2007-08-28 David Heine <dlheine@tensilica.com>
[deliverable/binutils-gdb.git] / gdb / NEWS
CommitLineData
c906108c
SS
1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
3
6dd09645
JB
4*** Changes since GDB 6.6
5
3a40aaa0
UW
6* When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
7symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
8-Bsymbolic linker option.
9
a6ec25f2
BW
10* When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
11recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
12is not supported.
13
6dd09645
JB
14* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
15frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
16
c9bb8148
DJ
17* GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
1832-bit or 64-bit register values.
19
0d5de010
DJ
20* Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
21
23181151
DJ
22* GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
23target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
24a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
25
e1f48ead 26* Arrays of explicitly SIGNED or UNSIGNED CHARs are now printed as arrays
f8b73d13 27of numbers.
e1f48ead 28
123dc839
DJ
29* Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
30for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
f8b73d13 31only ARM and MIPS).
123dc839 32
05a4558a
DJ
33* GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
34iWMMXt coprocessor.
fb1e4ffc 35
7c963485
PA
36* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
37ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
38has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
39
b18be20d
DJ
40* GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
41
0ca420ce
UW
42* GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
43
31d99776
DJ
44* The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
45layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
46segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
47
a4642986
MR
48* The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
49immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
50
cfa9d6d9
DJ
51* The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
52"library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
53packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
54where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
55Windows and SymbianOS).
255e7678
DJ
56
57* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
58(DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
cfa9d6d9 59
c9bb8148
DJ
60* New commands
61
23776285
MR
62set remoteflow
63show remoteflow
64 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
65 when debugging using remote targets.
66
c9bb8148
DJ
67set mem inaccessible-by-default
68show mem inaccessible-by-default
69 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
70 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
71 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
72 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
73 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
74
75set breakpoint auto-hw
76show breakpoint auto-hw
77 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
78 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
79 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
80 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
81 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
82 including "next" and "finish".
83
0e420bd8
JB
84catch exception
85catch exception unhandled
86 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
87
88catch assert
89 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
90
f822c95b
DJ
91set sysroot
92show sysroot
93 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
94 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
95 an alias to "set sysroot".
96
83cc5c53
UW
97info spu
98 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
99 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
100 architecture.
101
bd372731
MK
102* New native configurations
103
104OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
105
23181151
DJ
106set tdesc filename
107unset tdesc filename
108show tdesc filename
109 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
110 not query the target for its built-in description.
111
c9bb8148
DJ
112* New targets
113
54fe9172 114OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
c9bb8148 115MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
c077150c 116Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
c9bb8148 117
6dd09645
JB
118* New remote packets
119
120QPassSignals:
121 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
122 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
123
23181151
DJ
124qXfer:features:read:
125 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
126 features.
6dd09645 127
83cc5c53
UW
128qXfer:spu:read:
129qXfer:spu:write:
130 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
131 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
132
cfa9d6d9
DJ
133qXfer:libraries:read:
134 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
135 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
136 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
137 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
138
483367ee
DJ
139* Removed targets
140
141Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
142
d08950c4
UW
143alpha*-*-osf1*
144alpha*-*-osf2*
7ce59000 145d10v-*-*
483367ee
DJ
146hppa*-*-hiux*
147i[34567]86-ncr-*
148i[34567]86-*-dgux*
149i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
150i[34567]86-*-netware*
151i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
152i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
153i[34567]86-*-sco*
154i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
155i[34567]86-*-sysv4*
156i[34567]86-*-sysv5*
157i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
158i[34567]86-*-unixware*
159i[34567]86-*-sysv*
160i[34567]86-*-isc*
161m68*-cisco*-*
162m68*-tandem-*
ad527d2e 163mips*-*-pe
483367ee 164rs6000-*-lynxos*
ad527d2e 165sh*-*-pe
483367ee 166
7ce59000
DJ
167* Other removed features
168
169target abug
170target cpu32bug
171target est
172target rom68k
173
174 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
175
ea35711c
DJ
176target hms
177target e7000
178target sh3
179target sh3e
180
181 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
182 H8/300.
183
184target ocd
185
186 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
187 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
188 interfaces.
189
7ce59000
DJ
190DWARF 1 support
191
192 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
193 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
194
54d61198
DJ
195Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
196
197 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
198 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
199 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
200 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
201
ea35711c
DJ
202MIPS ".pdr" sections
203
204 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
205 in debugging information.
206
207Scheme support
208
209 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
210 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
211
1a69e1e4
DJ
212set mips stack-arg-size
213set mips saved-gpreg-size
214
215 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
216
6dd09645 217*** Changes in GDB 6.6
e374b601 218
ca3bf3bd
DJ
219* New targets
220
221Xtensa xtensa-elf
9c309e77 222Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
ca3bf3bd 223
6aec2e11
DJ
224* GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
225(mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
226running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
227
228* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
229Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
230supported.
231
17218d91
DJ
232* The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
233broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
234
9ebce043
DJ
235* The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
236stub provides the required support.
237
7d3d3ece
DJ
238* Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
239longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
240
4f8253f3
JB
241* New commands
242
243set substitute-path
244unset substitute-path
245show substitute-path
246 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
247 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
248 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
249 between compilation and debugging.
250
9fa66fd7
AS
251set trace-commands
252show trace-commands
253 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
254 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
255 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
256
1f5befc1
DJ
257* REMOVED features
258
259The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
260
2ec3381a
DJ
261Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
262an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
263
3d00d119
DJ
264The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
265
be2a5f71
DJ
266* New remote packets
267
268qSupported:
269 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
270 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
271 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
272 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
273 target.
274
0876f84a
DJ
275qXfer:auxv:read:
276 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
277 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
278
9ebce043
DJ
279qXfer:memory-map:read:
280 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
281 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
282
283vFlashErase:
284vFlashWrite:
285vFlashDone:
286 Erase and program a flash memory device.
287
0876f84a
DJ
288* Removed remote packets
289
290qPart:auxv:read:
291 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
292 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
293
e374b601 294*** Changes in GDB 6.5
53e5f3cf 295
96309189
MS
296* New targets
297
298Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
299
300Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
301
53e5f3cf
AS
302* New commands
303
304init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
305 only if it doesn't already have a value.
306
ac264b3b
MS
307The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
308
309checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
310
311restart <n> Return the program state to a
312 previously saved state.
313
314info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
315
316delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
317
318set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
319 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
320
321info forks List forks of the user program that
322 are available to be debugged.
323
324fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
325 forks of the user program that are
326 available to be debugged.
327
328delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
329 that are available to be debugged (and
330 kill the forked process).
331
332detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
333 that are available to be debugged (and
334 allow the process to continue).
335
3950dc3f
NS
336* New architecture
337
338Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
339
0ea3f30e
DJ
340* Improved Windows host support
341
342GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
343native console support, and remote communications using either
344network sockets or serial ports.
345
f79daebb
GM
346* Improved Modula-2 language support
347
348GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
349basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
350pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
351printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
352written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
353GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
354
acab6ab2
MM
355* REMOVED features
356
357The ARM rdi-share module.
358
f4267320
DJ
359The Netware NLM debug server.
360
53e5f3cf 361*** Changes in GDB 6.4
156a53ca 362
e0ecbda1
MK
363* New native configurations
364
02a677ac 365OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
e0ecbda1
MK
366OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
367
d64a6579
KB
368* New targets
369
370Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
371
b33a6190
AS
372* New command line options
373
374--batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
375--return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
376 the child (debugged) program exited with.
377--eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
378 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
379 specified multiple times and in conjunction
380 with the --command (-x) option.
381
11dced61
AC
382* Deprecated commands removed
383
384The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
385removed:
386
387 Command Replacement
388 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
389 othernames set arm disassembler
390 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
391 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
392 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
393 regs info registers
394
6fe85783
MK
395* New BSD user-level threads support
396
397It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
398library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
399configurations are:
400
401FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
402FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
403OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
404
405Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
406are not yet supported.
407
5260ca71
MS
408* New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
409(Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
410
e84ecc99
AC
411* REMOVED configurations and files
412
413VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
9445aa30 414Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
9445aa30 415National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
156a53ca 416
31e35378
JB
417* New "set print array-indexes" command
418
419After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
420when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
421behavior.
422
e85e5c83
MK
423* VAX floating point support
424
425GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
426
d91e9901
AS
427* User-defined command support
428
429In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
430to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
431section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
432
f2cb65ca
MC
433*** Changes in GDB 6.3:
434
f47b1503
AS
435* New command line option
436
437GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
438debugging.
439
f2cb65ca
MC
440* GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
441
442GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
443information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
444by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
445proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
446to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
860660cb 447
d08c0230
AC
448* Internationalization
449
450When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
451internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
452continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
453
117ea3cf
PH
454* Ada
455
456Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
457implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
458into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
459
d08c0230
AC
460* New native configurations
461
462GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
463
464* Remote 'p' packet
465
466GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
467packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
468
469* END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
470
471GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
472The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
473features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
474i386 application).
475
476GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
477compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
478continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
479configurations:
480
481hppa-*-hpux
482ia64-*-aix
483mips-*-irix*
484*-*-lynx
485mips-*-linux-gnu
486sds protocol
487xdr protocol
488powerpc bdm protocol
489
490Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
491made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
492
493* OBSOLETE configurations and files
494
495Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
496been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
497configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
498permanently REMOVED.
499
500h8300-*-*
501mcore-*-*
502mn10300-*-*
503ns32k-*-*
504sh64-*-*
505v850-*-*
506
ebb7c577
AC
507*** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
508
509* MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
510
511When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
512heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
513been fixed.
514
515* MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
516
517When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
518fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
519IRIX long double values).
520
521* VAX and "next"
522
523A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
524command. This problem has been fixed.
525
860660cb 526*** Changes in GDB 6.2:
faae5abe 527
0dea2468
AC
528* Fix for ``many threads''
529
530On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
531rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
532error message:
533
534 ptrace: No such process.
535 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
536
537This problem has been fixed.
538
2c07db7a
AC
539* "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
540
541Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
542GDB to dump core).
543
c23968a2
JB
544* New ``start'' command.
545
546This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
547
71009278
MK
548* New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
549
550Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
551live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
552platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
553
554FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
555FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
556NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
557NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
558NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
559OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
560OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
561OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
562OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
563
3c0b7db2
AC
564* Signal trampoline code overhauled
565
566Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
567These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
568of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
569call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
570signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
571
73cc75f3
AC
572Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
573features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
574include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
3c0b7db2 575
7243600a
BF
576* Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
577
6f606e1c
MK
578* New native configurations
579
97dc871c 580GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
0e56aeaf 581OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
bf2ca189
MK
582OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
583OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
d195bc9f 584OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 585NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
9f076e7a 586OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 587
a1b461bf
AC
588* END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
589
590GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
591The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
592including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
593migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
594compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
595work, was also included.
596
597GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
598module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
599
600h8300-*-*
601mcore-*-*
602mn10300-*-*
603ns32k-*-*
604sh64-*-*
605v850-*-*
606xstormy16-*-*
607
608Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
609made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
610
3c7012f5
AC
611* REMOVED configurations and files
612
613Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
614Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
615Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
616Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
617Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
618AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
619Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
620decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
621riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
622sonymips mips-sony-*
623sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
624
e5fe55f7
AC
625*** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
626
627* TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
628
629The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
630GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
631command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
632program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
633with GDB".
634
635* Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
636
637Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
638libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
639cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
640GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
641shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
642the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
643are created.
644
645Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
646
647* Fixed ISO-C build problems
648
649The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
650non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
651compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
652
653* Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
654
655Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
656wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
657
658* Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
659
660The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
661permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
662systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
663
664* Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
665
666Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
667has been updated to use constant array sizes.
668
669* Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
670
671GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
672its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
673panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
674
675* Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
676
677When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
678by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
679not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
680
faae5abe 681*** Changes in GDB 6.1:
f2c06f52 682
9175c9a3
MC
683* Removed --with-mmalloc
684
685Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
686conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
687
3cc87ec0
MK
688* Changes in AMD64 configurations
689
690The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
691the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
692and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
693you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
694
f0424ef6
MK
695* Revised SPARC target
696
697The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
698FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
03cebad2
MK
699support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
700from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
701(Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
f0424ef6 702
59659be2
ILT
703* New C++ demangler
704
705GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
706names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
707with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
708programs.
709
9e08b29b
DJ
710* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
711
712GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
713arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
714encountered these.
715
8dfe8985
DC
716* C++ nested types and namespaces
717
718GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
719improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
720is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
721Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
722namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
723"Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
724frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
725if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
726GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
727
cced5e27
MK
728* New native configurations
729
730NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
27d1e716 731OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2031c21a 732OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
f2cab569
MK
733OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
734OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
cced5e27 735
b4b4b794
KI
736* New debugging protocols
737
738M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
739
7989c619
AC
740* "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
741
742The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
743and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
744tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
745
5994185b
AC
746* OBSOLETE configurations and files
747
748Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
749been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
750configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
751permanently REMOVED.
752
753Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
754Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
755Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
756Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
757Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
758AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
759Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
0748d941
AC
760decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
761riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
762sonymips mips-sony-*
763sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
5994185b 764
0ddabb4c
AC
765* REMOVED configurations and files
766
767SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
768SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4a8269c0
AC
769Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
770Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
771H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
772HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
773HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
774HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
775PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
cf7c5c23 776386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
4a8269c0
AC
777Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
778 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
779 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f0424ef6
MK
780SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
781SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
4a8269c0
AC
782Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
783Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
0ddabb4c 784
c7f1390e
DJ
785*** Changes in GDB 6.0:
786
1fe43d45
AC
787* Objective-C
788
789Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
790integrated into GDB.
791
e6beb428
AC
792* New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
793
794DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
795information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
796By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
797backtraces.
798
799The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
800have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
801DWARF 2 CFI support.
802
803* Hosted file I/O.
804
805GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
806file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
807remote protocol documentation for details.
808
809* All targets using the new architecture framework.
810
811All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
812architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
813to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
814ppc32 on ppc64).
815
816* GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
817
818GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
819per-thread variables.
820
821* GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
822
823GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
824GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
825
826* Separate debug info.
827
828GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
829automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
830of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
831system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
832and optional debug files.
833
834* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
835
836DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
837describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
838debugger.
839
840GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
841for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
842
843* Java
844
845A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
846Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
847considered "useable".
848
85f8f974
DJ
849* GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
850
851The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
852commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
853kernel.
854
0fac0b41
DJ
855* GDB supports logging output to a file
856
857There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
858used to capture GDB's output to a file.
f2c06f52 859
6ad8ae5c
DJ
860* The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
861
862The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
863disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
864command.
865
e286caf2 866* d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
5f601589
AC
867
868The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
869registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
870
d28f9cdf
DJ
871* Profiling support
872
873A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
874be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
875session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
876"--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
877data, for more informative profiling results.
878
da0f9dcd
AC
879* Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
880
881The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
882option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
b68767c1 883"mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
da0f9dcd
AC
884
885Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
886removed.
887
fb9b6b35
JJ
888Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
889Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
890Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
891 in a subsequent -var-update.
892
954a4db8
MK
893* New native configurations.
894
895FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
896
6760f9e6
JB
897* Multi-arched targets.
898
b4263afa 899HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
85a453d5 900Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
6760f9e6 901
1b831c93
AC
902* OBSOLETE configurations and files
903
904Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
905been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
906configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
907permanently REMOVED.
908
8b0e5691 909Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
67f16606 910Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
fd2299bd 911H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
56056df7
AC
912HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
913HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
914HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
78c43945 915PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2fbce691
AC
916Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
917 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
918 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f81824a9
AC
919Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
920Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
fd2299bd 921
5835abe7
NC
922* REMOVED configurations and files
923
924V850EA ISA
1b831c93
AC
925Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
926IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
927i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
928i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
929i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
930HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
931 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
932 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
933Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
934Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
935Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
936OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
937I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5835abe7 938
a094c6fb
AC
939* MIPS $fp behavior changed
940
941The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
942the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
943context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
944address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
945The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
946
299ffc64 947*** Changes in GDB 5.3:
37057839 948
46248966
AC
949* GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
950
951When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
952`/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
953in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
954library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
955shared libs like mad''.
956
b9d14705 957* ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
6da02953 958
b9d14705
DJ
959Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
960the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
961arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
962powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
6da02953 963
e0e9281e
JB
964* GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
965
966GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
967and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
968they expand.
969
dd73b9bb
AC
970The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
971invocations in expression, and shows the result.
972
973The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
974macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
975
e0e9281e
JB
976Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
977information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
978your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
979information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
980
2250ee0c
CV
981* Multi-arched targets.
982
6e3ba3b8
JT
983DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
984DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
2250ee0c 985NEC V850 v850-*-*
6e3ba3b8 986National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
a1789893
GS
987Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
988Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
2250ee0c 989
cd9bfe15 990* New targets.
e33ce519 991
456f8b9d
DB
992Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
993
e33ce519 994
da8ca43d
JT
995* New native configurations
996
997Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
029923d4 998SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
45888261 999MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
9ce5c36a 1000UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
da8ca43d 1001
cd9bfe15
AC
1002* OBSOLETE configurations and files
1003
1004Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1005been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1006configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1007permanently REMOVED.
1008
92eb23c5 1009Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
a99a9e1b 1010OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1c7cc583 1011IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
7a3085c1 1012Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
7fb623f7 1013Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
eb4c54a2 1014Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
d8ee244c
MK
1015i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1016i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1017i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
822e978b
AC
1018HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1019 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
1020 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
4d210288 1021I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
92eb23c5 1022
db034ac5
AC
1023* OBSOLETE languages
1024
1025CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
1026
cd9bfe15
AC
1027* REMOVED configurations and files
1028
1029AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1030A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1031AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1032AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1033AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1034
1035testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
1036
20f01a46
DH
1037* New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
1038
1039This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
1040commands. The default is 1024.
1041
a5941fbf
MK
1042* Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
1043
1044Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
1045
89743e04
MS
1046* New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
1047
1048These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
1049to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
1050from a file into memory (restore).
37057839 1051
9fb14e79
JB
1052* Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
1053
1054The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
1055including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
1056of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
1057
2037aebb
AC
1058*** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
1059
1060* New targets.
1061
1062Atmel AVR avr*-*-*
1063
1064* Bug fixes
1065
1066gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
1067mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
1068Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
1069
1070gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
1071dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
1072Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
1073
1074Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
1075Surprisingly enough, it works now.
1076By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
1077
1078i386 hardware watchpoint support:
1079avoid misses on second run for some targets.
1080By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
1081
37057839 1082*** Changes in GDB 5.2:
eb7cedd9 1083
1a703748
MS
1084* New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
1085
1086This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
1087really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
1088In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
1089target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
1090This can be a significant performance improvement on some
1091(notably embedded) targets.
1092
cefd4ef5
MS
1093* New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
1094
55241689
AC
1095This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
1096process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
1097GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
1098hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
cefd4ef5 1099
352ed7b4
MS
1100* New command line option
1101
1102GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
1103
1104* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
1105
1106There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
1107command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
1108a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
1109be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
1110open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
1111issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
1112a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
1113it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
1114GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
1115is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
1116
fe419ffc
RE
1117* Changes in ARM configurations.
1118
1119Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
1120configuration is fully multi-arch.
1121
eb7cedd9
MK
1122* New native configurations
1123
fe419ffc 1124ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
eb7cedd9 1125x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
55241689 1126AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
768f0842 1127Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
eb7cedd9 1128
c9f63e6b
CV
1129* New targets
1130
1131Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
1132
9b4ff276
AC
1133* OBSOLETE configurations and files
1134
1135Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1136been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1137configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1138permanently REMOVED.
1139
1140AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1141A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1142AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1143AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1144AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1145
b4ceaee6 1146testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
9b4ff276 1147
e2caac18
AC
1148* REMOVED configurations and files
1149
1150TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
7bc65f05 1151WDC 65816 w65-*-*
7768dd6c
AC
1152PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1153PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1154PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
5e734e1f 1155Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1406caf7
AC
1156Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1157 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
7e24f0b1 1158SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
9b567150 1159Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
3680c638
AC
1160Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1161ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
a752853e 1162Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
e2caac18 1163
c2a727fa
TT
1164* Changes to command line processing
1165
1166The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
1167for the inferior from gdb's command line.
1168
467d8519
TT
1169* Changes to key bindings
1170
1171There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
1172
7072a954
AC
1173*** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
1174
1175Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
1176
1177Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
1178corrupted.
1179
1180Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
1181
1182Numerous documentation fixes.
1183
1184Numerous testsuite fixes.
1185
34f47bc4 1186*** Changes in GDB 5.1:
139760b7
MK
1187
1188* New native configurations
1189
1190Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
1191x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
55241689 1192MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
e23194cb
EZ
1193MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1194ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
55241689 1195s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
139760b7 1196
bf64bfd6
AC
1197* New targets
1198
def90278 1199Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
24be5c34 1200CRIS cris-axis
55241689 1201UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
def90278 1202
17e78a56 1203* OBSOLETE configurations and files
bf64bfd6
AC
1204
1205x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
9b9c068d 1206Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
bb19ff3b
AC
1207Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1208 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
76f4ea53
AC
1209TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1210WDC 65816 w65-*-*
4a1968f4 1211Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1b2b2c16
AC
1212PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1213PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1214PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
24f89b68 1215SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
514e603d
AC
1216Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1217ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
d036b4d9 1218Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
bf64bfd6 1219
17e78a56
AC
1220stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
1221kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
1222
7fcca85b
AC
1223Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1224been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1225configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1226permanently REMOVED.
1227
a196c81c 1228* REMOVED configurations and files
7fcca85b
AC
1229
1230Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1231Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
1232Pyramid pyramid-*-*
1233ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
1234Tahoe tahoe-*-*
a196c81c 1235ser-ocd.c *-*-*
bf64bfd6 1236
6d6b80e5 1237* GDB has been converted to ISO C.
e23194cb 1238
6d6b80e5 1239GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
e23194cb
EZ
1240sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
1241present.
1242
bf64bfd6
AC
1243* Other news:
1244
e23194cb
EZ
1245* "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
1246
1247* The MI enabled by default.
1248
1249The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
1250revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
1251engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
1252using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
1253which is now deprecated.
1254
1255* Support for debugging Pascal programs.
1256
1257GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
1258main features are supported:
1259
1260 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
1261
1262 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
1263 extension;
1264
1265 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
1266
1267 - a Pascal expression parser.
1268
1269However, some important features are not yet supported.
1270
1271 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
1272
1273 - there are some problems with boolean types;
1274
1275 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
1276 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
1277
1278 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
1279
1280 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
1281
1282* Changes in completion.
1283
1284Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
1285to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
1286users expect at the shell prompt.
1287
1288Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
1289`breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
1290program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
1291files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
1292be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
1293considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
1294name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
1295
1296`set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
1297
1298* New platform-independent commands:
1299
1300It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
1301hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
1302documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
1303
1304* Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
1305
d7275149
MK
1306Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
1307revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
1308many threads as your system allows you to have.
1309
e23194cb
EZ
1310Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
1311
d7275149
MK
1312Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
1313multi-threaded programs though.
e23194cb
EZ
1314
1315* Changes in MIPS configurations.
bf64bfd6
AC
1316
1317Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
1318
e23194cb
EZ
1319GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
1320debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
1321supported.)
1322
1323* Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
1324
1325Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
1326breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
1327implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
1328put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
1329and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
1330registers.
1331
1332The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
1333debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
1334watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
1335
1336* Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
1337
1338New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
1339the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
1340
1341New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
1342display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
1343IDT.
1344
1345New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
1346from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
1347New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
1348a given linear address.
1349
1350GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
1351program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
1352which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
1353
1354DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
1355
6c56c069
EZ
1356It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
1357
e23194cb
EZ
1358* Changes in documentation.
1359
1360All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
1361Documentation License.
1362
1363Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1364manual.
1365
1366TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
1367
1368Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1369manual.
1370
1371The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
1372documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
1373hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
1374
5d6640b1
AC
1375* GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
1376
1377The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
1378``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
1379contents of this file.
1380
1a1d8446
AC
1381* gdba.el deleted
1382
1383GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
139760b7 1384
9debab2f 1385*** Changes in GDB 5.0:
7a292a7a 1386
c63ce875
EZ
1387* Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
1388
1389Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
1390programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
1391displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
1392greater level of detail.
1393
1394* Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
1395
1396It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
1397bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
1398on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
1399written.
1400
1401* Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
1402
1403The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
1404necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
1405machines ``out of the box''.
1406
1407The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
1408possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
1409signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
1410would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
1411interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
1412
1413It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
1414standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
1415even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
1416and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
1417terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
1418
1419The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
1420enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
1421also works.
1422
1423DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
1424GDB.
1425
1426It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
1427directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
1428times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
1429breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
1430
ed9a39eb
JM
1431* New native configurations
1432
1433ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
afc05dd4 1434PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
ed9a39eb 1435
7a292a7a
SS
1436* New targets
1437
96baa820 1438Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
adf40b2e
JM
1439x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
1440PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
7a292a7a
SS
1441TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1442
085dd6e6
JM
1443* OBSOLETE configurations
1444
1445Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1446Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
9846de1b 1447Pyramid pyramid-*-*
ed9a39eb 1448ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
104c1213 1449Tahoe tahoe-*-*
7a292a7a 1450
9debab2f
AC
1451Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1452but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1453these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1454be permanently REMOVED.
1455
5330533d
SS
1456* Gould support removed
1457
1458Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
1459
bc9e5bbf
AC
1460* New features for SVR4
1461
1462On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
1463without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
1464load symbols from the running process's executable file.
1465
1466* Many C++ enhancements
1467
1468C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
1469in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
1470
adf40b2e
JM
1471* Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
1472
1473A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
1474sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
1475with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
1476``|<program> <args>'' vis:
1477
1478 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
1479 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
1480
43e526b9
JM
1481* MIPS 64 remote protocol
1482
1483A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
1484expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
1485instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
1486
1487The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
1488added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
1489
96baa820
JM
1490* ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
1491
1492The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
1493``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
1494include ``set remote P-packet''.
1495
11cf8741
JM
1496* Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
1497
1498The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
1499accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
1500``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
1501
7876dd43
DB
1502* ``apropos'' command added.
1503
1504The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
1505documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
1506try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
1507
bc9e5bbf
AC
1508* New MI interface
1509
1510A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
1511interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
7162c0ca
EZ
1512process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
1513"GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
1514enabled by configuring with:
bc9e5bbf
AC
1515
1516 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
1517
c906108c
SS
1518*** Changes in GDB-4.18:
1519
1520* New native configurations
1521
1522HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
1523HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
55241689 1524M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
c906108c
SS
1525
1526* New targets
1527
1528Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1529Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
1530Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1531
1532* OBSOLETE configurations
1533
1534Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
1535
1536Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1537but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1538these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1539be permanently REMOVED.
1540
1541* ANSI/ISO C
1542
1543As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
1544buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
1545containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
1546use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
1547available. If this is not true, please report the affected
1548configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
1549information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
1550already.
1551
1552* Readline 2.2
1553
1554GDB now uses readline 2.2.
1555
1556* set extension-language
1557
1558You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
1559languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
1560you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
1561 set extension-language .c c++
1562The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
1563and their associated languages.
1564
1565* Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
1566
1567When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
1568you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
1569PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
1570
1571 set processor NAME
1572
1573sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
1574following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
1575
1576 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
1577 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
1578 403 IBM PowerPC 403
1579 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
1580 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
1581 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
1582 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
1583 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
1584 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
1585 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
1586 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
1587
1588At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
1589special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
1590registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
1591only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
1592
1593* HP-UX support
1594
1595Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
1596more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
1597library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
1598support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
1599for xdb and dbx commands.
1600
1601* Catchpoints
1602
1603HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
1604generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
1605to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
1606
1607This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
1608argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
1609output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
1610
1611* Debugging across forks
1612
1613On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
1614in the inferior.
1615
1616* TUI
1617
1618HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
1619it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
1620configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
1621
1622* GDB remote protocol additions
1623
1624A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
1625Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
1626fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
1627allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
1628
1629For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
1630full 64-bit address. The command
1631
1632 set remoteaddresssize 32
1633
1634can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
1635the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
1636will be discarded.
1637
1638In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
1639command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
1640
1641 maint packet heythere
1642
1643sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
1644disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
1645time.
1646
1647The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
1648target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
1649downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
1650
1651* Tracing can collect general expressions
1652
1653You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
1654further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
1655doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
1656
1657* mask-address variable for Mips
1658
1659For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
1660a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
1661of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
1662
1663* Higher serial baud rates
1664
1665GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
1666230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
1667to achieve all of these rates.)
1668
1669* i960 simulator
1670
1671The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
1672builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
1673
1674
1675*** Changes in GDB-4.17:
1676
1677* New native configurations
1678
1679Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
1680Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
1681Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1682PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
1683PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1684Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
1685Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
1686
1687* New targets
1688
1689Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1690Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
1691Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1692Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
1693MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
1694MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
1695MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
1696Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
1697Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
1698Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1699NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
1700
1701* New debugging protocols
1702
1703ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
1704M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
1705DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
1706PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1707PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1708Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1709
1710* DWARF 2
1711
1712All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
1713format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
1714information.
1715
1716* Java frontend
1717
1718GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
1719only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
1720
1721* solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
1722
1723For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
1724loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
1725locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
1726
1727* Live range splitting
1728
1729GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
1730range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
1731more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
1732
1733* Hurd support
1734
1735GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
1736updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
1737
1738* ARM Thumb support
1739
1740GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
1741instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
1742instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
1743accordingly.
1744
1745* MIPS16 support
1746
1747GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
1748instruction set.
1749
1750* Overlay support
1751
1752GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
1753linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
1754will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
1755control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
1756additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
1757in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
1758
1759* info symbol
1760
1761The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
1762the symbol at the specified address.
1763
1764* Trace support
1765
1766The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
1767asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
1768extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
1769includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
1770file tracepoint.c for more details.
1771
1772* MIPS simulator
1773
1774Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
1775by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
1776of most MIPS variants.
1777
1778* Sparc simulator
1779
1780Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
1781by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
1782Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
1783
1784* set architecture
1785
1786For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
1787basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
1788architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
1789the possible architectures.
1790
1791*** Changes in GDB-4.16:
1792
1793* New native configurations
1794
1795Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
1796M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
1797PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
1798PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
1799PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1800RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
1801
1802* New targets
1803
1804ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
1805I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1806MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
1807MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
1808PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
1809Hitachi SH3 sh-*-*
1810Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1811
1812* PowerPC simulator
1813
1814The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
1815contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
1816PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
1817basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
1818performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
1819
1820* Solaris 2.5
1821
1822GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
1823
1824* Windows 95/NT native
1825
1826GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
1827To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
1828which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
1829Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
1830ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
1831
1832* dont-repeat command
1833
1834If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
1835command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
1836useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
1837extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
1838
1839* Send break instead of ^C
1840
1841The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
1842rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
1843GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
1844
1845* Remote protocol timeout
1846
1847The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
1848that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
1849to read from the target. The default value is 2.
1850
1851* Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
1852
1853By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
1854loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
1855stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
1856when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
1857in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
1858
1859Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
1860/usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
1861automatically on hpux10.
1862
1863* Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
1864
1865Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
1866
1867* Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
1868
1869When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
1870may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
1871the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
1872every character. The default value is 1050.
1873
1874* Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
1875
1876If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
1877a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
1878replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
1879details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
1880remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
1881to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
1882
1883* Speedups for remote debugging
1884
1885GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
1886the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
1887and more efficient S-record downloading.
1888
1889* Memory use reductions and statistics collection
1890
1891GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
1892Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
1893
1894*** Changes in GDB-4.15:
1895
1896* Psymtabs for XCOFF
1897
1898The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
1899can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
1900
1901* Remote targets use caching
1902
1903Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
1904remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
1905it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
1906debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
1907off' turns the the data cache off.
1908
1909* Remote targets may have threads
1910
1911The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
1912in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
1913gdb/remote.c for details.
1914
1915* NetROM support
1916
1917If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
1918support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
1919acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
1920write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
1921support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
1922another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
1923sequence is something like
1924
1925 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
1926 load <prog>
1927 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
1928
1929* Macintosh host
1930
1931GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
1932may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
1933it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
1934available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
1935device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
1936directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
1937scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
1938mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
1939
1940* Autoconf
1941
1942GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
1943but does simplify configuration and building.
1944
1945* hpux10
1946
1947GDB now supports hpux10.
1948
1949*** Changes in GDB-4.14:
1950
1951* New native configurations
1952
1953x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
1954x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
1955NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
1956Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
1957
1958* New targets
1959
1960A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1961HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
1962CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
1963PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
1964WDC 65816 w65-*-*
1965
1966* Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
1967
1968GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
1969possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
1970filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
1971the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
1972if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
1973
1974* Arguments to user-defined commands
1975
1976User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
1977Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
1978trivial example:
1979define adder
1980 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
1981
1982To execute the command use:
1983adder 1 2 3
1984
1985Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
1986Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
1987use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
1988
1989* New `if' and `while' commands
1990
1991This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
1992commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
1993expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
1994execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
1995terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
1996`else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
1997if the expression is zero.
1998
1999* Fortran source language mode
2000
2001GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
2002Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
2003variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
2004with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
2005Fortran compilers.
2006
2007* Better HPUX support
2008
2009Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
2010running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
2011processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
2012for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
2013that behavior do the following before running the program:
2014
2015 adb -w a.out
2016 __dld_flags?W 0x5
2017 control-d
2018
2019This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
2020To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
2021
2022 adb -w a.out
2023 __dld_flags?W 0x4
2024 control-d
2025
2026You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
2027the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
2028external linkage.
2029
2030GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
2031HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
2032
2033* Target byte order now dynamically selectable
2034
2035You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
2036commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
2037current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
2038"set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
2039associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
2040configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
2041
2042* New DOS host serial code
2043
2044This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
2045no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
2046a PC's serial port.
2047
2048*** Changes in GDB-4.13:
2049
2050* New "complete" command
2051
2052This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
2053were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
2054
2055* Trailing space optional in prompt
2056
2057"set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
2058allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
2059
2060* Breakpoint hit counts
2061
2062"info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
2063has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
2064can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
2065to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
2066less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
2067that breakpoint.
2068
2069* Ability to stop printing at NULL character
2070
2071"set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
2072an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
2073arrays actually contain only short strings.
2074
2075* Shared library breakpoints
2076
2077In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
2078breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
2079
2080* Hardware watchpoints
2081
2082There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
2083targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
2084
55241689 2085Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
c906108c
SS
2086
2087* Annotations
2088
2089Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
2090and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
2091
2092* Improved Irix 5 support
2093
2094GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
2095
2096* Improved HPPA support
2097
2098GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
2099
2100* New native configurations
2101
2102Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
2103HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2104Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
2105RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
2106
2107* New targets
2108
2109OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2110MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
2111Sparc64 sparc64-*-*
2112
2113* Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
2114
2115There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
2116This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
2117
2118* Fixes
2119
2120As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
2121and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
2122
2123*** Changes in GDB-4.12:
2124
2125* Irix 5 is now supported
2126
2127* HPPA support
2128
2129GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
2130to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
2131GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
2132of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
2133can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
2134
2135
2136*** Changes in GDB-4.11:
2137
2138* User visible changes:
2139
2140* Remote Debugging
2141
2142The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
2143target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
2144debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
2145integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
2146debugging info for the mips target).
2147
2148* DEC Alpha native support
2149
2150GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
2151debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
2152work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
2153Alpha-specific notes.
2154
2155* Preliminary thread implementation
2156
2157GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
2158
2159* LynxOS native and target support for 386
2160
2161This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
2162to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
2163for details).
2164
2165* Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
2166
2167This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
2168mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
2169call methods, ...etc.
2170
2171*** Changes in GDB-4.10:
2172
2173 * User visible changes:
2174
2175Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
2176supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
2177other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
2178somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
2179
2180Filename completion now works.
2181
2182When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
2183arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
2184addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
2185
2186All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
2187vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
2188should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
2189your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
2190to be on the far side of a thin network line.
2191
2192 * DEC alpha support
2193
2194This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
2195cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
2196
2197
2198*** Changes in GDB-4.9:
2199
2200 * Testsuite
2201
2202This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
2203The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
2204via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
2205
2206 * C++ demangling
2207
2208'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
2209emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
2210Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
2211disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
2212use gdb with AT&T cfront.
2213
2214 * Simulators
2215
2216GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
2217So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
2218Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
2219
2220 * New targets supported
2221
2222H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2223H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2224SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
2225Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2226IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
2227
2228Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
2229version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
2230GO32 memory extender.
2231
2232 * New remote protocols
2233
2234MIPS remote debugging protocol.
2235
2236 * New source languages supported
2237
2238This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
2239used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
2240into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
2241
2242
2243*** Changes in GDB-4.8:
2244
2245 * HP Precision Architecture supported
2246
2247GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
2248version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
2249University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
2250compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
2251format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
2252(as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
2253
2254Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
2255
2256 * Faster and better demangling
2257
2258We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
2259demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
2260character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
2261only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
2262This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
2263increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
2264symbol lookups.
2265
2266`Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
2267from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
2268compiler does not actually implement.
2269
2270 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
2271
2272In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
2273inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
2274recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
2275very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
2276The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
2277circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
2278fix.
2279
2280The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
2281release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
2282
2283 * Improved configure script
2284
2285The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
2286you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
2287host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
2288done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
2289
2290We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
2291version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
2292`--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
2293The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
2294only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
2295We hope to make this the default in a future release.
2296
2297 * Documentation improvements
2298
2299There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
2300produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
2301before submitting changes.
2302
2303The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
2304M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
2305`info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
2306you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
2307a future texinfo-X.Y release.
2308
2309*NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
2310We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
2311been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
2312or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
2313`texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
2314around this problem.
2315
2316 * New features
2317
2318GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
2319the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
2320`print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
2321the target program.
2322
2323The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
2324how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
2325
2326 * New native hosts supported
2327
2328HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
2329386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
2330
2331 * New targets supported
2332
2333AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
2334
2335 * New file formats supported
2336
2337BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
2338HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
2339
2340 * Major bug fixes
2341
2342Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
2343
2344We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
2345printf_filtered("%s") problems.
2346
2347We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
2348for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
2349release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
2350
2351You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
2352will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
2353
2354We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
2355for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
2356especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
2357libraries.
2358
2359The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
2360information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
2361command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
2362any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
2363when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
2364
2365 * Internal improvements
2366
2367GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
2368debugging of multiple languages in the future.
2369
2370GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
2371Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
2372symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
2373contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
2374shared code that handles any of them.
2375
2376 * New command line options
2377
2378We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
2379
2380 * Mmalloc licensing
2381
2382The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
2383General Public License.
2384
2385*** Changes in GDB-4.7:
2386
2387 * Host/native/target split
2388
2389GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
2390hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
2391target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
2392local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
2393ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
2394
2395The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
2396GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
2397is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
2398code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
2399any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
2400built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
2401handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
2402
2403GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
2404It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
2405plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
2406
2407 * New hosts supported
2408
2409HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
2410386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2411386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
2412
2413 * New targets supported
2414
2415Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
241668030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
2417
2418 * New native hosts supported
2419
2420386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2421 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
2422386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
2423
2424 * New file formats supported
2425
2426BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
2427supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
2428format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
2429
2430 * New commands
2431
2432`show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
2433`show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
2434These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
2435
2436`info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
2437
2438You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
2439scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
2440prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
2441executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
2442
2443 * C++ improvements
2444
2445We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
2446info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
2447symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
2448
2449Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
2450
2451 * Major bug fixes
2452
2453The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
2454fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
2455by the compiler.
2456
2457We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
2458support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
2459
2460John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
2461slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
2462that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
2463purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
2464the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
2465mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
2466
2467Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
2468about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
2469completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
2470we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
2471
2472 * AMD 29k support
2473
2474A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
2475specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
2476calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
2477usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
2478in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
2479
2480We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
2481Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
2482of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
2483resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
2484
2485 * Remote interfaces
2486
2487We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
2488with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
2489message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
2490This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
2491needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
2492breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
2493each instruction being stepped through.
2494
2495The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
2496registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
2497
2498There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
2499find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
2500Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
2501processor with a serial port.
2502
2503 * Configuration
2504
2505Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
2506`table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
2507supported, and what files each one uses.
2508
2509 * Library changes
2510
2511There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
2512disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
2513Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
2514disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
2515
2516The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
2517Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
2518can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
2519grants all the rights from the General Public License.
2520
2521 * Documentation
2522
2523The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
2524reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
2525as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
2526encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
2527system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
2528bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
2529
2530And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
2531
2532
2533*** Changes in GDB-4.6:
2534
2535 * Better support for C++ function names
2536
2537GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
2538names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
2539(using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
2540single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
2541Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
2542
2543GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
2544the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
2545You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
2546lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
2547for the list of formats.
2548
2549 * G++ symbol mangling problem
2550
2551Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
2552C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
2553directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
2554can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
2555usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
2556about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
2557this problem.)
2558
2559 * New 'maintenance' command
2560
2561All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
2562the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
2563can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
2564
2565 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
2566 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
2567 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
2568 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
2569 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
2570 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
2571
2572The following commands are new:
2573
2574 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
2575 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
2576 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
2577
2578 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
2579
2580We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
2581(e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
2582be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
2583read after argv processing.
2584
2585 * New hosts supported
2586
2587Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
2588
55241689 2589GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
c906108c
SS
2590
2591We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
2592is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
2593for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
2594masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
2595fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
2596It costs extra.
2597
2598 * New targets supported
2599
2600Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2601
2602 * More smarts about finding #include files
2603
2604GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
2605all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
2606greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
2607especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
2608the one that contains your sources.
2609
2610We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
2611breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
2612try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
2613
2614 * Interesting infernals change
2615
2616GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
2617section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
2618target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
2619stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
2620
2621 * Bug fixes (of course!)
2622
2623There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
2624 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
2625 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
2626
2627See the ChangeLog for details.
2628
2629*** Changes in GDB-4.5:
2630
2631 * New machines supported (host and target)
2632
2633IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
2634
2635SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
2636
2637 * New malloc package
2638
2639GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
2640Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
2641capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
2642This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
2643pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
2644more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
2645
2646 * info proc
2647
2648The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
2649'help info proc' for details.
2650
2651 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
2652
2653The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
2654Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
2655possible.
2656
2657 * File name changes for MS-DOS
2658
2659Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
2660support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
2661conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
2662environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
2663that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
2664in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
2665
2666 * Cross byte order fixes
2667
2668Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
2669targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
2670
2671 * New -mapped and -readnow options
2672
2673If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
2674system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
2675`symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
2676program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
2677called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
2678Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
2679and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
2680the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
2681option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
2682starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
2683
2684You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
2685the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
2686information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
2687slower, but makes future operations faster.
2688
2689The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
2690build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
2691A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
2692use is:
2693
2694 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
2695
2696The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
2697It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
2698shared across multiple host platforms.
2699
2700 * longjmp() handling
2701
2702GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
2703siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
2704all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
2705platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
2706
2707 * Solaris 2.0
2708
2709Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
2710this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
2711reading symbols.
2712
2713 * Bug fixes
2714
2715As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
2716People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
2717crashes and trashed symbol tables.
2718
2719*** Changes in GDB-4.4:
2720
2721 * New machines supported (host and target)
2722
2723SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2724 (except core files)
2725BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
2726Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
2727
2728 * New machines supported (target)
2729
2730AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2731
2732 * C++ support
2733
2734GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
2735The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
2736per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
2737
2738GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
2739`ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
2740extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
2741good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
2742will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
2743released.
2744
2745 * New features for SVR4
2746
2747GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
2748shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
2749only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
2750
2751The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
2752on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
2753it prints the address mappings of the process.
2754
2755If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
2756bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
2757
2758 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
2759
2760Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
2761now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
2762skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
2763make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
2764same code linked statically.
2765
2766 * New Getopt
2767
2768GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
2769version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
2770continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
2771Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
2772added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
2773future by other options that begin with the same letter.
2774
2775 * Bugs fixed
2776
2777The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
2778Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
2779See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
2780
2781
2782*** Changes in GDB-4.3:
2783
2784 * New machines supported (host and target)
2785
2786Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
2787NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
2788Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2789
2790 * Almost SCO Unix support
2791
2792We had hoped to support:
2793SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2794(except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
2795that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
2796about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
2797
2798 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
2799
2800GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
2801debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
2802is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
2803send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
2804reqired (if any).
2805
2806 * New Readline
2807
2808GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
2809is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
2810required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
2811
2812 * Bugs fixed
2813
2814The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
2815Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
2816See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
2817
2818 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
2819
2820GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
2821supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
2822symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
2823
2824Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
2825mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
2826debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
2827mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
2828version 2.
2829
2830Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
2831really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
2832line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
2833variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
2834situation somewhat.
2835
2836When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
2837However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
2838methods.
2839
2840We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
2841DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
2842encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
2843
2844
2845*** Changes in GDB-4.2:
2846
2847 * Improved configuration
2848
2849Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
2850Porting BFD is simpler.
2851
2852 * Stepping improved
2853
2854The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
2855of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
2856in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
2857function that has debugging information is called within the line.
2858
2859 * Bug fixing
2860
2861Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
2862
2863 * New host supported (not target)
2864
2865Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
2866
2867
2868*** Changes in GDB-4.1:
2869
2870 * Multiple source language support
2871
2872GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
2873It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
2874and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
2875language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
2876You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
2877`set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
2878
2879 * GDB and Modula-2
2880
2881GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
2882currently under development at the State University of New York at
2883Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
2884continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
2885
2886Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
2887debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
2888symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
2889
2890There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
2891in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
2892
2893 * set write on/off
2894
2895GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
2896a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
2897the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
2898by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
2899effect immediately.
2900
2901 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
2902
2903When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
2904shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
2905The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
2906examining core files.
2907
2908 * set listsize
2909
2910You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
2911The default is 10.
2912
2913 * New machines supported (host and target)
2914
2915SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
2916Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
2917Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
2918
2919 * New hosts supported (not targets)
2920
2921IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
2922
2923 * New targets supported (not hosts)
2924
2925AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2926AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2927Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
2928
2929 * New remote interfaces
2930
2931AMD 29000 Adapt
2932AMD 29000 Minimon
2933
2934
2935*** Changes in GDB-4.0:
2936
2937 * New Facilities
2938
2939Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
2940
2941Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
2942target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
2943is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
2944remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
2945remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
2946also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
2947using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
2948stub on the target system.
2949
2950New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
2951
2952GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
2953library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
2954object file types such as a.out and coff.
2955
2956There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
2957refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
2958
2959
2960 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
2961
2962All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
2963by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
2964
2965For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
2966``Show prompt'' produces the response:
2967Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
2968
2969What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
2970print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
2971will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
2972all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
2973
2974confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
2975 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
2976 it is already running. Default is ON.
2977
2978editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
2979 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
2980 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
2981 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
2982 Default is ON.
2983
2984history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
2985 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
2986 or the value of the environment variable
2987 GDBHISTFILE.
2988
2989history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
2990 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
2991 HISTSIZE.
2992
2993history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
2994 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
2995 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
2996
2997history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
2998 history expansion will be performed on
2999 command line input. The default is OFF.
3000
3001radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
3002 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
3003 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
3004
3005height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
3006 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
3007 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3008 variable TERM.
3009
3010width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
3011 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
3012 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3013 variable TERM.
3014
3015Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
3016``set width'' instead.
3017
3018print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
3019 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
3020 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
3021 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
3022
3023print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
3024 is OFF.
3025
3026print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
3027 "raw" form if off.
3028
3029print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
3030 like instructions.
3031
3032print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
3033
3034
3035 * Support for Epoch Environment.
3036
3037The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
3038new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
3039are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
3040window.
3041
3042
3043 * Support for Shared Libraries
3044
3045GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
3046Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
3047before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
3048happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
3049At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
3050from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
3051shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
3052It can be abbreviated ``share''.
3053
3054sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
3055 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
3056 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
3057
3058info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
3059
3060
3061 * Watchpoints
3062
3063A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
3064expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
3065tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
3066quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
3067problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
3068more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
3069
3070watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
3071
3072info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
3073
3074delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3075disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3076enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3077
3078
3079 * C++ multiple inheritance
3080
3081When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
3082for C++ programs.
3083
3084 * C++ exception handling
3085
3086Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
3087ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
3088the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
3089handler's context).
3090
3091catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
3092 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
3093 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
3094
3095info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
3096 current stack frame.
3097
3098
3099 * Minor command changes
3100
3101The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
3102command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
3103is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
3104
3105The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
3106at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
3107frames without printing.
3108
3109 * New directory command
3110
3111'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
3112The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
3113about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
3114with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
3115find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
3116
3117 * Configuring GDB for compilation
3118
3119For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
3120for more details.
3121
3122GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
3123two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
3124Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
3125where the program that you are debugging will run.
This page took 0.523158 seconds and 4 git commands to generate.