handling
1382 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
1383 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
1384 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
1385 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
1389 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
1390 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
1395 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
1396 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
1397 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
1399 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
1401 * New machines supported (host and target)
1403 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
1405 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
1406 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
1408 * New machines supported (target)
1410 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1414 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
1415 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
1416 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
1418 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
1419 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
1420 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
1421 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
1422 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
1425 * New features for SVR4
1427 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
1428 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
1429 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
1431 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
1432 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
1433 it prints the address mappings of the process.
1435 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
1436 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
1438 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
1440 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
1441 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
1442 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
1443 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
1444 same code linked statically.
1448 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
1449 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
1450 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
1451 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
1452 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
1453 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
1457 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
1458 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
1459 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
1462 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
1464 * New machines supported (host and target)
1466 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
1467 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
1468 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1470 * Almost SCO Unix support
1472 We had hoped to support:
1473 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
1474 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
1475 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
1476 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
1478 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
1480 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
1481 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
1482 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
1483 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
1488 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
1489 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
1490 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
1494 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
1495 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
1496 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
1498 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
1500 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
1501 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
1502 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
1504 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
1505 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
1506 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
1507 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
1510 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
1511 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
1512 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
1513 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
1516 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
1517 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
1520 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
1521 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
1522 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
1525 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
1527 * Improved configuration
1529 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
1530 Porting BFD is simpler.
1534 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
1535 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
1536 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
1537 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
1541 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
1543 * New host supported (not target)
1545 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
1548 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
1550 * Multiple source language support
1552 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
1553 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
1554 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
1555 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
1556 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
1557 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
1561 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
1562 currently under development at the State University of New York at
1563 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
1564 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
1566 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
1567 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
1568 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
1570 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
1571 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
1575 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
1576 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
1577 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
1578 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
1581 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
1583 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
1584 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
1585 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
1586 examining core files.
1590 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
1593 * New machines supported (host and target)
1595 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
1596 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
1597 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
1599 * New hosts supported (not targets)
1601 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
1603 * New targets supported (not hosts)
1605 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1606 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1607 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
1609 * New remote interfaces
1615 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
1619 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
1621 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
1622 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
1623 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
1624 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
1625 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
1626 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
1627 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
1628 stub on the target system.
1630 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
1632 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
1633 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
1634 object file types such as a.out and coff.
1636 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
1637 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
1640 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
1642 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
1643 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
1645 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
1646 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
1647 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
1649 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
1650 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
1651 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
1652 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
1654 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
1655 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
1656 it is already running. Default is ON.
1658 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
1659 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
1660 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
1661 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
1664 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
1665 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
1666 or the value of the environment variable
1669 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
1670 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
1673 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
1674 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
1675 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
1677 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
1678 history expansion will be performed on
1679 command line input. The default is OFF.
1681 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
1682 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
1683 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
1685 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
1686 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
1687 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
1690 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
1691 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
1692 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
1695 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
1696 ``set width'' instead.
1698 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
1699 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
1700 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
1701 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
1703 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
1706 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
1709 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
1712 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
1715 * Support for Epoch Environment.
1717 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
1718 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
1719 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
1723 * Support for Shared Libraries
1725 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
1726 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
1727 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
1728 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
1729 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
1730 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
1731 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
1732 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
1734 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
1735 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
1736 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
1738 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
1743 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
1744 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
1745 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
1746 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
1747 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
1748 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
1750 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
1752 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
1754 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
1755 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
1756 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
1759 * C++ multiple inheritance
1761 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
1764 * C++ exception handling
1766 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
1767 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
1768 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
1771 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
1772 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
1773 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
1775 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
1776 current stack frame.
1779 * Minor command changes
1781 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
1782 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
1783 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
1785 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
1786 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
1787 frames without printing.
1789 * New directory command
1791 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
1792 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
1793 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
1794 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
1795 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
1797 * Configuring GDB for compilation
1799 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
1802 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
1803 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
1804 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
1805 where the program that you are debugging will run.