1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB 6.6
6 * When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
7 recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
10 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
11 frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
13 * GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
14 32-bit or 64-bit register values.
16 * Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
18 * GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
19 target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
20 a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
22 * Arrays of explicitly SIGNED or UNSIGNED CHARs are now printed as arrays
25 * Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
26 for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
29 * GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
32 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
33 ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
34 has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
36 * GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
38 * GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
42 set mem inaccessible-by-default
43 show mem inaccessible-by-default
44 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
45 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
46 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
47 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
48 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
50 set breakpoint auto-hw
51 show breakpoint auto-hw
52 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
53 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
54 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
55 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
56 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
57 including "next" and "finish".
60 catch exception unhandled
61 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
64 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
68 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
69 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
70 an alias to "set sysroot".
72 * New native configurations
74 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
79 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
80 not query the target for its built-in description.
84 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
85 MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
86 Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
91 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
92 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
95 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
100 Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
109 i[34567]86-*-netware*
110 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
111 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
113 i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
116 i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
117 i[34567]86-*-unixware*
126 * Other removed features
133 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
140 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
145 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
146 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
151 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
152 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
154 Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
156 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
157 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
158 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
159 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
163 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
164 in debugging information.
168 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
169 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
171 *** Changes in GDB 6.6
176 Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
178 * GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
179 (mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
180 running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
182 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
183 Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
186 * The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
187 broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
189 * The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
190 stub provides the required support.
192 * Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
193 longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
198 unset substitute-path
200 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
201 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
202 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
203 between compilation and debugging.
207 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
208 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
209 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
213 The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
215 Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
216 an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
218 The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
223 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
224 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
225 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
226 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
230 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
231 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
233 qXfer:memory-map:read:
234 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
235 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
240 Erase and program a flash memory device.
242 * Removed remote packets
245 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
246 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
248 *** Changes in GDB 6.5
252 Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
254 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
258 init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
259 only if it doesn't already have a value.
261 The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
263 checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
265 restart <n> Return the program state to a
266 previously saved state.
268 info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
270 delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
272 set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
273 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
275 info forks List forks of the user program that
276 are available to be debugged.
278 fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
279 forks of the user program that are
280 available to be debugged.
282 delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
283 that are available to be debugged (and
284 kill the forked process).
286 detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
287 that are available to be debugged (and
288 allow the process to continue).
292 Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
294 * Improved Windows host support
296 GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
297 native console support, and remote communications using either
298 network sockets or serial ports.
300 * Improved Modula-2 language support
302 GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
303 basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
304 pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
305 printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
306 written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
307 GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
311 The ARM rdi-share module.
313 The Netware NLM debug server.
315 *** Changes in GDB 6.4
317 * New native configurations
319 OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
320 OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
324 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
326 * New command line options
328 --batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
329 --return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
330 the child (debugged) program exited with.
331 --eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
332 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
333 specified multiple times and in conjunction
334 with the --command (-x) option.
336 * Deprecated commands removed
338 The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
342 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
343 othernames set arm disassembler
344 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
345 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
346 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
349 * New BSD user-level threads support
351 It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
352 library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
355 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
356 FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
357 OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
359 Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
360 are not yet supported.
362 * New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
363 (Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
365 * REMOVED configurations and files
367 VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
368 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
369 National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
371 * New "set print array-indexes" command
373 After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
374 when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
377 * VAX floating point support
379 GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
381 * User-defined command support
383 In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
384 to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
385 section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
387 *** Changes in GDB 6.3:
389 * New command line option
391 GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
394 * GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
396 GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
397 information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
398 by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
399 proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
400 to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
402 * Internationalization
404 When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
405 internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
406 continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
410 Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
411 implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
412 into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
414 * New native configurations
416 GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
420 GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
421 packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
423 * END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
425 GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
426 The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
427 features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
430 GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
431 compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
432 continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
444 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
445 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
447 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
449 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
450 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
451 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
461 *** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
463 * MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
465 When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
466 heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
469 * MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
471 When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
472 fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
473 IRIX long double values).
477 A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
478 command. This problem has been fixed.
480 *** Changes in GDB 6.2:
482 * Fix for ``many threads''
484 On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
485 rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
488 ptrace: No such process.
489 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
491 This problem has been fixed.
493 * "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
495 Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
498 * New ``start'' command.
500 This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
502 * New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
504 Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
505 live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
506 platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
508 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
509 FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
510 NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
511 NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
512 NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
513 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
514 OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
515 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
516 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
518 * Signal trampoline code overhauled
520 Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
521 These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
522 of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
523 call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
524 signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
526 Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
527 features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
528 include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
530 * Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
532 * New native configurations
534 GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
535 OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
536 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
537 OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
538 OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
539 NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
540 OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
542 * END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
544 GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
545 The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
546 including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
547 migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
548 compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
549 work, was also included.
551 GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
552 module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
562 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
563 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
565 * REMOVED configurations and files
567 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
568 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
569 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
570 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
571 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
572 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
573 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
574 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
575 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
577 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
579 *** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
581 * TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
583 The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
584 GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
585 command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
586 program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
589 * Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
591 Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
592 libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
593 cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
594 GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
595 shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
596 the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
599 Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
601 * Fixed ISO-C build problems
603 The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
604 non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
605 compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
607 * Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
609 Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
610 wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
612 * Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
614 The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
615 permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
616 systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
618 * Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
620 Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
621 has been updated to use constant array sizes.
623 * Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
625 GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
626 its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
627 panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
629 * Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
631 When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
632 by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
633 not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
635 *** Changes in GDB 6.1:
637 * Removed --with-mmalloc
639 Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
640 conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
642 * Changes in AMD64 configurations
644 The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
645 the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
646 and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
647 you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
649 * Revised SPARC target
651 The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
652 FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
653 support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
654 from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
655 (Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
659 GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
660 names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
661 with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
664 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
666 GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
667 arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
670 * C++ nested types and namespaces
672 GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
673 improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
674 is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
675 Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
676 namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
677 "Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
678 frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
679 if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
680 GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
682 * New native configurations
684 NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
685 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
686 OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
687 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
688 OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
690 * New debugging protocols
692 M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
694 * "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
696 The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
697 and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
698 tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
700 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
702 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
703 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
704 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
707 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
708 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
709 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
710 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
711 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
712 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
713 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
714 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
715 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
717 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
719 * REMOVED configurations and files
721 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
722 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
723 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
724 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
725 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
726 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
727 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
728 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
729 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
730 386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
731 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
732 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
733 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
734 SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
735 SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
736 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
737 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
739 *** Changes in GDB 6.0:
743 Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
746 * New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
748 DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
749 information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
750 By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
753 The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
754 have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
759 GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
760 file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
761 remote protocol documentation for details.
763 * All targets using the new architecture framework.
765 All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
766 architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
767 to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
770 * GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
772 GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
773 per-thread variables.
775 * GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
777 GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
778 GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
780 * Separate debug info.
782 GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
783 automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
784 of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
785 system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
786 and optional debug files.
788 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
790 DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
791 describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
794 GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
795 for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
799 A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
800 Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
801 considered "useable".
803 * GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
805 The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
806 commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
809 * GDB supports logging output to a file
811 There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
812 used to capture GDB's output to a file.
814 * The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
816 The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
817 disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
820 * d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
822 The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
823 registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
827 A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
828 be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
829 session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
830 "--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
831 data, for more informative profiling results.
833 * Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
835 The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
836 option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
837 "mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
839 Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
842 Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
843 Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
844 Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
845 in a subsequent -var-update.
847 * New native configurations.
849 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
851 * Multi-arched targets.
853 HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
854 Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
856 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
858 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
859 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
860 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
863 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
864 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
865 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
866 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
867 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
868 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
869 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
870 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
871 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
872 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
873 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
874 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
876 * REMOVED configurations and files
879 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
880 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
881 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
882 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
883 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
884 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
886 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
887 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
888 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
889 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
890 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
891 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
893 * MIPS $fp behavior changed
895 The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
896 the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
897 context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
898 address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
899 The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
901 *** Changes in GDB 5.3:
903 * GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
905 When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
906 `/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
907 in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
908 library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
909 shared libs like mad''.
911 * ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
913 Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
914 the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
915 arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
916 powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
918 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
920 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
921 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
924 The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
925 invocations in expression, and shows the result.
927 The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
928 macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
930 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
931 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
932 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
933 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
935 * Multi-arched targets.
937 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
938 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
940 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
941 Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
942 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
946 Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
949 * New native configurations
951 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
952 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
953 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
954 UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
956 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
958 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
959 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
960 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
963 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
964 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
965 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
966 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
967 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
968 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
969 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
970 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
971 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
972 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
974 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
975 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
979 CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
981 * REMOVED configurations and files
983 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
984 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
985 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
986 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
987 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
989 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
991 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
993 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
994 commands. The default is 1024.
996 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
998 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
1000 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
1002 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
1003 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
1004 from a file into memory (restore).
1006 * Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
1008 The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
1009 including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
1010 of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
1012 *** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
1020 gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
1021 mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
1022 Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
1024 gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
1025 dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
1026 Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
1028 Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
1029 Surprisingly enough, it works now.
1030 By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
1032 i386 hardware watchpoint support:
1033 avoid misses on second run for some targets.
1034 By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
1036 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
1038 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
1040 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
1041 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
1042 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
1043 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
1044 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
1045 (notably embedded) targets.
1047 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
1049 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
1050 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
1051 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
1052 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
1054 * New command line option
1056 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
1058 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
1060 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
1061 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
1062 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
1063 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
1064 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
1065 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
1066 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
1067 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
1068 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
1069 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
1071 * Changes in ARM configurations.
1073 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
1074 configuration is fully multi-arch.
1076 * New native configurations
1078 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
1079 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
1080 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
1081 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
1085 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
1087 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1089 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1090 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1091 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1092 permanently REMOVED.
1094 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1095 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1096 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1097 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1098 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1100 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
1102 * REMOVED configurations and files
1104 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1106 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1107 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1108 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
1109 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1110 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1111 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
1112 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
1113 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1114 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1115 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
1116 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
1118 * Changes to command line processing
1120 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
1121 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
1123 * Changes to key bindings
1125 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
1127 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
1129 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
1131 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
1134 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
1136 Numerous documentation fixes.
1138 Numerous testsuite fixes.
1140 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
1142 * New native configurations
1144 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
1145 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
1146 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
1147 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1148 ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
1149 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
1153 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
1155 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
1157 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1159 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
1160 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1161 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1162 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
1163 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1165 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1166 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1167 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1168 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
1169 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
1170 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1171 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
1172 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
1174 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
1175 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
1177 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1178 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1179 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1180 permanently REMOVED.
1182 * REMOVED configurations and files
1184 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1185 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
1187 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
1191 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
1193 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
1194 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
1199 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
1201 * The MI enabled by default.
1203 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
1204 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
1205 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
1206 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
1207 which is now deprecated.
1209 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
1211 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
1212 main features are supported:
1214 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
1216 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
1219 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
1221 - a Pascal expression parser.
1223 However, some important features are not yet supported.
1225 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
1227 - there are some problems with boolean types;
1229 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
1230 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
1232 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
1234 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
1236 * Changes in completion.
1238 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
1239 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
1240 users expect at the shell prompt.
1242 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
1243 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
1244 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
1245 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
1246 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
1247 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
1248 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
1250 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
1252 * New platform-independent commands:
1254 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
1255 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
1256 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
1258 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
1260 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
1261 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
1262 many threads as your system allows you to have.
1264 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
1266 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
1267 multi-threaded programs though.
1269 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
1271 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
1273 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
1274 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
1277 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
1279 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
1280 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
1281 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
1282 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
1283 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
1286 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
1287 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
1288 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
1290 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
1292 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
1293 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
1295 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
1296 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
1299 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
1300 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
1301 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
1302 a given linear address.
1304 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
1305 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
1306 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
1308 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
1310 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
1312 * Changes in documentation.
1314 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
1315 Documentation License.
1317 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1320 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
1322 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1325 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
1326 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
1327 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
1329 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
1331 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
1332 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
1333 contents of this file.
1337 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
1339 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
1341 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
1343 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
1344 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
1345 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
1346 greater level of detail.
1348 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
1350 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
1351 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
1352 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
1355 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
1357 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
1358 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
1359 machines ``out of the box''.
1361 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
1362 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
1363 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
1364 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
1365 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
1367 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
1368 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
1369 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
1370 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
1371 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
1373 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
1374 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
1377 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
1380 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
1381 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
1382 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
1383 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
1385 * New native configurations
1387 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
1388 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
1392 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
1393 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
1394 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
1395 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1397 * OBSOLETE configurations
1399 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1400 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
1402 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
1405 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1406 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1407 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1408 be permanently REMOVED.
1410 * Gould support removed
1412 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
1414 * New features for SVR4
1416 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
1417 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
1418 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
1420 * Many C++ enhancements
1422 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
1423 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
1425 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
1427 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
1428 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
1429 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
1430 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
1432 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
1433 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
1435 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
1437 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
1438 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
1439 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
1441 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
1442 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
1444 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
1446 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
1447 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
1448 include ``set remote P-packet''.
1450 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
1452 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
1453 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
1454 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
1456 * ``apropos'' command added.
1458 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
1459 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
1460 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
1464 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
1465 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
1466 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
1467 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
1468 enabled by configuring with:
1470 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
1472 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
1474 * New native configurations
1476 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
1477 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
1478 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
1482 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1483 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
1484 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1486 * OBSOLETE configurations
1488 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
1490 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1491 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1492 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1493 be permanently REMOVED.
1497 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
1498 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
1499 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
1500 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
1501 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
1502 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
1503 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
1508 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
1510 * set extension-language
1512 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
1513 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
1514 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
1515 set extension-language .c c++
1516 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
1517 and their associated languages.
1519 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
1521 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
1522 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
1523 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
1527 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
1528 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
1530 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
1531 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
1533 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
1534 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
1535 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
1536 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
1537 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
1538 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
1539 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
1540 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
1542 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
1543 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
1544 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
1545 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
1549 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
1550 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
1551 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
1552 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
1553 for xdb and dbx commands.
1557 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
1558 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
1559 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
1561 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
1562 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
1563 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
1565 * Debugging across forks
1567 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
1572 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
1573 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
1574 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
1576 * GDB remote protocol additions
1578 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
1579 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
1580 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
1581 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
1583 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
1584 full 64-bit address. The command
1586 set remoteaddresssize 32
1588 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
1589 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
1592 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
1593 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
1595 maint packet heythere
1597 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
1598 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
1601 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
1602 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
1603 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
1605 * Tracing can collect general expressions
1607 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
1608 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
1609 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
1611 * mask-address variable for Mips
1613 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
1614 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
1615 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
1617 * Higher serial baud rates
1619 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
1620 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
1621 to achieve all of these rates.)
1625 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
1626 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
1629 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
1631 * New native configurations
1633 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
1634 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
1635 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1636 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
1637 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1638 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
1639 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
1643 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1644 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
1645 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1646 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
1647 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
1648 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
1649 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
1650 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
1651 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
1652 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1653 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
1655 * New debugging protocols
1657 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
1658 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
1659 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
1660 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1661 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1662 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1666 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
1667 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
1672 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
1673 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
1675 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
1677 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
1678 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
1679 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
1681 * Live range splitting
1683 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
1684 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
1685 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
1689 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
1690 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
1694 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
1695 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
1696 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
1701 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
1706 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
1707 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
1708 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
1709 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
1710 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
1711 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
1715 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
1716 the symbol at the specified address.
1720 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
1721 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
1722 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
1723 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
1724 file tracepoint.c for more details.
1728 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
1729 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
1730 of most MIPS variants.
1734 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
1735 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
1736 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
1740 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
1741 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
1742 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
1743 the possible architectures.
1745 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
1747 * New native configurations
1749 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
1750 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
1751 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
1752 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
1753 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1754 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
1758 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
1759 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1760 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
1761 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
1762 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
1764 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1768 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
1769 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
1770 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
1771 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
1772 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
1776 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
1778 * Windows 95/NT native
1780 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
1781 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
1782 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
1783 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
1784 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
1786 * dont-repeat command
1788 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
1789 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
1790 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
1791 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
1793 * Send break instead of ^C
1795 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
1796 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
1797 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
1799 * Remote protocol timeout
1801 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
1802 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
1803 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
1805 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
1807 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
1808 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
1809 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
1810 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
1811 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
1813 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
1814 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
1815 automatically on hpux10.
1817 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
1819 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
1821 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
1823 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
1824 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
1825 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
1826 every character. The default value is 1050.
1828 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
1830 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
1831 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
1832 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
1833 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
1834 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
1835 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
1837 * Speedups for remote debugging
1839 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
1840 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
1841 and more efficient S-record downloading.
1843 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
1845 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
1846 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
1848 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
1850 * Psymtabs for XCOFF
1852 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
1853 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
1855 * Remote targets use caching
1857 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
1858 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
1859 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
1860 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
1861 off' turns the the data cache off.
1863 * Remote targets may have threads
1865 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
1866 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
1867 gdb/remote.c for details.
1871 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
1872 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
1873 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
1874 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
1875 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
1876 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
1877 sequence is something like
1879 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
1881 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
1885 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
1886 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
1887 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
1888 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
1889 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
1890 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
1891 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
1892 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
1896 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
1897 but does simplify configuration and building.
1901 GDB now supports hpux10.
1903 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
1905 * New native configurations
1907 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
1908 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
1909 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
1910 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
1914 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1915 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
1916 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
1917 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
1920 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
1922 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
1923 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
1924 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
1925 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
1926 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
1928 * Arguments to user-defined commands
1930 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
1931 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
1934 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
1936 To execute the command use:
1939 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
1940 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
1941 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
1943 * New `if' and `while' commands
1945 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
1946 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
1947 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
1948 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
1949 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
1950 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
1951 if the expression is zero.
1953 * Fortran source language mode
1955 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
1956 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
1957 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
1958 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
1961 * Better HPUX support
1963 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
1964 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
1965 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
1966 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
1967 that behavior do the following before running the program:
1973 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
1974 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
1980 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
1981 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
1984 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
1985 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
1987 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
1989 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
1990 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
1991 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
1992 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
1993 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
1994 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
1996 * New DOS host serial code
1998 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
1999 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
2002 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
2004 * New "complete" command
2006 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
2007 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
2009 * Trailing space optional in prompt
2011 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
2012 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
2014 * Breakpoint hit counts
2016 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
2017 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
2018 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
2019 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
2020 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
2023 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
2025 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
2026 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
2027 arrays actually contain only short strings.
2029 * Shared library breakpoints
2031 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
2032 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
2034 * Hardware watchpoints
2036 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
2037 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
2039 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
2043 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
2044 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
2046 * Improved Irix 5 support
2048 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
2050 * Improved HPPA support
2052 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
2054 * New native configurations
2056 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
2057 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2058 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
2059 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
2063 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2064 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
2067 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
2069 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
2070 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
2074 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
2075 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
2077 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
2079 * Irix 5 is now supported
2083 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
2084 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
2085 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
2086 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
2087 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
2090 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
2092 * User visible changes:
2096 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
2097 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
2098 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
2099 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
2100 debugging info for the mips target).
2102 * DEC Alpha native support
2104 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
2105 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
2106 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
2107 Alpha-specific notes.
2109 * Preliminary thread implementation
2111 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
2113 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
2115 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
2116 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
2119 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
2121 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
2122 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
2123 call methods, ...etc.
2125 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
2127 * User visible changes:
2129 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
2130 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
2131 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
2132 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
2134 Filename completion now works.
2136 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
2137 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
2138 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
2140 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
2141 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
2142 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
2143 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
2144 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
2148 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
2149 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
2152 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
2156 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
2157 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
2158 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
2162 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
2163 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
2164 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
2165 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
2166 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
2170 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
2171 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
2172 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
2174 * New targets supported
2176 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2177 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2178 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
2179 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2180 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
2182 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
2183 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
2184 GO32 memory extender.
2186 * New remote protocols
2188 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
2190 * New source languages supported
2192 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
2193 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
2194 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
2197 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
2199 * HP Precision Architecture supported
2201 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
2202 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
2203 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
2204 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
2205 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
2206 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
2208 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
2210 * Faster and better demangling
2212 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
2213 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
2214 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
2215 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
2216 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
2217 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
2220 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
2221 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
2222 compiler does not actually implement.
2224 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
2226 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
2227 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
2228 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
2229 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
2230 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
2231 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
2234 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
2235 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
2237 * Improved configure script
2239 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
2240 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
2241 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
2242 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
2244 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
2245 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
2246 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
2247 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
2248 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
2249 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
2251 * Documentation improvements
2253 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
2254 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
2255 before submitting changes.
2257 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
2258 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
2259 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
2260 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
2261 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
2263 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
2264 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
2265 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
2266 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
2267 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
2268 around this problem.
2272 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
2273 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
2274 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
2277 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
2278 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
2280 * New native hosts supported
2282 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
2283 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
2285 * New targets supported
2287 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
2289 * New file formats supported
2291 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
2292 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
2296 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
2298 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
2299 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
2301 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
2302 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
2303 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
2305 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
2306 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
2308 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
2309 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
2310 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
2313 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
2314 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
2315 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
2316 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
2317 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
2319 * Internal improvements
2321 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
2322 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
2324 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
2325 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
2326 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
2327 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
2328 shared code that handles any of them.
2330 * New command line options
2332 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
2336 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
2337 General Public License.
2339 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
2341 * Host/native/target split
2343 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
2344 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
2345 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
2346 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
2347 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
2349 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
2350 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
2351 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
2352 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
2353 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
2354 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
2355 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
2357 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
2358 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
2359 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
2361 * New hosts supported
2363 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
2364 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2365 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
2367 * New targets supported
2369 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
2370 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
2372 * New native hosts supported
2374 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2375 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
2376 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
2378 * New file formats supported
2380 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
2381 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
2382 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
2386 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
2387 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
2388 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
2390 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
2392 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
2393 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
2394 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
2395 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
2399 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
2400 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
2401 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
2403 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
2407 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
2408 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
2411 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
2412 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
2414 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
2415 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
2416 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
2417 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
2418 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
2419 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
2421 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
2422 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
2423 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
2424 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
2428 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
2429 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
2430 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
2431 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
2432 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
2434 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
2435 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
2436 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
2437 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
2441 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
2442 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
2443 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
2444 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
2445 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
2446 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
2447 each instruction being stepped through.
2449 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
2450 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
2452 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
2453 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
2454 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
2455 processor with a serial port.
2459 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
2460 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
2461 supported, and what files each one uses.
2465 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
2466 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
2467 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
2468 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
2470 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
2471 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
2472 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
2473 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
2477 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
2478 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
2479 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
2480 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
2481 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
2482 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
2484 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
2487 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
2489 * Better support for C++ function names
2491 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
2492 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
2493 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
2494 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
2495 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
2497 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
2498 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
2499 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
2500 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
2501 for the list of formats.
2503 * G++ symbol mangling problem
2505 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
2506 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
2507 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
2508 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
2509 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
2510 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
2513 * New 'maintenance' command
2515 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
2516 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
2517 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
2519 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
2520 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
2521 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
2522 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
2523 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
2524 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
2526 The following commands are new:
2528 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
2529 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
2530 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
2532 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
2534 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
2535 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
2536 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
2537 read after argv processing.
2539 * New hosts supported
2541 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
2543 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
2545 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
2546 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
2547 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
2548 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
2549 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
2552 * New targets supported
2554 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2556 * More smarts about finding #include files
2558 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
2559 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
2560 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
2561 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
2562 the one that contains your sources.
2564 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
2565 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
2566 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
2568 * Interesting infernals change
2570 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
2571 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
2572 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
2573 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
2575 * Bug fixes (of course!)
2577 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
2578 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
2579 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
2581 See the ChangeLog for details.
2583 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
2585 * New machines supported (host and target)
2587 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
2589 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
2591 * New malloc package
2593 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
2594 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
2595 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
2596 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
2597 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
2598 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
2602 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
2603 'help info proc' for details.
2605 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
2607 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
2608 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
2611 * File name changes for MS-DOS
2613 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
2614 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
2615 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
2616 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
2617 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
2618 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
2620 * Cross byte order fixes
2622 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
2623 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
2625 * New -mapped and -readnow options
2627 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
2628 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
2629 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
2630 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
2631 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
2632 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
2633 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
2634 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
2635 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
2636 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
2638 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
2639 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
2640 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
2641 slower, but makes future operations faster.
2643 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
2644 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
2645 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
2648 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
2650 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
2651 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
2652 shared across multiple host platforms.
2654 * longjmp() handling
2656 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
2657 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
2658 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
2659 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
2663 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
2664 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
2669 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
2670 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
2671 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
2673 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
2675 * New machines supported (host and target)
2677 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2679 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
2680 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
2682 * New machines supported (target)
2684 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2688 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
2689 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
2690 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
2692 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
2693 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
2694 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
2695 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
2696 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
2699 * New features for SVR4
2701 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
2702 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
2703 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
2705 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
2706 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
2707 it prints the address mappings of the process.
2709 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
2710 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
2712 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
2714 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
2715 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
2716 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
2717 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
2718 same code linked statically.
2722 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
2723 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
2724 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
2725 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
2726 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
2727 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
2731 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
2732 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
2733 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
2736 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
2738 * New machines supported (host and target)
2740 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
2741 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
2742 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2744 * Almost SCO Unix support
2746 We had hoped to support:
2747 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2748 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
2749 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
2750 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
2752 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
2754 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
2755 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
2756 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
2757 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
2762 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
2763 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
2764 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
2768 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
2769 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
2770 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
2772 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
2774 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
2775 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
2776 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
2778 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
2779 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
2780 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
2781 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
2784 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
2785 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
2786 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
2787 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
2790 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
2791 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
2794 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
2795 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
2796 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
2799 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
2801 * Improved configuration
2803 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
2804 Porting BFD is simpler.
2808 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
2809 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
2810 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
2811 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
2815 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
2817 * New host supported (not target)
2819 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
2822 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
2824 * Multiple source language support
2826 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
2827 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
2828 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
2829 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
2830 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
2831 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
2835 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
2836 currently under development at the State University of New York at
2837 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
2838 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
2840 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
2841 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
2842 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
2844 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
2845 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
2849 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
2850 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
2851 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
2852 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
2855 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
2857 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
2858 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
2859 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
2860 examining core files.
2864 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
2867 * New machines supported (host and target)
2869 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
2870 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
2871 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
2873 * New hosts supported (not targets)
2875 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
2877 * New targets supported (not hosts)
2879 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2880 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2881 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
2883 * New remote interfaces
2889 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
2893 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
2895 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
2896 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
2897 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
2898 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
2899 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
2900 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
2901 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
2902 stub on the target system.
2904 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
2906 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
2907 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
2908 object file types such as a.out and coff.
2910 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
2911 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
2914 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
2916 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
2917 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
2919 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
2920 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
2921 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
2923 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
2924 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
2925 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
2926 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
2928 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
2929 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
2930 it is already running. Default is ON.
2932 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
2933 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
2934 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
2935 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
2938 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
2939 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
2940 or the value of the environment variable
2943 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
2944 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
2947 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
2948 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
2949 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
2951 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
2952 history expansion will be performed on
2953 command line input. The default is OFF.
2955 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
2956 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
2957 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
2959 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
2960 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
2961 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2964 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
2965 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
2966 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2969 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
2970 ``set width'' instead.
2972 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
2973 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
2974 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
2975 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
2977 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
2980 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
2983 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
2986 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
2989 * Support for Epoch Environment.
2991 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
2992 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
2993 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
2997 * Support for Shared Libraries
2999 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
3000 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
3001 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
3002 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
3003 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
3004 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
3005 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
3006 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
3008 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
3009 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
3010 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
3012 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
3017 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
3018 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
3019 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
3020 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
3021 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
3022 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
3024 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
3026 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
3028 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3029 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3030 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3033 * C++ multiple inheritance
3035 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
3038 * C++ exception handling
3040 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
3041 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
3042 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
3045 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
3046 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
3047 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
3049 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
3050 current stack frame.
3053 * Minor command changes
3055 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
3056 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
3057 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
3059 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
3060 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
3061 frames without printing.
3063 * New directory command
3065 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
3066 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
3067 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
3068 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
3069 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
3071 * Configuring GDB for compilation
3073 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
3076 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
3077 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
3078 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
3079 where the program that you are debugging will run.