1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB 6.8
6 * GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
7 DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
9 * The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
10 and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
11 `set/show sh calling-convention'.
13 * GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
14 with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
16 * 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
18 * Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
19 which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
21 * The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
22 list of section offsets.
24 * On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
25 conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
28 * New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
30 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
31 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
37 Display timestamps with GDB debugging output.
42 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
44 set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
46 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
47 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
48 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
50 set breakpoint always-inserted
51 show breakpoint always-inserted
52 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
53 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
54 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
56 set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
57 show arm fallback-mode
58 set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
60 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
61 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
62 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
63 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
65 *** Changes in GDB 6.8
67 * New native configurations
69 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
70 Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
74 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
75 Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
77 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
79 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
80 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
81 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
82 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
84 * GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
85 (mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
87 * Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
90 * GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
91 including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
92 and in inlined functions.
94 * GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
95 accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
96 more than one contiguous range of addresses.
98 * Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
100 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
101 registers on PowerPC targets.
103 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
104 targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
106 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
107 commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
109 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
110 extended-remote mode.
112 * hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
113 The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
114 error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
115 The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
117 * GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
118 building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
119 target architectures.
121 * GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
122 Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
123 now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
124 stored in two consecutive float registers.
126 * The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
129 * Improved support for debugging Ada
130 Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
132 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
133 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
134 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
135 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
137 - Improved command completion in Ada
142 set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
143 show print frame-arguments
144 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
145 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
150 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
157 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
166 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
168 * GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
172 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
176 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
178 *** Changes in GDB 6.7
180 * Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
181 bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
182 Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
184 * When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
185 symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
186 -Bsymbolic linker option.
188 * When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
189 recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
192 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
193 frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
195 * GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
196 32-bit or 64-bit register values.
198 * Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
200 * GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
201 target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
202 a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
204 * Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
205 automatically displayed as character or string data.
207 * The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
208 arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
211 * Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
212 for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
213 only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
215 * GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
218 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
219 ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
220 has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
222 * GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
224 * GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
226 * The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
227 layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
228 segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
230 * The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
231 immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
233 * The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
234 "library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
235 packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
236 where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
237 Windows and SymbianOS).
239 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
240 (DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
242 * GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
243 according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
249 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
250 when debugging using remote targets.
252 set mem inaccessible-by-default
253 show mem inaccessible-by-default
254 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
255 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
256 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
257 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
258 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
260 set breakpoint auto-hw
261 show breakpoint auto-hw
262 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
263 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
264 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
265 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
266 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
267 including "next" and "finish".
270 catch exception unhandled
271 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
274 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
278 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
279 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
280 an alias to "set sysroot".
283 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
284 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
287 * New native configurations
289 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
294 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
295 not query the target for its built-in description.
299 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
300 MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
301 Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
306 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
307 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
310 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
315 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
316 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
318 qXfer:libraries:read:
319 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
320 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
321 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
322 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
326 Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
335 i[34567]86-*-netware*
336 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
337 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
339 i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
342 i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
343 i[34567]86-*-unixware*
352 * Other removed features
359 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
366 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
371 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
372 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
377 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
378 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
380 Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
382 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
383 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
384 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
385 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
389 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
390 in debugging information.
394 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
395 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
397 set mips stack-arg-size
398 set mips saved-gpreg-size
400 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
402 *** Changes in GDB 6.6
407 Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
409 * GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
410 (mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
411 running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
413 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
414 Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
417 * The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
418 broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
420 * The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
421 stub provides the required support.
423 * Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
424 longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
429 unset substitute-path
431 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
432 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
433 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
434 between compilation and debugging.
438 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
439 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
440 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
444 The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
446 Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
447 an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
449 The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
454 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
455 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
456 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
457 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
461 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
462 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
464 qXfer:memory-map:read:
465 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
466 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
471 Erase and program a flash memory device.
473 * Removed remote packets
476 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
477 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
479 *** Changes in GDB 6.5
483 Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
485 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
489 init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
490 only if it doesn't already have a value.
492 The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
494 checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
496 restart <n> Return the program state to a
497 previously saved state.
499 info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
501 delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
503 set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
504 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
506 info forks List forks of the user program that
507 are available to be debugged.
509 fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
510 forks of the user program that are
511 available to be debugged.
513 delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
514 that are available to be debugged (and
515 kill the forked process).
517 detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
518 that are available to be debugged (and
519 allow the process to continue).
523 Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
525 * Improved Windows host support
527 GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
528 native console support, and remote communications using either
529 network sockets or serial ports.
531 * Improved Modula-2 language support
533 GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
534 basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
535 pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
536 printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
537 written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
538 GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
542 The ARM rdi-share module.
544 The Netware NLM debug server.
546 *** Changes in GDB 6.4
548 * New native configurations
550 OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
551 OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
555 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
557 * New command line options
559 --batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
560 --return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
561 the child (debugged) program exited with.
562 --eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
563 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
564 specified multiple times and in conjunction
565 with the --command (-x) option.
567 * Deprecated commands removed
569 The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
573 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
574 othernames set arm disassembler
575 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
576 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
577 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
580 * New BSD user-level threads support
582 It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
583 library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
586 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
587 FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
588 OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
590 Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
591 are not yet supported.
593 * New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
594 (Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
596 * REMOVED configurations and files
598 VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
599 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
600 National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
602 * New "set print array-indexes" command
604 After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
605 when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
608 * VAX floating point support
610 GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
612 * User-defined command support
614 In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
615 to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
616 section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
618 *** Changes in GDB 6.3:
620 * New command line option
622 GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
625 * GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
627 GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
628 information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
629 by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
630 proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
631 to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
633 * Internationalization
635 When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
636 internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
637 continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
641 Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
642 implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
643 into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
645 * New native configurations
647 GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
651 GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
652 packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
654 * END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
656 GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
657 The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
658 features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
661 GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
662 compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
663 continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
675 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
676 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
678 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
680 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
681 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
682 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
692 *** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
694 * MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
696 When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
697 heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
700 * MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
702 When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
703 fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
704 IRIX long double values).
708 A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
709 command. This problem has been fixed.
711 *** Changes in GDB 6.2:
713 * Fix for ``many threads''
715 On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
716 rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
719 ptrace: No such process.
720 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
722 This problem has been fixed.
724 * "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
726 Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
729 * New ``start'' command.
731 This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
733 * New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
735 Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
736 live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
737 platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
739 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
740 FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
741 NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
742 NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
743 NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
744 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
745 OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
746 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
747 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
749 * Signal trampoline code overhauled
751 Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
752 These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
753 of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
754 call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
755 signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
757 Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
758 features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
759 include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
761 * Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
763 * New native configurations
765 GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
766 OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
767 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
768 OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
769 OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
770 NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
771 OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
773 * END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
775 GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
776 The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
777 including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
778 migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
779 compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
780 work, was also included.
782 GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
783 module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
793 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
794 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
796 * REMOVED configurations and files
798 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
799 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
800 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
801 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
802 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
803 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
804 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
805 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
806 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
808 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
810 *** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
812 * TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
814 The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
815 GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
816 command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
817 program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
820 * Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
822 Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
823 libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
824 cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
825 GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
826 shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
827 the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
830 Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
832 * Fixed ISO-C build problems
834 The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
835 non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
836 compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
838 * Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
840 Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
841 wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
843 * Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
845 The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
846 permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
847 systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
849 * Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
851 Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
852 has been updated to use constant array sizes.
854 * Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
856 GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
857 its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
858 panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
860 * Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
862 When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
863 by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
864 not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
866 *** Changes in GDB 6.1:
868 * Removed --with-mmalloc
870 Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
871 conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
873 * Changes in AMD64 configurations
875 The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
876 the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
877 and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
878 you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
880 * Revised SPARC target
882 The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
883 FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
884 support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
885 from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
886 (Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
890 GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
891 names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
892 with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
895 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
897 GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
898 arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
901 * C++ nested types and namespaces
903 GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
904 improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
905 is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
906 Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
907 namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
908 "Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
909 frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
910 if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
911 GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
913 * New native configurations
915 NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
916 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
917 OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
918 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
919 OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
921 * New debugging protocols
923 M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
925 * "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
927 The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
928 and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
929 tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
931 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
933 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
934 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
935 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
938 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
939 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
940 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
941 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
942 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
943 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
944 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
945 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
946 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
948 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
950 * REMOVED configurations and files
952 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
953 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
954 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
955 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
956 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
957 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
958 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
959 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
960 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
961 386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
962 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
963 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
964 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
965 SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
966 SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
967 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
968 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
970 *** Changes in GDB 6.0:
974 Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
977 * New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
979 DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
980 information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
981 By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
984 The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
985 have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
990 GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
991 file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
992 remote protocol documentation for details.
994 * All targets using the new architecture framework.
996 All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
997 architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
998 to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
1001 * GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
1003 GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
1004 per-thread variables.
1006 * GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
1008 GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
1009 GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
1011 * Separate debug info.
1013 GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
1014 automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
1015 of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
1016 system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
1017 and optional debug files.
1019 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
1021 DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
1022 describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
1025 GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
1026 for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
1030 A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
1031 Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
1032 considered "useable".
1034 * GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
1036 The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
1037 commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
1040 * GDB supports logging output to a file
1042 There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
1043 used to capture GDB's output to a file.
1045 * The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
1047 The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
1048 disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
1051 * d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
1053 The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
1054 registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
1058 A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
1059 be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
1060 session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
1061 "--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
1062 data, for more informative profiling results.
1064 * Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
1066 The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
1067 option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
1068 "mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
1070 Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
1073 Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
1074 Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
1075 Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
1076 in a subsequent -var-update.
1078 * New native configurations.
1080 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1082 * Multi-arched targets.
1084 HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
1085 Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
1087 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1089 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1090 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1091 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1092 permanently REMOVED.
1094 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1095 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1096 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1097 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
1098 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1099 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
1100 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
1101 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
1102 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
1103 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
1104 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1105 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
1107 * REMOVED configurations and files
1110 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1111 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
1112 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1113 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1114 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
1115 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1117 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
1118 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1119 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1120 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1121 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1122 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1124 * MIPS $fp behavior changed
1126 The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
1127 the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
1128 context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
1129 address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
1130 The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
1132 *** Changes in GDB 5.3:
1134 * GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
1136 When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
1137 `/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
1138 in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
1139 library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
1140 shared libs like mad''.
1142 * ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
1144 Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
1145 the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
1146 arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
1147 powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
1149 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
1151 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
1152 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
1155 The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
1156 invocations in expression, and shows the result.
1158 The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
1159 macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
1161 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
1162 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
1163 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
1164 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
1166 * Multi-arched targets.
1168 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
1169 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
1171 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
1172 Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
1173 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
1177 Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
1180 * New native configurations
1182 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
1183 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
1184 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
1185 UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
1187 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1189 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1190 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1191 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1192 permanently REMOVED.
1194 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1195 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1196 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
1197 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1198 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1199 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1200 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1201 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1202 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
1203 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1205 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
1206 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1208 * OBSOLETE languages
1210 CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
1212 * REMOVED configurations and files
1214 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1215 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1216 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1217 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1218 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1220 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
1222 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
1224 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
1225 commands. The default is 1024.
1227 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
1229 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
1231 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
1233 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
1234 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
1235 from a file into memory (restore).
1237 * Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
1239 The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
1240 including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
1241 of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
1243 *** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
1251 gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
1252 mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
1253 Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
1255 gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
1256 dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
1257 Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
1259 Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
1260 Surprisingly enough, it works now.
1261 By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
1263 i386 hardware watchpoint support:
1264 avoid misses on second run for some targets.
1265 By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
1267 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
1269 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
1271 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
1272 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
1273 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
1274 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
1275 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
1276 (notably embedded) targets.
1278 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
1280 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
1281 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
1282 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
1283 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
1285 * New command line option
1287 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
1289 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
1291 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
1292 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
1293 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
1294 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
1295 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
1296 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
1297 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
1298 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
1299 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
1300 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
1302 * Changes in ARM configurations.
1304 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
1305 configuration is fully multi-arch.
1307 * New native configurations
1309 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
1310 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
1311 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
1312 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
1316 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
1318 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1320 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1321 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1322 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1323 permanently REMOVED.
1325 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1326 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1327 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1328 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1329 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1331 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
1333 * REMOVED configurations and files
1335 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1337 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1338 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1339 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
1340 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1341 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1342 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
1343 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
1344 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1345 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1346 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
1347 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
1349 * Changes to command line processing
1351 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
1352 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
1354 * Changes to key bindings
1356 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
1358 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
1360 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
1362 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
1365 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
1367 Numerous documentation fixes.
1369 Numerous testsuite fixes.
1371 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
1373 * New native configurations
1375 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
1376 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
1377 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
1378 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1379 ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
1380 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
1384 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
1386 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
1388 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1390 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
1391 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1392 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1393 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
1394 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1396 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1397 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1398 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1399 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
1400 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
1401 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1402 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
1403 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
1405 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
1406 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
1408 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1409 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1410 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1411 permanently REMOVED.
1413 * REMOVED configurations and files
1415 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1416 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
1418 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
1422 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
1424 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
1425 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
1430 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
1432 * The MI enabled by default.
1434 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
1435 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
1436 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
1437 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
1438 which is now deprecated.
1440 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
1442 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
1443 main features are supported:
1445 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
1447 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
1450 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
1452 - a Pascal expression parser.
1454 However, some important features are not yet supported.
1456 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
1458 - there are some problems with boolean types;
1460 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
1461 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
1463 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
1465 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
1467 * Changes in completion.
1469 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
1470 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
1471 users expect at the shell prompt.
1473 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
1474 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
1475 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
1476 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
1477 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
1478 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
1479 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
1481 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
1483 * New platform-independent commands:
1485 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
1486 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
1487 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
1489 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
1491 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
1492 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
1493 many threads as your system allows you to have.
1495 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
1497 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
1498 multi-threaded programs though.
1500 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
1502 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
1504 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
1505 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
1508 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
1510 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
1511 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
1512 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
1513 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
1514 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
1517 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
1518 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
1519 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
1521 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
1523 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
1524 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
1526 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
1527 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
1530 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
1531 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
1532 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
1533 a given linear address.
1535 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
1536 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
1537 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
1539 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
1541 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
1543 * Changes in documentation.
1545 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
1546 Documentation License.
1548 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1551 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
1553 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1556 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
1557 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
1558 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
1560 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
1562 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
1563 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
1564 contents of this file.
1568 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
1570 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
1572 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
1574 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
1575 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
1576 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
1577 greater level of detail.
1579 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
1581 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
1582 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
1583 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
1586 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
1588 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
1589 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
1590 machines ``out of the box''.
1592 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
1593 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
1594 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
1595 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
1596 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
1598 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
1599 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
1600 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
1601 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
1602 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
1604 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
1605 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
1608 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
1611 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
1612 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
1613 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
1614 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
1616 * New native configurations
1618 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
1619 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
1623 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
1624 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
1625 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
1626 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1628 * OBSOLETE configurations
1630 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1631 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
1633 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
1636 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1637 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1638 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1639 be permanently REMOVED.
1641 * Gould support removed
1643 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
1645 * New features for SVR4
1647 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
1648 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
1649 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
1651 * Many C++ enhancements
1653 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
1654 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
1656 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
1658 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
1659 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
1660 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
1661 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
1663 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
1664 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
1666 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
1668 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
1669 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
1670 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
1672 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
1673 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
1675 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
1677 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
1678 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
1679 include ``set remote P-packet''.
1681 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
1683 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
1684 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
1685 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
1687 * ``apropos'' command added.
1689 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
1690 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
1691 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
1695 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
1696 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
1697 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
1698 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
1699 enabled by configuring with:
1701 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
1703 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
1705 * New native configurations
1707 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
1708 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
1709 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
1713 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1714 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
1715 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1717 * OBSOLETE configurations
1719 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
1721 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1722 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1723 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1724 be permanently REMOVED.
1728 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
1729 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
1730 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
1731 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
1732 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
1733 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
1734 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
1739 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
1741 * set extension-language
1743 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
1744 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
1745 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
1746 set extension-language .c c++
1747 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
1748 and their associated languages.
1750 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
1752 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
1753 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
1754 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
1758 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
1759 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
1761 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
1762 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
1764 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
1765 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
1766 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
1767 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
1768 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
1769 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
1770 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
1771 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
1773 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
1774 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
1775 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
1776 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
1780 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
1781 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
1782 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
1783 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
1784 for xdb and dbx commands.
1788 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
1789 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
1790 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
1792 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
1793 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
1794 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
1796 * Debugging across forks
1798 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
1803 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
1804 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
1805 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
1807 * GDB remote protocol additions
1809 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
1810 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
1811 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
1812 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
1814 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
1815 full 64-bit address. The command
1817 set remoteaddresssize 32
1819 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
1820 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
1823 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
1824 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
1826 maint packet heythere
1828 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
1829 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
1832 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
1833 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
1834 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
1836 * Tracing can collect general expressions
1838 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
1839 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
1840 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
1842 * mask-address variable for Mips
1844 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
1845 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
1846 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
1848 * Higher serial baud rates
1850 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
1851 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
1852 to achieve all of these rates.)
1856 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
1857 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
1860 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
1862 * New native configurations
1864 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
1865 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
1866 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1867 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
1868 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1869 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
1870 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
1874 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1875 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
1876 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1877 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
1878 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
1879 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
1880 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
1881 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
1882 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
1883 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1884 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
1886 * New debugging protocols
1888 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
1889 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
1890 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
1891 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1892 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1893 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1897 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
1898 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
1903 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
1904 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
1906 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
1908 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
1909 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
1910 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
1912 * Live range splitting
1914 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
1915 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
1916 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
1920 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
1921 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
1925 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
1926 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
1927 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
1932 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
1937 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
1938 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
1939 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
1940 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
1941 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
1942 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
1946 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
1947 the symbol at the specified address.
1951 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
1952 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
1953 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
1954 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
1955 file tracepoint.c for more details.
1959 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
1960 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
1961 of most MIPS variants.
1965 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
1966 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
1967 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
1971 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
1972 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
1973 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
1974 the possible architectures.
1976 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
1978 * New native configurations
1980 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
1981 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
1982 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
1983 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
1984 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1985 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
1989 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
1990 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1991 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
1992 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
1993 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
1995 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1999 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
2000 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
2001 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
2002 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
2003 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
2007 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
2009 * Windows 95/NT native
2011 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
2012 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
2013 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
2014 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
2015 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
2017 * dont-repeat command
2019 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
2020 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
2021 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
2022 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
2024 * Send break instead of ^C
2026 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
2027 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
2028 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
2030 * Remote protocol timeout
2032 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
2033 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
2034 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
2036 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
2038 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
2039 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
2040 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
2041 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
2042 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
2044 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
2045 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
2046 automatically on hpux10.
2048 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
2050 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
2052 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
2054 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
2055 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
2056 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
2057 every character. The default value is 1050.
2059 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
2061 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
2062 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
2063 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
2064 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
2065 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
2066 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
2068 * Speedups for remote debugging
2070 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
2071 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
2072 and more efficient S-record downloading.
2074 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
2076 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
2077 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
2079 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
2081 * Psymtabs for XCOFF
2083 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
2084 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
2086 * Remote targets use caching
2088 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
2089 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
2090 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
2091 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
2092 off' turns the the data cache off.
2094 * Remote targets may have threads
2096 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
2097 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
2098 gdb/remote.c for details.
2102 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
2103 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
2104 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
2105 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
2106 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
2107 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
2108 sequence is something like
2110 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
2112 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
2116 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
2117 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
2118 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
2119 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
2120 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
2121 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
2122 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
2123 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
2127 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
2128 but does simplify configuration and building.
2132 GDB now supports hpux10.
2134 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
2136 * New native configurations
2138 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
2139 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
2140 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
2141 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
2145 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2146 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
2147 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
2148 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
2151 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
2153 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
2154 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
2155 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
2156 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
2157 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
2159 * Arguments to user-defined commands
2161 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
2162 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
2165 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
2167 To execute the command use:
2170 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
2171 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
2172 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
2174 * New `if' and `while' commands
2176 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
2177 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
2178 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
2179 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
2180 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
2181 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
2182 if the expression is zero.
2184 * Fortran source language mode
2186 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
2187 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
2188 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
2189 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
2192 * Better HPUX support
2194 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
2195 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
2196 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
2197 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
2198 that behavior do the following before running the program:
2204 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
2205 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
2211 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
2212 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
2215 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
2216 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
2218 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
2220 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
2221 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
2222 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
2223 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
2224 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
2225 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
2227 * New DOS host serial code
2229 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
2230 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
2233 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
2235 * New "complete" command
2237 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
2238 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
2240 * Trailing space optional in prompt
2242 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
2243 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
2245 * Breakpoint hit counts
2247 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
2248 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
2249 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
2250 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
2251 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
2254 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
2256 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
2257 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
2258 arrays actually contain only short strings.
2260 * Shared library breakpoints
2262 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
2263 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
2265 * Hardware watchpoints
2267 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
2268 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
2270 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
2274 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
2275 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
2277 * Improved Irix 5 support
2279 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
2281 * Improved HPPA support
2283 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
2285 * New native configurations
2287 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
2288 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2289 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
2290 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
2294 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2295 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
2298 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
2300 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
2301 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
2305 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
2306 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
2308 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
2310 * Irix 5 is now supported
2314 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
2315 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
2316 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
2317 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
2318 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
2321 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
2323 * User visible changes:
2327 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
2328 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
2329 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
2330 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
2331 debugging info for the mips target).
2333 * DEC Alpha native support
2335 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
2336 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
2337 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
2338 Alpha-specific notes.
2340 * Preliminary thread implementation
2342 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
2344 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
2346 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
2347 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
2350 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
2352 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
2353 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
2354 call methods, ...etc.
2356 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
2358 * User visible changes:
2360 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
2361 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
2362 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
2363 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
2365 Filename completion now works.
2367 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
2368 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
2369 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
2371 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
2372 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
2373 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
2374 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
2375 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
2379 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
2380 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
2383 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
2387 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
2388 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
2389 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
2393 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
2394 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
2395 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
2396 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
2397 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
2401 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
2402 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
2403 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
2405 * New targets supported
2407 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2408 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2409 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
2410 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2411 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
2413 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
2414 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
2415 GO32 memory extender.
2417 * New remote protocols
2419 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
2421 * New source languages supported
2423 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
2424 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
2425 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
2428 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
2430 * HP Precision Architecture supported
2432 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
2433 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
2434 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
2435 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
2436 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
2437 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
2439 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
2441 * Faster and better demangling
2443 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
2444 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
2445 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
2446 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
2447 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
2448 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
2451 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
2452 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
2453 compiler does not actually implement.
2455 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
2457 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
2458 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
2459 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
2460 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
2461 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
2462 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
2465 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
2466 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
2468 * Improved configure script
2470 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
2471 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
2472 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
2473 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
2475 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
2476 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
2477 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
2478 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
2479 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
2480 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
2482 * Documentation improvements
2484 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
2485 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
2486 before submitting changes.
2488 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
2489 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
2490 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
2491 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
2492 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
2494 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
2495 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
2496 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
2497 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
2498 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
2499 around this problem.
2503 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
2504 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
2505 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
2508 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
2509 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
2511 * New native hosts supported
2513 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
2514 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
2516 * New targets supported
2518 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
2520 * New file formats supported
2522 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
2523 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
2527 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
2529 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
2530 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
2532 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
2533 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
2534 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
2536 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
2537 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
2539 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
2540 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
2541 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
2544 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
2545 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
2546 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
2547 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
2548 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
2550 * Internal improvements
2552 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
2553 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
2555 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
2556 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
2557 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
2558 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
2559 shared code that handles any of them.
2561 * New command line options
2563 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
2567 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
2568 General Public License.
2570 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
2572 * Host/native/target split
2574 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
2575 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
2576 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
2577 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
2578 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
2580 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
2581 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
2582 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
2583 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
2584 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
2585 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
2586 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
2588 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
2589 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
2590 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
2592 * New hosts supported
2594 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
2595 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2596 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
2598 * New targets supported
2600 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
2601 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
2603 * New native hosts supported
2605 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2606 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
2607 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
2609 * New file formats supported
2611 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
2612 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
2613 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
2617 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
2618 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
2619 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
2621 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
2623 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
2624 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
2625 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
2626 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
2630 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
2631 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
2632 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
2634 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
2638 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
2639 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
2642 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
2643 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
2645 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
2646 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
2647 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
2648 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
2649 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
2650 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
2652 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
2653 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
2654 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
2655 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
2659 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
2660 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
2661 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
2662 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
2663 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
2665 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
2666 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
2667 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
2668 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
2672 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
2673 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
2674 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
2675 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
2676 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
2677 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
2678 each instruction being stepped through.
2680 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
2681 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
2683 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
2684 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
2685 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
2686 processor with a serial port.
2690 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
2691 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
2692 supported, and what files each one uses.
2696 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
2697 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
2698 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
2699 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
2701 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
2702 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
2703 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
2704 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
2708 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
2709 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
2710 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
2711 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
2712 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
2713 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
2715 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
2718 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
2720 * Better support for C++ function names
2722 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
2723 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
2724 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
2725 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
2726 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
2728 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
2729 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
2730 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
2731 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
2732 for the list of formats.
2734 * G++ symbol mangling problem
2736 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
2737 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
2738 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
2739 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
2740 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
2741 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
2744 * New 'maintenance' command
2746 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
2747 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
2748 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
2750 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
2751 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
2752 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
2753 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
2754 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
2755 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
2757 The following commands are new:
2759 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
2760 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
2761 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
2763 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
2765 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
2766 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
2767 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
2768 read after argv processing.
2770 * New hosts supported
2772 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
2774 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
2776 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
2777 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
2778 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
2779 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
2780 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
2783 * New targets supported
2785 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2787 * More smarts about finding #include files
2789 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
2790 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
2791 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
2792 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
2793 the one that contains your sources.
2795 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
2796 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
2797 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
2799 * Interesting infernals change
2801 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
2802 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
2803 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
2804 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
2806 * Bug fixes (of course!)
2808 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
2809 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
2810 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
2812 See the ChangeLog for details.
2814 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
2816 * New machines supported (host and target)
2818 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
2820 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
2822 * New malloc package
2824 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
2825 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
2826 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
2827 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
2828 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
2829 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
2833 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
2834 'help info proc' for details.
2836 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
2838 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
2839 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
2842 * File name changes for MS-DOS
2844 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
2845 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
2846 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
2847 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
2848 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
2849 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
2851 * Cross byte order fixes
2853 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
2854 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
2856 * New -mapped and -readnow options
2858 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
2859 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
2860 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
2861 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
2862 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
2863 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
2864 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
2865 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
2866 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
2867 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
2869 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
2870 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
2871 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
2872 slower, but makes future operations faster.
2874 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
2875 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
2876 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
2879 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
2881 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
2882 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
2883 shared across multiple host platforms.
2885 * longjmp() handling
2887 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
2888 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
2889 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
2890 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
2894 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
2895 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
2900 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
2901 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
2902 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
2904 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
2906 * New machines supported (host and target)
2908 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2910 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
2911 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
2913 * New machines supported (target)
2915 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2919 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
2920 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
2921 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
2923 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
2924 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
2925 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
2926 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
2927 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
2930 * New features for SVR4
2932 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
2933 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
2934 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
2936 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
2937 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
2938 it prints the address mappings of the process.
2940 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
2941 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
2943 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
2945 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
2946 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
2947 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
2948 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
2949 same code linked statically.
2953 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
2954 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
2955 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
2956 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
2957 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
2958 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
2962 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
2963 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
2964 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
2967 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
2969 * New machines supported (host and target)
2971 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
2972 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
2973 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2975 * Almost SCO Unix support
2977 We had hoped to support:
2978 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2979 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
2980 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
2981 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
2983 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
2985 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
2986 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
2987 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
2988 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
2993 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
2994 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
2995 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
2999 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
3000 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
3001 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
3003 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
3005 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
3006 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
3007 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
3009 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
3010 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
3011 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
3012 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
3015 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
3016 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
3017 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
3018 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
3021 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
3022 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
3025 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
3026 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
3027 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
3030 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
3032 * Improved configuration
3034 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
3035 Porting BFD is simpler.
3039 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
3040 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
3041 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
3042 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
3046 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
3048 * New host supported (not target)
3050 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
3053 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
3055 * Multiple source language support
3057 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
3058 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
3059 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
3060 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
3061 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
3062 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
3066 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
3067 currently under development at the State University of New York at
3068 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
3069 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
3071 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
3072 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
3073 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
3075 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
3076 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
3080 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
3081 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
3082 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
3083 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
3086 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
3088 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
3089 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
3090 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
3091 examining core files.
3095 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
3098 * New machines supported (host and target)
3100 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
3101 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
3102 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
3104 * New hosts supported (not targets)
3106 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
3108 * New targets supported (not hosts)
3110 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
3111 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
3112 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
3114 * New remote interfaces
3120 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
3124 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
3126 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
3127 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
3128 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
3129 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
3130 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
3131 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
3132 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
3133 stub on the target system.
3135 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
3137 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
3138 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
3139 object file types such as a.out and coff.
3141 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
3142 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
3145 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
3147 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
3148 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
3150 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
3151 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
3152 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
3154 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
3155 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
3156 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
3157 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
3159 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
3160 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
3161 it is already running. Default is ON.
3163 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
3164 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
3165 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
3166 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
3169 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
3170 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
3171 or the value of the environment variable
3174 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
3175 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
3178 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
3179 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
3180 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
3182 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
3183 history expansion will be performed on
3184 command line input. The default is OFF.
3186 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
3187 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
3188 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
3190 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
3191 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
3192 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3195 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
3196 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
3197 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3200 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
3201 ``set width'' instead.
3203 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
3204 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
3205 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
3206 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
3208 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
3211 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
3214 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
3217 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
3220 * Support for Epoch Environment.
3222 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
3223 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
3224 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
3228 * Support for Shared Libraries
3230 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
3231 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
3232 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
3233 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
3234 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
3235 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
3236 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
3237 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
3239 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
3240 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
3241 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
3243 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
3248 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
3249 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
3250 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
3251 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
3252 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
3253 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
3255 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
3257 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
3259 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3260 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3261 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3264 * C++ multiple inheritance
3266 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
3269 * C++ exception handling
3271 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
3272 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
3273 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
3276 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
3277 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
3278 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
3280 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
3281 current stack frame.
3284 * Minor command changes
3286 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
3287 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
3288 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
3290 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
3291 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
3292 frames without printing.
3294 * New directory command
3296 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
3297 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
3298 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
3299 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
3300 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
3302 * Configuring GDB for compilation
3304 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
3307 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
3308 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
3309 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
3310 where the program that you are debugging will run.
projects / deliverable / binutils-gdb.git / blob