1 What has changed since GDB-3.5?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
6 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
7 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
8 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
9 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
10 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
12 * User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
13 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg0.
16 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
18 To execute the command use:
21 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
22 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
23 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
25 * New "if" and "while" commands. This makes it possible to write
26 somewhat more sophisticated user-defined commands.
28 * Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
29 running hpux9 or later. See the GDB manual for the few minor problems
30 and potential workarounds.
32 * GDB can now read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on HPPAs
33 (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
35 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
37 * New "complete" command
39 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
40 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
42 * Trailing space optional in prompt
44 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
45 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
47 * Breakpoint hit counts
49 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
50 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
51 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
52 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
53 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
56 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
58 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
59 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
60 arrays actually contain only short strings.
62 * Shared library breakpoints
64 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
65 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
67 * Hardware watchpoints
69 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
70 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
72 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under Linux.
76 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
77 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
79 * Improved Irix 5 support
81 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
83 * Improved HPPA support
85 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
87 * New native configurations
89 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
90 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
91 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
92 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
96 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
97 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
100 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
102 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
103 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
107 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
108 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
110 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
112 * Irix 5 is now supported
116 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
117 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
118 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
119 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
120 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
123 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
125 * User visible changes:
129 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
130 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
131 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
132 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
133 debugging info for the mips target).
135 * DEC Alpha native support
137 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
138 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
139 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
140 Alpha-specific notes.
142 * Preliminary thread implementation
144 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
146 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
148 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
149 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
152 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
154 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
155 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
156 call methods, ...etc.
158 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
160 * User visible changes:
162 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
163 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
164 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
165 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
167 Filename completion now works.
169 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
170 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
171 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
173 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
174 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
175 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
176 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
177 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
181 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
182 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
185 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
189 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
190 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
191 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
195 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
196 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
197 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
198 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
199 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
203 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
204 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
205 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
207 * New targets supported
209 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
210 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
211 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
212 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
213 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
215 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
216 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
217 GO32 memory extender.
219 * New remote protocols
221 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
223 * New source languages supported
225 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
226 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
227 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
230 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
232 * HP Precision Architecture supported
234 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
235 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
236 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
237 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
238 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
239 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
241 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
243 * Faster and better demangling
245 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
246 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
247 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
248 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
249 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
250 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
253 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
254 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
255 compiler does not actually implement.
257 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
259 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
260 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
261 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
262 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
263 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
264 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
267 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
268 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
270 * Improved configure script
272 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
273 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
274 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
275 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
277 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
278 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
279 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
280 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
281 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
282 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
284 * Documentation improvements
286 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
287 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
288 before submitting changes.
290 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
291 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
292 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
293 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
294 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
296 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
297 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
298 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
299 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
300 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
305 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
306 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
307 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
310 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
311 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
313 * New native hosts supported
315 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
316 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
318 * New targets supported
320 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
322 * New file formats supported
324 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
325 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
329 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
331 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
332 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
334 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
335 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
336 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
338 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
339 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
341 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
342 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
343 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
346 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
347 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
348 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
349 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
350 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
352 * Internal improvements
354 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
355 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
357 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
358 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
359 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
360 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
361 shared code that handles any of them.
363 * New command line options
365 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
369 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
370 General Public License.
372 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
374 * Host/native/target split
376 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
377 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
378 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
379 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
380 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
382 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
383 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
384 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
385 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
386 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
387 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
388 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
390 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
391 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
392 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
394 * New hosts supported
396 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
397 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
398 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
400 * New targets supported
402 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
403 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
405 * New native hosts supported
407 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
408 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
409 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
411 * New file formats supported
413 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
414 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
415 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
419 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
420 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
421 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
423 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
425 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
426 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
427 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
428 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
432 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
433 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
434 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
436 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
440 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
441 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
444 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
445 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
447 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
448 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
449 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
450 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
451 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
452 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
454 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
455 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
456 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
457 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
461 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
462 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
463 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
464 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
465 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
467 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
468 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
469 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
470 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
474 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
475 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
476 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
477 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
478 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
479 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
480 each instruction being stepped through.
482 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
483 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
485 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
486 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
487 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
488 processor with a serial port.
492 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
493 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
494 supported, and what files each one uses.
498 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
499 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
500 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
501 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
503 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
504 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
505 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
506 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
510 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
511 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
512 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
513 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
514 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
515 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
517 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
520 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
522 * Better support for C++ function names
524 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
525 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
526 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
527 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
528 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
530 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
531 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
532 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
533 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
534 for the list of formats.
536 * G++ symbol mangling problem
538 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
539 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
540 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
541 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
542 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
543 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
546 * New 'maintenance' command
548 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
549 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
550 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
552 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
553 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
554 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
555 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
556 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
557 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
559 The following commands are new:
561 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
562 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
563 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
565 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
567 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
568 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
569 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
570 read after argv processing.
572 * New hosts supported
574 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
576 Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
578 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
579 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
580 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
581 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
582 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
585 * New targets supported
587 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
589 * More smarts about finding #include files
591 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
592 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
593 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
594 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
595 the one that contains your sources.
597 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
598 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
599 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
601 * Interesting infernals change
603 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
604 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
605 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
606 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
608 * Bug fixes (of course!)
610 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
611 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
612 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
614 See the ChangeLog for details.
616 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
618 * New machines supported (host and target)
620 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
622 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
626 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
627 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
628 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
629 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
630 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
631 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
635 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
636 'help info proc' for details.
638 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
640 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
641 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
644 * File name changes for MS-DOS
646 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
647 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
648 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
649 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
650 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
651 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
653 * Cross byte order fixes
655 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
656 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
658 * New -mapped and -readnow options
660 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
661 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
662 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
663 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
664 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
665 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
666 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
667 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
668 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
669 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
671 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
672 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
673 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
674 slower, but makes future operations faster.
676 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
677 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
678 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
681 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
683 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
684 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
685 shared across multiple host platforms.
689 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
690 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
691 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
692 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
696 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
697 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
702 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
703 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
704 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
706 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
708 * New machines supported (host and target)
710 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
712 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
713 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
715 * New machines supported (target)
717 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
721 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
722 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
723 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
725 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
726 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
727 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
728 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
729 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
732 * New features for SVR4
734 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
735 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
736 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
738 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
739 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
740 it prints the address mappings of the process.
742 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
743 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
745 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
747 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
748 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
749 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
750 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
751 same code linked statically.
755 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
756 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
757 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
758 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
759 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
760 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
764 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
765 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
766 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
769 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
771 * New machines supported (host and target)
773 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
774 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
775 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
777 * Almost SCO Unix support
779 We had hoped to support:
780 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
781 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
782 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
783 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
785 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
787 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
788 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
789 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
790 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
795 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
796 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
797 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
801 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
802 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
803 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
805 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
807 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
808 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
809 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
811 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
812 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
813 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
814 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
817 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
818 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
819 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
820 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
823 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
824 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
827 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
828 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
829 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
832 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
834 * Improved configuration
836 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
837 Porting BFD is simpler.
841 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
842 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
843 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
844 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
848 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
850 * New host supported (not target)
852 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
855 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
857 * Multiple source language support
859 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
860 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
861 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
862 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
863 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
864 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
868 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
869 currently under development at the State University of New York at
870 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
871 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
873 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
874 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
875 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
877 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
878 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
882 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
883 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
884 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
885 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
888 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
890 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
891 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
892 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
893 examining core files.
897 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
900 * New machines supported (host and target)
902 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
903 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
904 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
906 * New hosts supported (not targets)
908 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
910 * New targets supported (not hosts)
912 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
913 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
914 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
916 * New remote interfaces
922 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
926 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
928 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
929 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
930 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
931 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
932 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
933 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
934 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
935 stub on the target system.
937 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
939 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
940 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
941 object file types such as a.out and coff.
943 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
944 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
947 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
949 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
950 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
952 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
953 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
954 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
956 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
957 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
958 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
959 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
961 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
962 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
963 it is already running. Default is ON.
965 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
966 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
967 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
968 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
971 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
972 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
973 or the value of the environment variable
976 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
977 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
980 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
981 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
982 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
984 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
985 history expansion will be performed on
986 command line input. The default is OFF.
988 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
989 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
990 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
992 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
993 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
994 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
997 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
998 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
999 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
1002 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
1003 ``set width'' instead.
1005 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
1006 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
1007 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
1008 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
1010 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
1013 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
1016 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
1019 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
1022 * Support for Epoch Environment.
1024 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
1025 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
1026 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
1030 * Support for Shared Libraries
1032 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
1033 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
1034 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
1035 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
1036 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
1037 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
1038 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
1039 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
1041 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
1042 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
1043 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
1045 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
1050 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
1051 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
1052 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
1053 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
1054 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
1055 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
1057 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
1059 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
1061 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
1062 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
1063 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
1066 * C++ multiple inheritance
1068 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
1071 * C++ exception handling
1073 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
1074 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
1075 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
1078 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
1079 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
1080 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
1082 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
1083 current stack frame.
1086 * Minor command changes
1088 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
1089 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
1090 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
1092 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
1093 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
1094 frames without printing.
1096 * New directory command
1098 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
1099 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
1100 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
1101 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
1102 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
1104 * Configuring GDB for compilation
1106 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
1109 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
1110 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
1111 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
1112 where the program that you are debugging will run.
projects / deliverable / binutils-gdb.git / blob