1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB 7.2
6 * GDB has a new command: "set directories".
7 It is like the "dir" command except that it replaces the
8 source path list instead of augmenting it.
11 Initial support for the OpenCL C language (http://www.khronos.org/opencl)
12 has been integrated into GDB.
16 ** GDB values in Python are now callable if the value represents a
17 function. For example, if 'some_value' represents a function that
18 takes two integer parameters and returns a value, you can call
19 that function like so:
21 result = some_value (10,20)
23 ** Module gdb.types has been added.
24 It contains a collection of utilities for working with gdb.Types objects:
25 get_basic_type, has_field, make_enum_dict.
27 ** Module gdb.printing has been added.
28 It contains utilities for writing and registering pretty-printers.
29 New classes: PrettyPrinter, SubPrettyPrinter,
30 RegexpCollectionPrettyPrinter.
31 New function: register_pretty_printer.
33 ** New commands "info pretty-printers", "enable pretty-printer" and
34 "disable pretty-printer" have been added.
36 ** gdb.parameter("directories") is now available.
40 ** GDB now puts template parameters in scope when debugging in an
41 instantiation. For example, if you have:
43 template<int X> int func (void) { return X; }
45 then if you step into func<5>, "print X" will show "5". This
46 feature requires proper debuginfo support from the compiler; it
49 * GDB now follows GCC's rules on accessing volatile objects when
50 reading or writing target state during expression evaluation.
51 One notable difference to prior behavior is that "print x = 0"
52 no longer generates a read of x; the value of the assignment is
53 now always taken directly from the value being assigned.
55 * GDB now has some support for using labels in the program's source in
56 linespecs. For instance, you can use "advance label" to continue
59 * GDB now has support for reading and writing a new .gdb_index
60 section. This section holds a fast index of DWARF debugging
61 information and can be used to greatly speed up GDB startup and
62 operation. See the documentation for `save gdb-index' for details.
64 * The "watch" command now accepts an optional "-location" argument.
65 When used, this causes GDB to watch the memory referred to by the
66 expression. Such a watchpoint is never deleted due to it going out
69 * GDB now supports thread debugging of core dumps on GNU/Linux.
71 GDB now activates thread debugging using the libthread_db library
72 when debugging GNU/Linux core dumps, similarly to when debugging
73 live processes. As a result, when debugging a core dump file, GDB
74 is now able to display pthread_t ids of threads. For example, "info
75 threads" shows the same output as when debugging the process when it
76 was live. In earlier releases, you'd see something like this:
79 * 1 LWP 6780 main () at main.c:10
81 While now you see this:
84 * 1 Thread 0x7f0f5712a700 (LWP 6780) main () at main.c:10
86 It is also now possible to inspect TLS variables when debugging core
89 When debugging a core dump generated on a machine other than the one
90 used to run GDB, you may need to point GDB at the correct
91 libthread_db library with the "set libthread-db-search-path"
92 command. See the user manual for more details on this command.
94 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
96 ** GDBserver is now supported on PowerPC LynxOS (versions 4.x and 5.x),
97 and i686 LynxOS (version 5.x).
99 * Ada task switching is now supported on sparc-elf targets when
100 debugging a program using the Ravenscar Profile. For more information,
101 see the "Tasking Support when using the Ravenscar Profile" section
102 in the GDB user manual.
104 * Guile support was removed.
106 *** Changes in GDB 7.2
108 * Shared library support for remote targets by default
110 When GDB is configured for a generic, non-OS specific target, like
111 for example, --target=arm-eabi or one of the many *-*-elf targets,
112 GDB now queries remote stubs for loaded shared libraries using the
113 `qXfer:libraries:read' packet. Previously, shared library support
114 was always disabled for such configurations.
118 ** Argument Dependent Lookup (ADL)
120 In C++ ADL lookup directs function search to the namespaces of its
121 arguments even if the namespace has not been imported.
131 Here the compiler will search for `foo' in the namespace of 'b'
132 and find A::foo. GDB now supports this. This construct is commonly
133 used in the Standard Template Library for operators.
135 ** Improved User Defined Operator Support
137 In addition to member operators, GDB now supports lookup of operators
138 defined in a namespace and imported with a `using' directive, operators
139 defined in the global scope, operators imported implicitly from an
140 anonymous namespace, and the ADL operators mentioned in the previous
142 GDB now also supports proper overload resolution for all the previously
143 mentioned flavors of operators.
145 ** static const class members
147 Printing of static const class members that are initialized in the
148 class definition has been fixed.
150 * Windows Thread Information Block access.
152 On Windows targets, GDB now supports displaying the Windows Thread
153 Information Block (TIB) structure. This structure is visible either
154 by using the new command `info w32 thread-information-block' or, by
155 dereferencing the new convenience variable named `$_tlb', a
156 thread-specific pointer to the TIB. This feature is also supported
157 when remote debugging using GDBserver.
161 Static tracepoints are calls in the user program into a tracing
162 library. One such library is a port of the LTTng kernel tracer to
163 userspace --- UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer, http://lttng.org/ust).
164 When debugging with GDBserver, GDB now supports combining the GDB
165 tracepoint machinery with such libraries. For example: the user can
166 use GDB to probe a static tracepoint marker (a call from the user
167 program into the tracing library) with the new "strace" command (see
168 "New commands" below). This creates a "static tracepoint" in the
169 breakpoint list, that can be manipulated with the same feature set
170 as fast and regular tracepoints. E.g., collect registers, local and
171 global variables, collect trace state variables, and define
172 tracepoint conditions. In addition, the user can collect extra
173 static tracepoint marker specific data, by collecting the new
174 $_sdata internal variable. When analyzing the trace buffer, you can
175 inspect $_sdata like any other variable available to GDB. For more
176 information, see the "Tracepoints" chapter in GDB user manual. New
177 remote packets have been defined to support static tracepoints, see
178 the "New remote packets" section below.
180 * Better reconstruction of tracepoints after disconnected tracing
182 GDB will attempt to download the original source form of tracepoint
183 definitions when starting a trace run, and then will upload these
184 upon reconnection to the target, resulting in a more accurate
185 reconstruction of the tracepoints that are in use on the target.
189 You can now exercise direct control over the ways that GDB can
190 affect your program. For instance, you can disallow the setting of
191 breakpoints, so that the program can run continuously (assuming
192 non-stop mode). In addition, the "observer" variable is available
193 to switch all of the different controls; in observer mode, GDB
194 cannot affect the target's behavior at all, which is useful for
195 tasks like diagnosing live systems in the field.
197 * The new convenience variable $_thread holds the number of the
204 Return the address of the Windows Thread Information Block of a given thread.
208 In response to several of the tracepoint packets, the target may now
209 also respond with a number of intermediate `qRelocInsn' request
210 packets before the final result packet, to have GDB handle
211 relocating an instruction to execute at a different address. This
212 is particularly useful for stubs that support fast tracepoints. GDB
213 reports support for this feature in the qSupported packet.
217 List static tracepoint markers in the target program.
221 List static tracepoint markers at a given address in the target
224 qXfer:statictrace:read
226 Read the static trace data collected (by a `collect $_sdata'
227 tracepoint action). The remote stub reports support for this packet
228 to gdb's qSupported query.
232 Send the current settings of GDB's permission flags.
236 Send part of the source (textual) form of a tracepoint definition,
237 which includes location, conditional, and action list.
239 * The source command now accepts a -s option to force searching for the
240 script in the source search path even if the script name specifies
243 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
245 - GDBserver now support tracepoints (including fast tracepoints, and
246 static tracepoints). The feature is currently supported by the
247 i386-linux and amd64-linux builds. See the "Tracepoints support
248 in gdbserver" section in the manual for more information.
250 GDBserver JIT compiles the tracepoint's conditional agent
251 expression bytecode into native code whenever possible for low
252 overhead dynamic tracepoints conditionals. For such tracepoints,
253 an expression that examines program state is evaluated when the
254 tracepoint is reached, in order to determine whether to capture
255 trace data. If the condition is simple and false, processing the
256 tracepoint finishes very quickly and no data is gathered.
258 GDBserver interfaces with the UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer) library
259 for static tracepoints support.
261 - GDBserver now supports x86_64 Windows 64-bit debugging.
263 * GDB now sends xmlRegisters= in qSupported packet to indicate that
264 it understands register description.
266 * The --batch flag now disables pagination and queries.
268 * X86 general purpose registers
270 GDB now supports reading/writing byte, word and double-word x86
271 general purpose registers directly. This means you can use, say,
272 $ah or $ax to refer, respectively, to the byte register AH and
273 16-bit word register AX that are actually portions of the 32-bit
274 register EAX or 64-bit register RAX.
276 * The `commands' command now accepts a range of breakpoints to modify.
277 A plain `commands' following a command that creates multiple
278 breakpoints affects all the breakpoints set by that command. This
279 applies to breakpoints set by `rbreak', and also applies when a
280 single `break' command creates multiple breakpoints (e.g.,
281 breakpoints on overloaded c++ functions).
283 * The `rbreak' command now accepts a filename specification as part of
284 its argument, limiting the functions selected by the regex to those
285 in the specified file.
287 * Support for remote debugging Windows and SymbianOS shared libraries
288 from Unix hosts has been improved. Non Windows GDB builds now can
289 understand target reported file names that follow MS-DOS based file
290 system semantics, such as file names that include drive letters and
291 use the backslash character as directory separator. This makes it
292 possible to transparently use the "set sysroot" and "set
293 solib-search-path" on Unix hosts to point as host copies of the
294 target's shared libraries. See the new command "set
295 target-file-system-kind" described below, and the "Commands to
296 specify files" section in the user manual for more information.
300 eval template, expressions...
301 Convert the values of one or more expressions under the control
302 of the string template to a command line, and call it.
304 set target-file-system-kind unix|dos-based|auto
305 show target-file-system-kind
306 Set or show the assumed file system kind for target reported file
309 save breakpoints <filename>
310 Save all current breakpoint definitions to a file suitable for use
311 in a later debugging session. To read the saved breakpoint
312 definitions, use the `source' command.
314 `save tracepoints' is a new alias for `save-tracepoints'. The latter
317 info static-tracepoint-markers
318 Display information about static tracepoint markers in the target.
320 strace FN | FILE:LINE | *ADDR | -m MARKER_ID
321 Define a static tracepoint by probing a marker at the given
322 function, line, address, or marker ID.
326 Enable and disable observer mode.
328 set may-write-registers on|off
329 set may-write-memory on|off
330 set may-insert-breakpoints on|off
331 set may-insert-tracepoints on|off
332 set may-insert-fast-tracepoints on|off
333 set may-interrupt on|off
334 Set individual permissions for GDB effects on the target. Note that
335 some of these settings can have undesirable or surprising
336 consequences, particularly when changed in the middle of a session.
337 For instance, disabling the writing of memory can prevent
338 breakpoints from being inserted, cause single-stepping to fail, or
339 even crash your program, if you disable after breakpoints have been
340 inserted. However, GDB should not crash.
342 set record memory-query on|off
343 show record memory-query
344 Control whether to stop the inferior if memory changes caused
345 by an instruction cannot be recorded.
350 The disassemble command now supports "start,+length" form of two arguments.
354 ** GDB now provides a new directory location, called the python directory,
355 where Python scripts written for GDB can be installed. The location
356 of that directory is <data-directory>/python, where <data-directory>
357 is the GDB data directory. For more details, see section `Scripting
358 GDB using Python' in the manual.
360 ** The GDB Python API now has access to breakpoints, symbols, symbol
361 tables, program spaces, inferiors, threads and frame's code blocks.
362 Additionally, GDB Parameters can now be created from the API, and
363 manipulated via set/show in the CLI.
365 ** New functions gdb.target_charset, gdb.target_wide_charset,
366 gdb.progspaces, gdb.current_progspace, and gdb.string_to_argv.
368 ** New exception gdb.GdbError.
370 ** Pretty-printers are now also looked up in the current program space.
372 ** Pretty-printers can now be individually enabled and disabled.
374 ** GDB now looks for names of Python scripts to auto-load in a
375 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts', in addition to looking
376 for a OBJFILE-gdb.py script when OBJFILE is read by the debugger.
378 * Tracepoint actions were unified with breakpoint commands. In particular,
379 there are no longer differences in "info break" output for breakpoints and
380 tracepoints and the "commands" command can be used for both tracepoints and
385 ARM Symbian arm*-*-symbianelf*
387 * D language support.
388 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the D programming
391 * GDB now supports the extended ptrace interface for PowerPC which is
392 available since Linux kernel version 2.6.34. This automatically enables
393 any hardware breakpoints and additional hardware watchpoints available in
394 the processor. The old ptrace interface exposes just one hardware
395 watchpoint and no hardware breakpoints.
397 * GDB is now able to use the Data Value Compare (DVC) register available on
398 embedded PowerPC processors to implement in hardware simple watchpoint
399 conditions of the form:
401 watch ADDRESS|VARIABLE if ADDRESS|VARIABLE == CONSTANT EXPRESSION
403 This works in native GDB running on Linux kernels with the extended ptrace
404 interface mentioned above.
406 *** Changes in GDB 7.1
412 GDB now supports importing of namespaces in C++. This enables the
413 user to inspect variables from imported namespaces. Support for
414 namepace aliasing has also been added. So, if a namespace is
415 aliased in the current scope (e.g. namepace C=A; ) the user can
416 print variables using the alias (e.g. (gdb) print C::x).
420 All known bugs relating to the printing of virtual base class were
421 fixed. It is now possible to call overloaded static methods using a
426 The C++ cast operators static_cast<>, dynamic_cast<>, const_cast<>,
427 and reinterpret_cast<> are now handled by the C++ expression parser.
431 Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze-*-*
436 Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze
439 * Multi-program debugging.
441 GDB now has support for multi-program (a.k.a. multi-executable or
442 multi-exec) debugging. This allows for debugging multiple inferiors
443 simultaneously each running a different program under the same GDB
444 session. See "Debugging Multiple Inferiors and Programs" in the
445 manual for more information. This implied some user visible changes
446 in the multi-inferior support. For example, "info inferiors" now
447 lists inferiors that are not running yet or that have exited
448 already. See also "New commands" and "New options" below.
450 * New tracing features
452 GDB's tracepoint facility now includes several new features:
454 ** Trace state variables
456 GDB tracepoints now include support for trace state variables, which
457 are variables managed by the target agent during a tracing
458 experiment. They are useful for tracepoints that trigger each
459 other, so for instance one tracepoint can count hits in a variable,
460 and then a second tracepoint has a condition that is true when the
461 count reaches a particular value. Trace state variables share the
462 $-syntax of GDB convenience variables, and can appear in both
463 tracepoint actions and condition expressions. Use the "tvariable"
464 command to create, and "info tvariables" to view; see "Trace State
465 Variables" in the manual for more detail.
469 GDB now includes an option for defining fast tracepoints, which
470 targets may implement more efficiently, such as by installing a jump
471 into the target agent rather than a trap instruction. The resulting
472 speedup can be by two orders of magnitude or more, although the
473 tradeoff is that some program locations on some target architectures
474 might not allow fast tracepoint installation, for instance if the
475 instruction to be replaced is shorter than the jump. To request a
476 fast tracepoint, use the "ftrace" command, with syntax identical to
477 the regular trace command.
479 ** Disconnected tracing
481 It is now possible to detach GDB from the target while it is running
482 a trace experiment, then reconnect later to see how the experiment
483 is going. In addition, a new variable disconnected-tracing lets you
484 tell the target agent whether to continue running a trace if the
485 connection is lost unexpectedly.
489 GDB now has the ability to save the trace buffer into a file, and
490 then use that file as a target, similarly to you can do with
491 corefiles. You can select trace frames, print data that was
492 collected in them, and use tstatus to display the state of the
493 tracing run at the moment that it was saved. To create a trace
494 file, use "tsave <filename>", and to use it, do "target tfile
497 ** Circular trace buffer
499 You can ask the target agent to handle the trace buffer as a
500 circular buffer, discarding the oldest trace frames to make room for
501 newer ones, by setting circular-trace-buffer to on. This feature may
502 not be available for all target agents.
507 The disassemble command, when invoked with two arguments, now requires
508 the arguments to be comma-separated.
511 The info variables command now displays variable definitions. Files
512 which only declare a variable are not shown.
515 The source command is now capable of sourcing Python scripts.
516 This feature is dependent on the debugger being build with Python
519 Related to this enhancement is also the introduction of a new command
520 "set script-extension" (see below).
522 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
524 record save [<FILENAME>]
525 Save a file (in core file format) containing the process record
526 execution log for replay debugging at a later time.
528 record restore <FILENAME>
529 Restore the process record execution log that was saved at an
530 earlier time, for replay debugging.
532 add-inferior [-copies <N>] [-exec <FILENAME>]
535 clone-inferior [-copies <N>] [ID]
536 Make a new inferior ready to execute the same program another
542 maint info program-spaces
543 List the program spaces loaded into GDB.
545 set remote interrupt-sequence [Ctrl-C | BREAK | BREAK-g]
546 show remote interrupt-sequence
547 Allow the user to select one of ^C, a BREAK signal or BREAK-g
548 as the sequence to the remote target in order to interrupt the execution.
549 Ctrl-C is a default. Some system prefers BREAK which is high level of
550 serial line for some certain time. Linux kernel prefers BREAK-g, a.k.a
551 Magic SysRq g. It is BREAK signal and character 'g'.
553 set remote interrupt-on-connect [on | off]
554 show remote interrupt-on-connect
555 When interrupt-on-connect is ON, gdb sends interrupt-sequence to
556 remote target when gdb connects to it. This is needed when you debug
559 set remotebreak [on | off]
561 Deprecated. Use "set/show remote interrupt-sequence" instead.
563 tvariable $NAME [ = EXP ]
564 Create or modify a trace state variable.
567 List trace state variables and their values.
569 delete tvariable $NAME ...
570 Delete one or more trace state variables.
573 Evaluate the given expressions without collecting anything into the
574 trace buffer. (Valid in tracepoint actions only.)
576 ftrace FN / FILE:LINE / *ADDR
577 Define a fast tracepoint at the given function, line, or address.
579 * New expression syntax
581 GDB now parses the 0b prefix of binary numbers the same way as GCC does.
582 GDB now parses 0b101010 identically with 42.
586 set follow-exec-mode new|same
587 show follow-exec-mode
588 Control whether GDB reuses the same inferior across an exec call or
589 creates a new one. This is useful to be able to restart the old
590 executable after the inferior having done an exec call.
592 set default-collect EXPR, ...
594 Define a list of expressions to be collected at each tracepoint.
595 This is a useful way to ensure essential items are not overlooked,
596 such as registers or a critical global variable.
598 set disconnected-tracing
599 show disconnected-tracing
600 If set to 1, the target is instructed to continue tracing if it
601 loses its connection to GDB. If 0, the target is to stop tracing
604 set circular-trace-buffer
605 show circular-trace-buffer
606 If set to on, the target is instructed to use a circular trace buffer
607 and discard the oldest trace frames instead of stopping the trace due
608 to a full trace buffer. If set to off, the trace stops when the buffer
609 fills up. Some targets may not support this.
611 set script-extension off|soft|strict
612 show script-extension
613 If set to "off", the debugger does not perform any script language
614 recognition, and all sourced files are assumed to be GDB scripts.
615 If set to "soft" (the default), files are sourced according to
616 filename extension, falling back to GDB scripts if the first
618 If set to "strict", files are sourced according to filename extension.
620 set ada trust-PAD-over-XVS on|off
621 show ada trust-PAD-over-XVS
622 If off, activate a workaround against a bug in the debugging information
623 generated by the compiler for PAD types (see gcc/exp_dbug.ads in
624 the GCC sources for more information about the GNAT encoding and
625 PAD types in particular). It is always safe to set this option to
626 off, but this introduces a slight performance penalty. The default
629 * Python API Improvements
631 ** GDB provides the new class gdb.LazyString. This is useful in
632 some pretty-printing cases. The new method gdb.Value.lazy_string
633 provides a simple way to create objects of this type.
635 ** The fields returned by gdb.Type.fields now have an
636 `is_base_class' attribute.
638 ** The new method gdb.Type.range returns the range of an array type.
640 ** The new method gdb.parse_and_eval can be used to parse and
641 evaluate an expression.
646 Define a trace state variable.
649 Get the current value of a trace state variable.
652 Set desired tracing behavior upon disconnection.
655 Set the trace buffer to be linear or circular.
658 Get data about the tracepoints currently in use.
662 Process record now works correctly with hardware watchpoints.
664 Multiple bug fixes have been made to the mips-irix port, making it
665 much more reliable. In particular:
666 - Debugging threaded applications is now possible again. Previously,
667 GDB would hang while starting the program, or while waiting for
668 the program to stop at a breakpoint.
669 - Attaching to a running process no longer hangs.
670 - An error occurring while loading a core file has been fixed.
671 - Changing the value of the PC register now works again. This fixes
672 problems observed when using the "jump" command, or when calling
673 a function from GDB, or even when assigning a new value to $pc.
674 - With the "finish" and "return" commands, the return value for functions
675 returning a small array is now correctly printed.
676 - It is now possible to break on shared library code which gets executed
677 during a shared library init phase (code executed while executing
678 their .init section). Previously, the breakpoint would have no effect.
679 - GDB is now able to backtrace through the signal handler for
680 non-threaded programs.
682 PIE (Position Independent Executable) programs debugging is now supported.
683 This includes debugging execution of PIC (Position Independent Code) shared
684 libraries although for that, it should be possible to run such libraries as an
687 *** Changes in GDB 7.0
689 * GDB now has an interface for JIT compilation. Applications that
690 dynamically generate code can create symbol files in memory and register
691 them with GDB. For users, the feature should work transparently, and
692 for JIT developers, the interface is documented in the GDB manual in the
693 "JIT Compilation Interface" chapter.
695 * Tracepoints may now be conditional. The syntax is as for
696 breakpoints; either an "if" clause appended to the "trace" command,
697 or the "condition" command is available. GDB sends the condition to
698 the target for evaluation using the same bytecode format as is used
699 for tracepoint actions.
701 * The disassemble command now supports: an optional /r modifier, print the
702 raw instructions in hex as well as in symbolic form, and an optional /m
703 modifier to print mixed source+assembly.
705 * Process record and replay
707 In a architecture environment that supports ``process record and
708 replay'', ``process record and replay'' target can record a log of
709 the process execution, and replay it with both forward and reverse
712 * Reverse debugging: GDB now has new commands reverse-continue, reverse-
713 step, reverse-next, reverse-finish, reverse-stepi, reverse-nexti, and
714 set execution-direction {forward|reverse}, for targets that support
717 * GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on MIPS/Linux systems. This
718 feature is available with a native GDB running on kernel version
721 * GDB now has support for multi-byte and wide character sets on the
722 target. Strings whose character type is wchar_t, char16_t, or
723 char32_t are now correctly printed. GDB supports wide- and unicode-
724 literals in C, that is, L'x', L"string", u'x', u"string", U'x', and
725 U"string" syntax. And, GDB allows the "%ls" and "%lc" formats in
726 `printf'. This feature requires iconv to work properly; if your
727 system does not have a working iconv, GDB can use GNU libiconv. See
728 the installation instructions for more information.
730 * GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
731 remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
732 with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
733 the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
735 * "info sharedlibrary" now takes an optional regex of libraries to show,
736 and it now reports if a shared library has no debugging information.
738 * Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
739 now complete on file names.
741 * When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
742 completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
743 For instance, consider:
745 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
746 # struct example variable;
749 If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
750 completions will be "f1" and "f2".
752 * Inlined functions are now supported. They show up in backtraces, and
753 the "step", "next", and "finish" commands handle them automatically.
755 * GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
756 operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
759 * GDB now supports inspecting extra signal information, exported by
760 the new $_siginfo convenience variable. The feature is currently
761 implemented on linux ARM, i386 and amd64.
763 * GDB can now display the VFP floating point registers and NEON vector
764 registers on ARM targets. Both ARM GNU/Linux native GDB and gdbserver
765 can provide these registers (requires Linux 2.6.30 or later). Remote
766 and simulator targets may also provide them.
771 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
774 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
775 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
776 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
779 Kill the process with the specified process ID. Use this in preference
780 to `k' when multiprocess protocol extensions are supported.
783 Obtains additional operating system information
787 Read or write additional signal information.
789 * Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
791 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
792 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
793 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
795 * GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
796 DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
798 * The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
799 and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
800 `set/show sh calling-convention'.
802 * GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
803 with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
805 * 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
807 * Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
809 * Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
810 which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
812 * The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
813 list of section offsets.
815 * On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
816 conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
817 have also been fixed.
819 * GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
820 From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
821 are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
823 * GDB now parses C++ symbol and type names more flexibly. For
826 template<typename T> class C { };
829 GDB will now correctly handle all of:
831 ptype C<char const *>
833 ptype C<const char *>
836 * New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
838 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
839 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
841 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
842 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
843 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
845 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
846 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
848 - Support for the sparc64-linux-gnu target is now included in
851 - The amd64-linux build of gdbserver now supports debugging both
852 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
854 - The i386-linux, amd64-linux, and i386-win32 builds of gdbserver
855 now support hardware watchpoints, and will use them automatically
860 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
861 available is determined at configure time.
863 New GDB commands can now be written in Python.
865 * Ada tasking support
867 Ada tasks can now be inspected in GDB. The following commands have
871 Print the list of Ada tasks.
873 Print detailed information about task number N.
875 Print the task number of the current task.
877 Switch the context of debugging to task number N.
879 * Support for user-defined prefixed commands. The "define" command can
880 add new commands to existing prefixes, e.g. "target".
882 * Multi-inferior, multi-process debugging.
884 GDB now has generalized support for multi-inferior debugging. See
885 "Debugging Multiple Inferiors" in the manual for more information.
886 Although availability still depends on target support, the command
887 set is more uniform now. The GNU/Linux specific multi-forks support
888 has been migrated to this new framework. This implied some user
889 visible changes; see "New commands" and also "Removed commands"
892 * Target descriptions can now describe the target OS ABI. See the
893 "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for more
896 * Target descriptions can now describe "compatible" architectures
897 to indicate that the target can execute applications for a different
898 architecture in addition to those for the main target architecture.
899 See the "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for
902 * Multi-architecture debugging.
904 GDB now includes general supports for debugging applications on
905 hybrid systems that use more than one single processor architecture
906 at the same time. Each such hybrid architecture still requires
907 specific support to be added. The only hybrid architecture supported
908 in this version of GDB is the Cell Broadband Engine.
910 * GDB now supports integrated debugging of Cell/B.E. applications that
911 use both the PPU and SPU architectures. To enable support for hybrid
912 Cell/B.E. debugging, you need to configure GDB to support both the
913 powerpc-linux or powerpc64-linux and the spu-elf targets, using the
914 --enable-targets configure option.
916 * Non-stop mode debugging.
918 For some targets, GDB now supports an optional mode of operation in
919 which you can examine stopped threads while other threads continue
920 to execute freely. This is referred to as non-stop mode, with the
921 old mode referred to as all-stop mode. See the "Non-Stop Mode"
922 section in the user manual for more information.
924 To be able to support remote non-stop debugging, a remote stub needs
925 to implement the non-stop mode remote protocol extensions, as
926 described in the "Remote Non-Stop" section of the user manual. The
927 GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been adjusted to support these
928 extensions on linux targets.
930 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
932 catch syscall [NAME(S) | NUMBER(S)]
933 Catch system calls. Arguments, which should be names of system
934 calls or their numbers, mean catch only those syscalls. Without
935 arguments, every syscall will be caught. When the inferior issues
936 any of the specified syscalls, GDB will stop and announce the system
937 call, both when it is called and when its call returns. This
938 feature is currently available with a native GDB running on the
939 Linux Kernel, under the following architectures: x86, x86_64,
940 PowerPC and PowerPC64.
942 find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
944 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
946 maint set python print-stack
947 maint show python print-stack
948 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
951 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
956 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
960 Show operating system information about processes.
963 List the inferiors currently under GDB's control.
966 Switch focus to inferior number NUM.
969 Detach from inferior number NUM.
972 Kill inferior number NUM.
977 show spu stop-on-load
978 Control whether to stop for new SPE threads during Cell/B.E. debugging.
980 set spu auto-flush-cache
981 show spu auto-flush-cache
982 Control whether to automatically flush the software-managed cache
983 during Cell/B.E. debugging.
985 set sh calling-convention
986 show sh calling-convention
987 Control the calling convention used when calling SH target functions.
991 Control display of timestamps with GDB debugging output.
993 set disassemble-next-line
994 show disassemble-next-line
995 Control display of disassembled source lines or instructions when
998 set remote noack-packet
999 show remote noack-packet
1000 Set/show the use of remote protocol QStartNoAckMode packet. See above
1001 under "New remote packets."
1003 set remote query-attached-packet
1004 show remote query-attached-packet
1005 Control use of remote protocol `qAttached' (query-attached) packet.
1007 set remote read-siginfo-object
1008 show remote read-siginfo-object
1009 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:read' (read-siginfo-object)
1012 set remote write-siginfo-object
1013 show remote write-siginfo-object
1014 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:write' (write-siginfo-object)
1017 set remote reverse-continue
1018 show remote reverse-continue
1019 Control use of remote protocol 'bc' (reverse-continue) packet.
1021 set remote reverse-step
1022 show remote reverse-step
1023 Control use of remote protocol 'bs' (reverse-step) packet.
1025 set displaced-stepping
1026 show displaced-stepping
1027 Control displaced stepping mode. Displaced stepping is a way to
1028 single-step over breakpoints without removing them from the debuggee.
1029 Also known as "out-of-line single-stepping".
1032 show debug displaced
1033 Control display of debugging info for displaced stepping.
1035 maint set internal-error
1036 maint show internal-error
1037 Control what GDB does when an internal error is detected.
1039 maint set internal-warning
1040 maint show internal-warning
1041 Control what GDB does when an internal warning is detected.
1046 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
1048 set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
1049 show multiple-symbols
1050 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
1051 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
1052 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
1054 set breakpoint always-inserted
1055 show breakpoint always-inserted
1056 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
1057 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
1058 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
1060 set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
1061 show arm fallback-mode
1062 set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
1064 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
1065 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
1066 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
1067 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
1069 set disable-randomization
1070 show disable-randomization
1071 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
1072 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
1073 multiple debugging sessions.
1077 Control whether other threads are stopped or not when some thread hits
1082 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
1083 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
1084 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
1085 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
1087 set target-wide-charset
1088 show target-wide-charset
1089 The target-wide-charset is the name of the character set that GDB
1090 uses when printing characters whose type is wchar_t.
1092 set tcp auto-retry (on|off)
1094 set tcp connect-timeout
1095 show tcp connect-timeout
1096 These commands allow GDB to retry failed TCP connections to a remote stub
1097 with a specified timeout period; this is useful if the stub is launched
1098 in parallel with GDB but may not be ready to accept connections immediately.
1100 set libthread-db-search-path
1101 show libthread-db-search-path
1102 Control list of directories which GDB will search for appropriate
1105 set schedule-multiple (on|off)
1106 show schedule-multiple
1107 Allow GDB to resume all threads of all processes or only threads of
1108 the current process.
1112 Use more aggressive caching for accesses to the stack. This improves
1113 performance of remote debugging (particularly backtraces) without
1114 affecting correctness.
1116 set interactive-mode (on|off|auto)
1117 show interactive-mode
1118 Control whether GDB runs in interactive mode (on) or not (off).
1119 When in interactive mode, GDB waits for the user to answer all
1120 queries. Otherwise, GDB does not wait and assumes the default
1121 answer. When set to auto (the default), GDB determines which
1122 mode to use based on the stdin settings.
1127 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `info
1128 inferiors' command. To list checkpoints, you can still use the
1129 `info checkpoints' command, which was an alias for the `info forks'
1133 Replaced by the new `inferior' command. To switch between
1134 checkpoints, you can still use the `restart' command, which was an
1135 alias for the `fork' command.
1138 This is removed, since some targets don't have a notion of
1139 processes. To switch between processes, you can still use the
1140 `inferior' command using GDB's own inferior number.
1143 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `kill
1144 inferior' command. To delete a checkpoint, you can still use the
1145 `delete checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `delete
1149 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `detach
1150 inferior' command. To detach a checkpoint, you can still use the
1151 `detach checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `detach
1154 * New native configurations
1156 x86/x86_64 Darwin i[34567]86-*-darwin*
1158 x86_64 MinGW x86_64-*-mingw*
1162 Lattice Mico32 lm32-*
1163 x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
1164 x86_64 DICOS x86_64-*-dicos*
1167 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports x86 Windows CE
1168 (mingw32ce) debugging.
1174 These commands were actually not implemented on any target.
1176 *** Changes in GDB 6.8
1178 * New native configurations
1180 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
1181 Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
1185 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
1186 Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
1188 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
1190 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
1191 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
1192 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
1193 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
1195 * GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
1196 (mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
1198 * Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
1201 * GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
1202 including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
1203 and in inlined functions.
1205 * GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
1206 accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
1207 more than one contiguous range of addresses.
1209 * Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
1211 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
1212 registers on PowerPC targets.
1214 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
1215 targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
1217 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
1218 commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
1220 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
1221 extended-remote mode.
1223 * hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
1224 The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
1225 error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
1226 The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
1228 * GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
1229 building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
1230 target architectures.
1232 * GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
1233 Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
1234 now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
1235 stored in two consecutive float registers.
1237 * The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
1240 * Improved support for debugging Ada
1241 Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
1243 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
1244 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
1245 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
1246 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
1248 - Improved command completion in Ada
1251 * GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
1256 set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
1257 show print frame-arguments
1258 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
1259 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
1264 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
1271 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
1273 * New remote packets
1280 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
1283 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
1287 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
1289 *** Changes in GDB 6.7
1291 * Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
1292 bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
1293 Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
1295 * When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
1296 symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
1297 -Bsymbolic linker option.
1299 * When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
1300 recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
1303 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
1304 frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
1306 * GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
1307 32-bit or 64-bit register values.
1309 * Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
1311 * GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
1312 target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
1313 a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
1315 * Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
1316 automatically displayed as character or string data.
1318 * The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
1319 arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
1322 * Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
1323 for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
1324 only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
1326 * GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
1329 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
1330 ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
1331 has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
1333 * GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
1335 * GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
1337 * The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
1338 layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
1339 segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
1341 * The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
1342 immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
1344 * The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
1345 "library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
1346 packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
1347 where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
1348 Windows and SymbianOS).
1350 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
1351 (DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
1353 * GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
1354 according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
1360 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
1361 when debugging using remote targets.
1363 set mem inaccessible-by-default
1364 show mem inaccessible-by-default
1365 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
1366 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
1367 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
1368 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
1369 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
1371 set breakpoint auto-hw
1372 show breakpoint auto-hw
1373 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
1374 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
1375 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
1376 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
1377 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
1378 including "next" and "finish".
1381 catch exception unhandled
1382 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
1385 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
1389 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
1390 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
1391 an alias to "set sysroot".
1394 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
1395 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
1398 * New native configurations
1400 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
1403 unset tdesc filename
1405 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
1406 not query the target for its built-in description.
1410 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
1411 MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
1412 Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
1414 * New remote packets
1417 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
1418 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
1420 qXfer:features:read:
1421 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
1426 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
1427 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
1429 qXfer:libraries:read:
1430 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
1431 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
1432 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
1433 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
1437 Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
1445 i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
1446 i[34567]86-*-netware*
1447 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
1448 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
1450 i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
1453 i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
1454 i[34567]86-*-unixware*
1463 * Other removed features
1470 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
1477 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
1482 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
1483 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
1488 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
1489 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
1491 Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
1493 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
1494 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
1495 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
1496 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
1498 MIPS ".pdr" sections
1500 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
1501 in debugging information.
1505 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
1506 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
1508 set mips stack-arg-size
1509 set mips saved-gpreg-size
1511 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
1513 *** Changes in GDB 6.6
1518 Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
1520 * GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
1521 (mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
1522 running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
1524 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
1525 Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
1528 * The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
1529 broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
1531 * The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
1532 stub provides the required support.
1534 * Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
1535 longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
1540 unset substitute-path
1541 show substitute-path
1542 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
1543 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
1544 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
1545 between compilation and debugging.
1549 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
1550 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
1551 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
1555 The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
1557 Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
1558 an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
1560 The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
1562 * New remote packets
1565 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
1566 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
1567 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
1568 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
1572 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
1573 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
1575 qXfer:memory-map:read:
1576 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
1577 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
1582 Erase and program a flash memory device.
1584 * Removed remote packets
1587 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
1588 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
1590 *** Changes in GDB 6.5
1594 Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
1596 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
1600 init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
1601 only if it doesn't already have a value.
1603 The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
1605 checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
1607 restart <n> Return the program state to a
1608 previously saved state.
1610 info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
1612 delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
1614 set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
1615 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
1617 info forks List forks of the user program that
1618 are available to be debugged.
1620 fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
1621 forks of the user program that are
1622 available to be debugged.
1624 delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
1625 that are available to be debugged (and
1626 kill the forked process).
1628 detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
1629 that are available to be debugged (and
1630 allow the process to continue).
1634 Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
1636 * Improved Windows host support
1638 GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
1639 native console support, and remote communications using either
1640 network sockets or serial ports.
1642 * Improved Modula-2 language support
1644 GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
1645 basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
1646 pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
1647 printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
1648 written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
1649 GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
1653 The ARM rdi-share module.
1655 The Netware NLM debug server.
1657 *** Changes in GDB 6.4
1659 * New native configurations
1661 OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
1662 OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
1666 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
1668 * New command line options
1670 --batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
1671 --return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
1672 the child (debugged) program exited with.
1673 --eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
1674 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
1675 specified multiple times and in conjunction
1676 with the --command (-x) option.
1678 * Deprecated commands removed
1680 The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
1684 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
1685 othernames set arm disassembler
1686 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
1687 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
1688 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
1691 * New BSD user-level threads support
1693 It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
1694 library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
1697 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1698 FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
1699 OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
1701 Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
1702 are not yet supported.
1704 * New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
1705 (Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
1707 * REMOVED configurations and files
1709 VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
1710 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
1711 National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
1713 * New "set print array-indexes" command
1715 After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
1716 when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
1719 * VAX floating point support
1721 GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
1723 * User-defined command support
1725 In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
1726 to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
1727 section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
1729 *** Changes in GDB 6.3:
1731 * New command line option
1733 GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
1736 * GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
1738 GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
1739 information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
1740 by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
1741 proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
1742 to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
1744 * Internationalization
1746 When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
1747 internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
1748 continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
1752 Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
1753 implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
1754 into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
1756 * New native configurations
1758 GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
1762 GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
1763 packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
1765 * END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
1767 GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
1768 The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
1769 features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
1772 GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
1773 compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
1774 continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
1784 powerpc bdm protocol
1786 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
1787 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
1789 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1791 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1792 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1793 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1794 permanently REMOVED.
1803 *** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
1805 * MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
1807 When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
1808 heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
1811 * MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
1813 When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
1814 fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
1815 IRIX long double values).
1819 A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
1820 command. This problem has been fixed.
1822 *** Changes in GDB 6.2:
1824 * Fix for ``many threads''
1826 On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
1827 rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
1830 ptrace: No such process.
1831 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
1833 This problem has been fixed.
1835 * "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
1837 Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
1840 * New ``start'' command.
1842 This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
1844 * New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
1846 Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
1847 live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
1848 platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
1850 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1851 FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
1852 NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
1853 NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
1854 NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
1855 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
1856 OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
1857 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
1858 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
1860 * Signal trampoline code overhauled
1862 Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
1863 These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
1864 of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
1865 call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
1866 signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
1868 Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
1869 features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
1870 include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
1872 * Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
1874 * New native configurations
1876 GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
1877 OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
1878 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
1879 OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
1880 OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
1881 NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
1882 OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
1884 * END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
1886 GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
1887 The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
1888 including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
1889 migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
1890 compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
1891 work, was also included.
1893 GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
1894 module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
1904 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
1905 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
1907 * REMOVED configurations and files
1909 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
1910 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
1911 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
1912 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
1913 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
1914 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
1915 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
1916 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
1917 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
1918 sonymips mips-sony-*
1919 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
1921 *** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
1923 * TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
1925 The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
1926 GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
1927 command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
1928 program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
1931 * Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
1933 Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
1934 libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
1935 cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
1936 GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
1937 shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
1938 the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
1941 Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
1943 * Fixed ISO-C build problems
1945 The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
1946 non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
1947 compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
1949 * Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
1951 Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
1952 wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
1954 * Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
1956 The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
1957 permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
1958 systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
1960 * Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
1962 Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
1963 has been updated to use constant array sizes.
1965 * Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
1967 GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
1968 its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
1969 panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
1971 * Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
1973 When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
1974 by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
1975 not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
1977 *** Changes in GDB 6.1:
1979 * Removed --with-mmalloc
1981 Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
1982 conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
1984 * Changes in AMD64 configurations
1986 The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
1987 the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
1988 and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
1989 you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
1991 * Revised SPARC target
1993 The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
1994 FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
1995 support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
1996 from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
1997 (Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
2001 GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
2002 names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
2003 with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
2006 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
2008 GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
2009 arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
2012 * C++ nested types and namespaces
2014 GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
2015 improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
2016 is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
2017 Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
2018 namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
2019 "Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
2020 frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
2021 if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
2022 GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
2024 * New native configurations
2026 NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
2027 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2028 OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
2029 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
2030 OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
2032 * New debugging protocols
2034 M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
2036 * "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
2038 The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
2039 and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
2040 tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
2042 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2044 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2045 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2046 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2047 permanently REMOVED.
2049 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
2050 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
2051 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
2052 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
2053 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
2054 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
2055 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
2056 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
2057 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
2058 sonymips mips-sony-*
2059 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
2061 * REMOVED configurations and files
2063 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
2064 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
2065 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2066 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
2067 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2068 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
2069 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2070 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
2071 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2072 386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
2073 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
2074 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
2075 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
2076 SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
2077 SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
2078 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2079 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
2081 *** Changes in GDB 6.0:
2085 Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
2086 integrated into GDB.
2088 * New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
2090 DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
2091 information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
2092 By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
2095 The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
2096 have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
2097 DWARF 2 CFI support.
2101 GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
2102 file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
2103 remote protocol documentation for details.
2105 * All targets using the new architecture framework.
2107 All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
2108 architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
2109 to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
2112 * GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
2114 GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
2115 per-thread variables.
2117 * GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
2119 GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
2120 GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
2122 * Separate debug info.
2124 GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
2125 automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
2126 of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
2127 system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
2128 and optional debug files.
2130 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
2132 DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
2133 describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
2136 GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
2137 for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
2141 A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
2142 Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
2143 considered "useable".
2145 * GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
2147 The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
2148 commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
2151 * GDB supports logging output to a file
2153 There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
2154 used to capture GDB's output to a file.
2156 * The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
2158 The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
2159 disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
2162 * d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
2164 The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
2165 registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
2169 A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
2170 be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
2171 session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
2172 "--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
2173 data, for more informative profiling results.
2175 * Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
2177 The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
2178 option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
2179 "mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
2181 Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
2184 Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
2185 Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
2186 Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
2187 in a subsequent -var-update.
2189 * New native configurations.
2191 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
2193 * Multi-arched targets.
2195 HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
2196 Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
2198 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2200 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2201 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2202 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2203 permanently REMOVED.
2205 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2206 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
2207 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2208 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
2209 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2210 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
2211 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2212 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
2213 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
2214 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
2215 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2216 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
2218 * REMOVED configurations and files
2221 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2222 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
2223 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
2224 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
2225 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
2226 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
2228 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
2229 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
2230 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
2231 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
2232 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2233 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
2235 * MIPS $fp behavior changed
2237 The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
2238 the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
2239 context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
2240 address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
2241 The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
2243 *** Changes in GDB 5.3:
2245 * GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
2247 When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
2248 `/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
2249 in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
2250 library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
2251 shared libs like mad''.
2253 * ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
2255 Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
2256 the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
2257 arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
2258 powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
2260 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
2262 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
2263 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
2266 The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
2267 invocations in expression, and shows the result.
2269 The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
2270 macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
2272 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
2273 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
2274 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
2275 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
2277 * Multi-arched targets.
2279 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
2280 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
2282 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
2283 Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
2284 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
2288 Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
2291 * New native configurations
2293 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
2294 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
2295 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
2296 UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
2298 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2300 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2301 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2302 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2303 permanently REMOVED.
2305 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
2306 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2307 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
2308 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
2309 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2310 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
2311 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
2312 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
2313 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
2314 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
2316 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
2317 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
2319 * OBSOLETE languages
2321 CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
2323 * REMOVED configurations and files
2325 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
2326 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2327 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2328 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2329 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2331 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
2333 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
2335 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
2336 commands. The default is 1024.
2338 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
2340 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
2342 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
2344 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
2345 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
2346 from a file into memory (restore).
2348 * Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
2350 The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
2351 including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
2352 of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
2354 *** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
2362 gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
2363 mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
2364 Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
2366 gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
2367 dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
2368 Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
2370 Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
2371 Surprisingly enough, it works now.
2372 By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
2374 i386 hardware watchpoint support:
2375 avoid misses on second run for some targets.
2376 By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
2378 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
2380 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
2382 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
2383 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
2384 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
2385 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
2386 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
2387 (notably embedded) targets.
2389 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
2391 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
2392 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
2393 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
2394 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
2396 * New command line option
2398 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
2400 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
2402 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
2403 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
2404 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
2405 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
2406 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
2407 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
2408 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
2409 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
2410 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
2411 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
2413 * Changes in ARM configurations.
2415 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
2416 configuration is fully multi-arch.
2418 * New native configurations
2420 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
2421 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
2422 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
2423 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
2427 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
2429 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2431 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2432 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2433 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2434 permanently REMOVED.
2436 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
2437 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2438 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2439 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2440 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2442 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
2444 * REMOVED configurations and files
2446 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2448 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2449 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2450 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
2451 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
2452 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
2453 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
2454 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
2455 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
2456 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
2457 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
2458 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
2460 * Changes to command line processing
2462 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
2463 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
2465 * Changes to key bindings
2467 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
2469 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
2471 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
2473 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
2476 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
2478 Numerous documentation fixes.
2480 Numerous testsuite fixes.
2482 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
2484 * New native configurations
2486 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
2487 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
2488 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
2489 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
2490 ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
2491 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
2495 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
2497 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
2499 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2501 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
2502 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
2503 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
2504 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
2505 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2507 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
2508 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2509 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2510 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
2511 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
2512 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
2513 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
2514 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
2516 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
2517 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
2519 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2520 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2521 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2522 permanently REMOVED.
2524 * REMOVED configurations and files
2526 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
2527 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
2529 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
2533 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
2535 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
2536 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
2541 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
2543 * The MI enabled by default.
2545 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
2546 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
2547 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
2548 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
2549 which is now deprecated.
2551 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
2553 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
2554 main features are supported:
2556 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
2558 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
2561 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
2563 - a Pascal expression parser.
2565 However, some important features are not yet supported.
2567 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
2569 - there are some problems with boolean types;
2571 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
2572 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
2574 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
2576 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
2578 * Changes in completion.
2580 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
2581 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
2582 users expect at the shell prompt.
2584 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
2585 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
2586 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
2587 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
2588 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
2589 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
2590 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
2592 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
2594 * New platform-independent commands:
2596 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
2597 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
2598 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
2600 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
2602 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
2603 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
2604 many threads as your system allows you to have.
2606 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
2608 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
2609 multi-threaded programs though.
2611 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
2613 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
2615 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
2616 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
2619 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
2621 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
2622 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
2623 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
2624 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
2625 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
2628 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
2629 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
2630 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
2632 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
2634 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
2635 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
2637 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
2638 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
2641 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
2642 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
2643 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
2644 a given linear address.
2646 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
2647 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
2648 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
2650 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
2652 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
2654 * Changes in documentation.
2656 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
2657 Documentation License.
2659 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
2662 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
2664 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
2667 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
2668 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
2669 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
2671 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
2673 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
2674 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
2675 contents of this file.
2679 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
2681 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
2683 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
2685 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
2686 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
2687 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
2688 greater level of detail.
2690 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
2692 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
2693 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
2694 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
2697 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
2699 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
2700 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
2701 machines ``out of the box''.
2703 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
2704 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
2705 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
2706 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
2707 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
2709 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
2710 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
2711 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
2712 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
2713 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
2715 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
2716 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
2719 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
2722 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
2723 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
2724 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
2725 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
2727 * New native configurations
2729 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
2730 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
2734 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
2735 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
2736 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
2737 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2739 * OBSOLETE configurations
2741 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
2742 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
2744 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
2747 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
2748 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
2749 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
2750 be permanently REMOVED.
2752 * Gould support removed
2754 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
2756 * New features for SVR4
2758 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
2759 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
2760 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
2762 * Many C++ enhancements
2764 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
2765 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
2767 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
2769 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
2770 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
2771 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
2772 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
2774 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
2775 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
2777 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
2779 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
2780 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
2781 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
2783 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
2784 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
2786 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
2788 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
2789 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
2790 include ``set remote P-packet''.
2792 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
2794 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
2795 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
2796 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
2798 * ``apropos'' command added.
2800 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
2801 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
2802 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
2806 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
2807 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
2808 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
2809 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
2810 enabled by configuring with:
2812 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
2814 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
2816 * New native configurations
2818 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
2819 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
2820 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
2824 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
2825 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
2826 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
2828 * OBSOLETE configurations
2830 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
2832 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
2833 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
2834 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
2835 be permanently REMOVED.
2839 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
2840 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
2841 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
2842 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
2843 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
2844 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
2845 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
2850 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
2852 * set extension-language
2854 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
2855 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
2856 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
2857 set extension-language .c c++
2858 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
2859 and their associated languages.
2861 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
2863 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
2864 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
2865 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
2869 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
2870 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
2872 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
2873 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
2875 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
2876 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
2877 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
2878 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
2879 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
2880 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
2881 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
2882 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
2884 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
2885 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
2886 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
2887 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
2891 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
2892 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
2893 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
2894 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
2895 for xdb and dbx commands.
2899 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
2900 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
2901 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
2903 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
2904 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
2905 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
2907 * Debugging across forks
2909 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
2914 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
2915 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
2916 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
2918 * GDB remote protocol additions
2920 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
2921 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
2922 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
2923 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
2925 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
2926 full 64-bit address. The command
2928 set remoteaddresssize 32
2930 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
2931 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
2934 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
2935 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
2937 maint packet heythere
2939 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
2940 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
2943 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
2944 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
2945 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
2947 * Tracing can collect general expressions
2949 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
2950 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
2951 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
2953 * mask-address variable for Mips
2955 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
2956 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
2957 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
2959 * Higher serial baud rates
2961 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
2962 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
2963 to achieve all of these rates.)
2967 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
2968 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
2971 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
2973 * New native configurations
2975 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
2976 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
2977 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
2978 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
2979 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2980 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
2981 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
2985 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
2986 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
2987 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
2988 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
2989 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
2990 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
2991 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
2992 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
2993 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
2994 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2995 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
2997 * New debugging protocols
2999 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
3000 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
3001 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
3002 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
3003 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
3004 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
3008 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
3009 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
3014 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
3015 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
3017 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
3019 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
3020 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
3021 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
3023 * Live range splitting
3025 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
3026 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
3027 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
3031 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
3032 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
3036 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
3037 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
3038 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
3043 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
3048 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
3049 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
3050 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
3051 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
3052 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
3053 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
3057 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
3058 the symbol at the specified address.
3062 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
3063 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
3064 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
3065 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
3066 file tracepoint.c for more details.
3070 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
3071 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
3072 of most MIPS variants.
3076 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
3077 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
3078 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
3082 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
3083 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
3084 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
3085 the possible architectures.
3087 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
3089 * New native configurations
3091 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
3092 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
3093 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
3094 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
3095 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
3096 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
3100 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
3101 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
3102 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
3103 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
3104 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
3106 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
3110 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
3111 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
3112 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
3113 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
3114 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
3118 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
3120 * Windows 95/NT native
3122 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
3123 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
3124 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
3125 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
3126 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
3128 * dont-repeat command
3130 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
3131 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
3132 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
3133 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
3135 * Send break instead of ^C
3137 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
3138 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
3139 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
3141 * Remote protocol timeout
3143 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
3144 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
3145 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
3147 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
3149 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
3150 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
3151 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
3152 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
3153 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
3155 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
3156 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
3157 automatically on hpux10.
3159 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
3161 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
3163 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
3165 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
3166 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
3167 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
3168 every character. The default value is 1050.
3170 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
3172 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
3173 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
3174 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
3175 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
3176 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
3177 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
3179 * Speedups for remote debugging
3181 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
3182 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
3183 and more efficient S-record downloading.
3185 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
3187 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
3188 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
3190 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
3192 * Psymtabs for XCOFF
3194 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
3195 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
3197 * Remote targets use caching
3199 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
3200 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
3201 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
3202 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
3203 off' turns the the data cache off.
3205 * Remote targets may have threads
3207 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
3208 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
3209 gdb/remote.c for details.
3213 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
3214 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
3215 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
3216 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
3217 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
3218 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
3219 sequence is something like
3221 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
3223 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
3227 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
3228 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
3229 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
3230 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
3231 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
3232 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
3233 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
3234 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
3238 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
3239 but does simplify configuration and building.
3243 GDB now supports hpux10.
3245 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
3247 * New native configurations
3249 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
3250 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
3251 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
3252 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
3256 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
3257 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
3258 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
3259 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
3262 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
3264 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
3265 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
3266 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
3267 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
3268 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
3270 * Arguments to user-defined commands
3272 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
3273 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
3276 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
3278 To execute the command use:
3281 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
3282 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
3283 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
3285 * New `if' and `while' commands
3287 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
3288 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
3289 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
3290 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
3291 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
3292 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
3293 if the expression is zero.
3295 * Fortran source language mode
3297 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
3298 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
3299 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
3300 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
3303 * Better HPUX support
3305 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
3306 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
3307 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
3308 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
3309 that behavior do the following before running the program:
3315 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
3316 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
3322 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
3323 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
3326 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
3327 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
3329 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
3331 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
3332 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
3333 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
3334 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
3335 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
3336 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
3338 * New DOS host serial code
3340 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
3341 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
3344 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
3346 * New "complete" command
3348 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
3349 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
3351 * Trailing space optional in prompt
3353 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
3354 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
3356 * Breakpoint hit counts
3358 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
3359 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
3360 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
3361 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
3362 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
3365 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
3367 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
3368 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
3369 arrays actually contain only short strings.
3371 * Shared library breakpoints
3373 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
3374 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
3376 * Hardware watchpoints
3378 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
3379 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
3381 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
3385 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
3386 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
3388 * Improved Irix 5 support
3390 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
3392 * Improved HPPA support
3394 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
3396 * New native configurations
3398 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
3399 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
3400 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
3401 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
3405 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
3406 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
3409 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
3411 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
3412 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
3416 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
3417 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
3419 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
3421 * Irix 5 is now supported
3425 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
3426 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
3427 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
3428 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
3429 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
3432 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
3434 * User visible changes:
3438 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
3439 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
3440 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
3441 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
3442 debugging info for the mips target).
3444 * DEC Alpha native support
3446 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
3447 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
3448 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
3449 Alpha-specific notes.
3451 * Preliminary thread implementation
3453 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
3455 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
3457 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
3458 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
3461 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
3463 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
3464 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
3465 call methods, ...etc.
3467 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
3469 * User visible changes:
3471 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
3472 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
3473 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
3474 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
3476 Filename completion now works.
3478 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
3479 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
3480 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
3482 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
3483 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
3484 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
3485 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
3486 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
3490 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
3491 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
3494 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
3498 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
3499 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
3500 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
3504 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
3505 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
3506 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
3507 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
3508 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
3512 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
3513 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
3514 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
3516 * New targets supported
3518 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
3519 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
3520 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
3521 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
3522 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
3524 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
3525 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
3526 GO32 memory extender.
3528 * New remote protocols
3530 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
3532 * New source languages supported
3534 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
3535 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
3536 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
3539 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
3541 * HP Precision Architecture supported
3543 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
3544 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
3545 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
3546 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
3547 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
3548 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
3550 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
3552 * Faster and better demangling
3554 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
3555 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
3556 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
3557 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
3558 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
3559 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
3562 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
3563 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
3564 compiler does not actually implement.
3566 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
3568 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
3569 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
3570 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
3571 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
3572 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
3573 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
3576 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
3577 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
3579 * Improved configure script
3581 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
3582 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
3583 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
3584 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
3586 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
3587 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
3588 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
3589 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
3590 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
3591 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
3593 * Documentation improvements
3595 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
3596 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
3597 before submitting changes.
3599 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
3600 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
3601 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
3602 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
3603 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
3605 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
3606 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
3607 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
3608 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
3609 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
3610 around this problem.
3614 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
3615 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
3616 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
3619 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
3620 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
3622 * New native hosts supported
3624 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
3625 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
3627 * New targets supported
3629 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
3631 * New file formats supported
3633 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
3634 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
3638 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
3640 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
3641 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
3643 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
3644 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
3645 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
3647 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
3648 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
3650 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
3651 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
3652 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
3655 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
3656 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
3657 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
3658 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
3659 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
3661 * Internal improvements
3663 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
3664 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
3666 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
3667 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
3668 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
3669 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
3670 shared code that handles any of them.
3672 * New command line options
3674 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
3678 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
3679 General Public License.
3681 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
3683 * Host/native/target split
3685 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
3686 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
3687 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
3688 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
3689 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
3691 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
3692 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
3693 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
3694 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
3695 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
3696 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
3697 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
3699 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
3700 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
3701 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
3703 * New hosts supported
3705 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
3706 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
3707 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
3709 * New targets supported
3711 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
3712 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
3714 * New native hosts supported
3716 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
3717 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
3718 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
3720 * New file formats supported
3722 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
3723 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
3724 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
3728 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
3729 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
3730 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
3732 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
3734 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
3735 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
3736 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
3737 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
3741 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
3742 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
3743 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
3745 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
3749 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
3750 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
3753 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
3754 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
3756 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
3757 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
3758 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
3759 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
3760 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
3761 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
3763 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
3764 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
3765 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
3766 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
3770 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
3771 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
3772 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
3773 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
3774 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
3776 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
3777 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
3778 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
3779 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
3783 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
3784 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
3785 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
3786 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
3787 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
3788 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
3789 each instruction being stepped through.
3791 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
3792 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
3794 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
3795 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
3796 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
3797 processor with a serial port.
3801 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
3802 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
3803 supported, and what files each one uses.
3807 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
3808 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
3809 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
3810 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
3812 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
3813 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
3814 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
3815 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
3819 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
3820 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
3821 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
3822 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
3823 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
3824 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
3826 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
3829 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
3831 * Better support for C++ function names
3833 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
3834 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
3835 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
3836 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
3837 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
3839 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
3840 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
3841 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
3842 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
3843 for the list of formats.
3845 * G++ symbol mangling problem
3847 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
3848 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
3849 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
3850 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
3851 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
3852 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
3855 * New 'maintenance' command
3857 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
3858 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
3859 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
3861 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
3862 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
3863 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
3864 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
3865 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
3866 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
3868 The following commands are new:
3870 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
3871 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
3872 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
3874 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
3876 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
3877 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
3878 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
3879 read after argv processing.
3881 * New hosts supported
3883 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
3885 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
3887 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
3888 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
3889 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
3890 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
3891 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
3894 * New targets supported
3896 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
3898 * More smarts about finding #include files
3900 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
3901 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
3902 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
3903 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
3904 the one that contains your sources.
3906 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
3907 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
3908 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
3910 * Interesting infernals change
3912 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
3913 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
3914 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
3915 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
3917 * Bug fixes (of course!)
3919 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
3920 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
3921 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
3923 See the ChangeLog for details.
3925 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
3927 * New machines supported (host and target)
3929 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
3931 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
3933 * New malloc package
3935 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
3936 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
3937 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
3938 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
3939 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
3940 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
3944 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
3945 'help info proc' for details.
3947 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
3949 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
3950 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
3953 * File name changes for MS-DOS
3955 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
3956 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
3957 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
3958 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
3959 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
3960 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
3962 * Cross byte order fixes
3964 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
3965 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
3967 * New -mapped and -readnow options
3969 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
3970 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
3971 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
3972 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
3973 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
3974 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
3975 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
3976 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
3977 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
3978 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
3980 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
3981 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
3982 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
3983 slower, but makes future operations faster.
3985 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
3986 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
3987 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
3990 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
3992 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
3993 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
3994 shared across multiple host platforms.
3996 * longjmp() handling
3998 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
3999 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
4000 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
4001 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
4005 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
4006 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
4011 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
4012 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
4013 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
4015 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
4017 * New machines supported (host and target)
4019 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
4021 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
4022 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
4024 * New machines supported (target)
4026 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
4030 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
4031 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
4032 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
4034 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
4035 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
4036 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
4037 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
4038 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
4041 * New features for SVR4
4043 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
4044 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
4045 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
4047 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
4048 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
4049 it prints the address mappings of the process.
4051 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
4052 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
4054 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
4056 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
4057 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
4058 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
4059 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
4060 same code linked statically.
4064 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
4065 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
4066 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
4067 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
4068 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
4069 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
4073 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
4074 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
4075 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
4078 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
4080 * New machines supported (host and target)
4082 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
4083 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
4084 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
4086 * Almost SCO Unix support
4088 We had hoped to support:
4089 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
4090 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
4091 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
4092 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
4094 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
4096 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
4097 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
4098 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
4099 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
4104 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
4105 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
4106 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
4110 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
4111 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
4112 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
4114 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
4116 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
4117 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
4118 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
4120 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
4121 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
4122 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
4123 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
4126 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
4127 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
4128 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
4129 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
4132 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
4133 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
4136 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
4137 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
4138 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
4141 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
4143 * Improved configuration
4145 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
4146 Porting BFD is simpler.
4150 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
4151 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
4152 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
4153 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
4157 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
4159 * New host supported (not target)
4161 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
4164 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
4166 * Multiple source language support
4168 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
4169 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
4170 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
4171 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
4172 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
4173 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
4177 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
4178 currently under development at the State University of New York at
4179 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
4180 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
4182 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
4183 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
4184 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
4186 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
4187 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
4191 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
4192 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
4193 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
4194 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
4197 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
4199 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
4200 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
4201 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
4202 examining core files.
4206 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
4209 * New machines supported (host and target)
4211 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4212 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
4213 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
4215 * New hosts supported (not targets)
4217 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
4219 * New targets supported (not hosts)
4221 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
4222 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
4223 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
4225 * New remote interfaces
4231 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
4235 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
4237 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
4238 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
4239 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
4240 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
4241 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
4242 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
4243 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
4244 stub on the target system.
4246 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
4248 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
4249 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
4250 object file types such as a.out and coff.
4252 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
4253 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
4256 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
4258 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
4259 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
4261 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
4262 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
4263 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
4265 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
4266 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
4267 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
4268 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
4270 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
4271 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
4272 it is already running. Default is ON.
4274 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
4275 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
4276 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
4277 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
4280 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
4281 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
4282 or the value of the environment variable
4285 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
4286 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
4289 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
4290 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
4291 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
4293 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
4294 history expansion will be performed on
4295 command line input. The default is OFF.
4297 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
4298 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
4299 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
4301 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
4302 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
4303 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
4306 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
4307 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
4308 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
4311 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
4312 ``set width'' instead.
4314 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
4315 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
4316 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
4317 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
4319 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
4322 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
4325 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
4328 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
4331 * Support for Epoch Environment.
4333 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
4334 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
4335 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
4339 * Support for Shared Libraries
4341 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
4342 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
4343 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
4344 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
4345 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
4346 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
4347 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
4348 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
4350 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
4351 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
4352 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
4354 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
4359 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
4360 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
4361 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
4362 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
4363 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
4364 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
4366 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
4368 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
4370 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4371 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4372 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4375 * C++ multiple inheritance
4377 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
4380 * C++ exception handling
4382 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
4383 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
4384 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
4387 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
4388 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
4389 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
4391 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
4392 current stack frame.
4395 * Minor command changes
4397 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
4398 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
4399 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
4401 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
4402 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
4403 frames without printing.
4405 * New directory command
4407 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
4408 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
4409 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
4410 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
4411 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
4413 * Configuring GDB for compilation
4415 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
4418 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
4419 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
4420 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
4421 where the program that you are debugging will run.