Add missing file from my previous commit.
[deliverable/binutils-gdb.git] / gdb / NEWS
CommitLineData
c906108c
SS
1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
3
bfbf3774
JB
4*** Changes since GDB 7.1
5
c8d5aac9
L
6* GDB now sends xmlRegisters= in qSupported packet to indicate that
7 it understands register description.
8
7c953934
TT
9* The --batch flag now disables pagination and queries.
10
8685c86f
L
11* X86 general purpose registers
12
13 GDB now supports reading/writing byte, word and double-word x86
14 general purpose registers directly. This means you can use, say,
15 $ah or $ax to refer, respectively, to the byte register AH and
16 16-bit word register AX that are actually portions of the 32-bit
17 register EAX or 64-bit register RAX.
18
95a42b64
TT
19* The `commands' command now accepts a range of breakpoints to modify.
20 A plain `commands' following an `rbreak' will affect all the
21 breakpoints set by `rbreak'.
22
f3e9a817
PM
23* Python scripting
24
f870a310
TT
25** The GDB Python API now has access to symbols, symbol tables, and
26 frame's code blocks.
27
28** New methods gdb.target_charset and gdb.target_wide_charset.
f3e9a817 29
a7bdde9e
VP
30* Tracepoint actions were unified with breakpoint commands. In particular,
31there are no longer differences in "info break" output for breakpoints and
32tracepoints and the "commands" command can be used for both tracepoints and
33regular breakpoints.
34
05071a4d
PA
35* New targets
36
37ARM Symbian arm*-*-symbianelf*
38
bfbf3774 39*** Changes in GDB 7.1
abc7453d 40
4eef138c
TT
41* C++ Improvements
42
43 ** Namespace Support
71dee663
SW
44
45 GDB now supports importing of namespaces in C++. This enables the
46 user to inspect variables from imported namespaces. Support for
47 namepace aliasing has also been added. So, if a namespace is
48 aliased in the current scope (e.g. namepace C=A; ) the user can
49 print variables using the alias (e.g. (gdb) print C::x).
50
4eef138c
TT
51 ** Bug Fixes
52
53 All known bugs relating to the printing of virtual base class were
54 fixed. It is now possible to call overloaded static methods using a
55 qualified name.
56
57 ** Cast Operators
58
59 The C++ cast operators static_cast<>, dynamic_cast<>, const_cast<>,
60 and reinterpret_cast<> are now handled by the C++ expression parser.
61
2d1c1221
ME
62* New targets
63
64Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze-*-*
34207b9e 65Renesas RX rx-*-elf
2d1c1221
ME
66
67* New Simulators
68
69Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze
34207b9e 70Renesas RX rx
2d1c1221 71
6c95b8df
PA
72* Multi-program debugging.
73
74 GDB now has support for multi-program (a.k.a. multi-executable or
75 multi-exec) debugging. This allows for debugging multiple inferiors
76 simultaneously each running a different program under the same GDB
77 session. See "Debugging Multiple Inferiors and Programs" in the
78 manual for more information. This implied some user visible changes
79 in the multi-inferior support. For example, "info inferiors" now
80 lists inferiors that are not running yet or that have exited
81 already. See also "New commands" and "New options" below.
82
d5551862
SS
83* New tracing features
84
85 GDB's tracepoint facility now includes several new features:
86
87 ** Trace state variables
f61e138d
SS
88
89 GDB tracepoints now include support for trace state variables, which
90 are variables managed by the target agent during a tracing
91 experiment. They are useful for tracepoints that trigger each
92 other, so for instance one tracepoint can count hits in a variable,
93 and then a second tracepoint has a condition that is true when the
94 count reaches a particular value. Trace state variables share the
95 $-syntax of GDB convenience variables, and can appear in both
96 tracepoint actions and condition expressions. Use the "tvariable"
97 command to create, and "info tvariables" to view; see "Trace State
98 Variables" in the manual for more detail.
7a697b8d 99
d5551862 100 ** Fast tracepoints
7a697b8d
SS
101
102 GDB now includes an option for defining fast tracepoints, which
103 targets may implement more efficiently, such as by installing a jump
104 into the target agent rather than a trap instruction. The resulting
105 speedup can be by two orders of magnitude or more, although the
106 tradeoff is that some program locations on some target architectures
107 might not allow fast tracepoint installation, for instance if the
108 instruction to be replaced is shorter than the jump. To request a
109 fast tracepoint, use the "ftrace" command, with syntax identical to
110 the regular trace command.
111
d5551862
SS
112 ** Disconnected tracing
113
114 It is now possible to detach GDB from the target while it is running
115 a trace experiment, then reconnect later to see how the experiment
116 is going. In addition, a new variable disconnected-tracing lets you
117 tell the target agent whether to continue running a trace if the
118 connection is lost unexpectedly.
119
00bf0b85
SS
120 ** Trace files
121
122 GDB now has the ability to save the trace buffer into a file, and
123 then use that file as a target, similarly to you can do with
124 corefiles. You can select trace frames, print data that was
125 collected in them, and use tstatus to display the state of the
126 tracing run at the moment that it was saved. To create a trace
127 file, use "tsave <filename>", and to use it, do "target tfile
128 <name>".
4daf5ac0
SS
129
130 ** Circular trace buffer
131
132 You can ask the target agent to handle the trace buffer as a
133 circular buffer, discarding the oldest trace frames to make room for
134 newer ones, by setting circular-trace-buffer to on. This feature may
135 not be available for all target agents.
136
21a0512e
PP
137* Changed commands
138
139disassemble
140 The disassemble command, when invoked with two arguments, now requires
141 the arguments to be comma-separated.
142
0fe7935b
DJ
143info variables
144 The info variables command now displays variable definitions. Files
145 which only declare a variable are not shown.
146
fb2e7cb4
JB
147source
148 The source command is now capable of sourcing Python scripts.
149 This feature is dependent on the debugger being build with Python
150 support.
151
152 Related to this enhancement is also the introduction of a new command
153 "set script-extension" (see below).
154
6c95b8df
PA
155* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
156
399cd161
MS
157record save [<FILENAME>]
158 Save a file (in core file format) containing the process record
159 execution log for replay debugging at a later time.
160
161record restore <FILENAME>
162 Restore the process record execution log that was saved at an
163 earlier time, for replay debugging.
164
6c95b8df
PA
165add-inferior [-copies <N>] [-exec <FILENAME>]
166 Add a new inferior.
167
168clone-inferior [-copies <N>] [ID]
169 Make a new inferior ready to execute the same program another
170 inferior has loaded.
171
172remove-inferior ID
173 Remove an inferior.
174
175maint info program-spaces
176 List the program spaces loaded into GDB.
177
9a7071a8
JB
178set remote interrupt-sequence [Ctrl-C | BREAK | BREAK-g]
179show remote interrupt-sequence
180 Allow the user to select one of ^C, a BREAK signal or BREAK-g
181 as the sequence to the remote target in order to interrupt the execution.
182 Ctrl-C is a default. Some system prefers BREAK which is high level of
183 serial line for some certain time. Linux kernel prefers BREAK-g, a.k.a
184 Magic SysRq g. It is BREAK signal and character 'g'.
185
186set remote interrupt-on-connect [on | off]
187show remote interrupt-on-connect
188 When interrupt-on-connect is ON, gdb sends interrupt-sequence to
189 remote target when gdb connects to it. This is needed when you debug
190 Linux kernel.
191
192set remotebreak [on | off]
193show remotebreak
194Deprecated. Use "set/show remote interrupt-sequence" instead.
195
f61e138d
SS
196tvariable $NAME [ = EXP ]
197 Create or modify a trace state variable.
198
199info tvariables
200 List trace state variables and their values.
201
202delete tvariable $NAME ...
203 Delete one or more trace state variables.
204
6da95a67
SS
205teval EXPR, ...
206 Evaluate the given expressions without collecting anything into the
207 trace buffer. (Valid in tracepoint actions only.)
208
7a697b8d
SS
209ftrace FN / FILE:LINE / *ADDR
210 Define a fast tracepoint at the given function, line, or address.
211
b0f02ee9
JK
212* New expression syntax
213
214 GDB now parses the 0b prefix of binary numbers the same way as GCC does.
215 GDB now parses 0b101010 identically with 42.
216
6c95b8df
PA
217* New options
218
219set follow-exec-mode new|same
220show follow-exec-mode
221 Control whether GDB reuses the same inferior across an exec call or
222 creates a new one. This is useful to be able to restart the old
223 executable after the inferior having done an exec call.
224
236f1d4d
SS
225set default-collect EXPR, ...
226show default-collect
227 Define a list of expressions to be collected at each tracepoint.
228 This is a useful way to ensure essential items are not overlooked,
229 such as registers or a critical global variable.
230
d5551862
SS
231set disconnected-tracing
232show disconnected-tracing
233 If set to 1, the target is instructed to continue tracing if it
234 loses its connection to GDB. If 0, the target is to stop tracing
235 upon disconnection.
236
4daf5ac0
SS
237set circular-trace-buffer
238show circular-trace-buffer
239 If set to on, the target is instructed to use a circular trace buffer
240 and discard the oldest trace frames instead of stopping the trace due
241 to a full trace buffer. If set to off, the trace stops when the buffer
242 fills up. Some targets may not support this.
243
fb2e7cb4
JB
244set script-extension off|soft|strict
245show script-extension
246 If set to "off", the debugger does not perform any script language
247 recognition, and all sourced files are assumed to be GDB scripts.
248 If set to "soft" (the default), files are sourced according to
249 filename extension, falling back to GDB scripts if the first
250 evaluation failed.
251 If set to "strict", files are sourced according to filename extension.
252
2b71fc8e
JB
253set ada trust-PAD-over-XVS on|off
254show ada trust-PAD-over-XVS
255 If off, activate a workaround against a bug in the debugging information
256 generated by the compiler for PAD types (see gcc/exp_dbug.ads in
257 the GCC sources for more information about the GNAT encoding and
258 PAD types in particular). It is always safe to set this option to
259 off, but this introduces a slight performance penalty. The default
260 is on.
261
de2e5182
TT
262* Python API Improvements
263
264 ** GDB provides the new class gdb.LazyString. This is useful in
265 some pretty-printing cases. The new method gdb.Value.lazy_string
266 provides a simple way to create objects of this type.
267
268 ** The fields returned by gdb.Type.fields now have an
269 `is_base_class' attribute.
270
271 ** The new method gdb.Type.range returns the range of an array type.
272
273 ** The new method gdb.parse_and_eval can be used to parse and
274 evaluate an expression.
275
f61e138d
SS
276* New remote packets
277
278QTDV
279 Define a trace state variable.
280
281qTV
282 Get the current value of a trace state variable.
283
d5551862
SS
284QTDisconnected
285 Set desired tracing behavior upon disconnection.
286
4daf5ac0
SS
287QTBuffer:circular
288 Set the trace buffer to be linear or circular.
289
d5551862
SS
290qTfP, qTsP
291 Get data about the tracepoints currently in use.
292
2d483d34
MS
293* Bug fixes
294
295Process record now works correctly with hardware watchpoints.
296
6e0e5977
JB
297Multiple bug fixes have been made to the mips-irix port, making it
298much more reliable. In particular:
299 - Debugging threaded applications is now possible again. Previously,
300 GDB would hang while starting the program, or while waiting for
301 the program to stop at a breakpoint.
302 - Attaching to a running process no longer hangs.
303 - An error occurring while loading a core file has been fixed.
304 - Changing the value of the PC register now works again. This fixes
305 problems observed when using the "jump" command, or when calling
306 a function from GDB, or even when assigning a new value to $pc.
307 - With the "finish" and "return" commands, the return value for functions
308 returning a small array is now correctly printed.
309 - It is now possible to break on shared library code which gets executed
310 during a shared library init phase (code executed while executing
311 their .init section). Previously, the breakpoint would have no effect.
312 - GDB is now able to backtrace through the signal handler for
313 non-threaded programs.
314
93c26624
JK
315PIE (Position Independent Executable) programs debugging is now supported.
316This includes debugging execution of PIC (Position Independent Code) shared
317libraries although for that, it should be possible to run such libraries as an
318executable program.
319
abc7453d 320*** Changes in GDB 7.0
75feb17d 321
4efc6507
DE
322* GDB now has an interface for JIT compilation. Applications that
323dynamically generate code can create symbol files in memory and register
324them with GDB. For users, the feature should work transparently, and
325for JIT developers, the interface is documented in the GDB manual in the
326"JIT Compilation Interface" chapter.
327
782b2b07
SS
328* Tracepoints may now be conditional. The syntax is as for
329breakpoints; either an "if" clause appended to the "trace" command,
330or the "condition" command is available. GDB sends the condition to
331the target for evaluation using the same bytecode format as is used
332for tracepoint actions.
333
e6158f16 334* "disassemble" command with a /r modifier, print the raw instructions
7280022e 335in hex as well as in symbolic form.
e6158f16 336
e7a8dbfb
HZ
337* Process record and replay
338
339 In a architecture environment that supports ``process record and
340 replay'', ``process record and replay'' target can record a log of
341 the process execution, and replay it with both forward and reverse
342 execute commands.
343
64644d9b
MS
344* Reverse debugging: GDB now has new commands reverse-continue, reverse-
345step, reverse-next, reverse-finish, reverse-stepi, reverse-nexti, and
346set execution-direction {forward|reverse}, for targets that support
347reverse execution.
348
b9412953
DD
349* GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on MIPS/Linux systems. This
350feature is available with a native GDB running on kernel version
3512.6.28 or later.
352
6c7a06a3
TT
353* GDB now has support for multi-byte and wide character sets on the
354target. Strings whose character type is wchar_t, char16_t, or
355char32_t are now correctly printed. GDB supports wide- and unicode-
356literals in C, that is, L'x', L"string", u'x', u"string", U'x', and
357U"string" syntax. And, GDB allows the "%ls" and "%lc" formats in
358`printf'. This feature requires iconv to work properly; if your
359system does not have a working iconv, GDB can use GNU libiconv. See
360the installation instructions for more information.
361
f1838a98
UW
362* GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
363remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
364with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
365the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
366
55333a84
DE
367* "info sharedlibrary" now takes an optional regex of libraries to show,
368and it now reports if a shared library has no debugging information.
369
7f6a6314
PM
370* Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
371now complete on file names.
372
65d12d83
TT
373* When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
374completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
375For instance, consider:
376
377 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
378 # struct example variable;
379 (gdb) p variable.
380
381If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
382completions will be "f1" and "f2".
383
edb3359d
DJ
384* Inlined functions are now supported. They show up in backtraces, and
385the "step", "next", and "finish" commands handle them automatically.
386
2fae03e8
TT
387* GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
388operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
389macros.
390
47a3467a 391* GDB now supports inspecting extra signal information, exported by
58d6951d
DJ
392the new $_siginfo convenience variable. The feature is currently
393implemented on linux ARM, i386 and amd64.
394
395* GDB can now display the VFP floating point registers and NEON vector
396registers on ARM targets. Both ARM GNU/Linux native GDB and gdbserver
397can provide these registers (requires Linux 2.6.30 or later). Remote
398and simulator targets may also provide them.
47a3467a 399
08388c79
DE
400* New remote packets
401
402qSearch:memory:
403 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
404
a6f3e723
SL
405QStartNoAckMode
406 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
407 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
408 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
409
d7713ae0
EZ
410vKill
411 Kill the process with the specified process ID. Use this in preference
412 to `k' when multiprocess protocol extensions are supported.
413
07e059b5
VP
414qXfer:osdata:read
415 Obtains additional operating system information
416
47a3467a
PA
417qXfer:siginfo:read
418qXfer:siginfo:write
419 Read or write additional signal information.
420
060871df
PA
421* Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
422
423 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
424 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
425 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
426
d14508fe
DE
427* The "disassemble" command now supports an optional /m modifier to print mixed
428source+assembly.
429
c055b101 430* GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
a0ef4274 431DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
c055b101
CV
432
433* The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
a0ef4274
DJ
434and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
435`set/show sh calling-convention'.
c055b101 436
31fffb02
CS
437* GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
438with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
439
88d8a8e0
JB
440* 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
441
7f99b190
JB
442* Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
443
ccd213ac
DJ
444* Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
445which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
446
1fddbabb 447* The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
31fffb02 448list of section offsets.
1fddbabb 449
a0ef4274
DJ
450* On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
451conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
452have also been fixed.
453
bfb8797a 454* GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
158c7665
PH
455From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
456are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
bfb8797a 457
71c25dea
TT
458* GDB now parses C++ symbol and type names more flexibly. For
459example, given:
460
461 template<typename T> class C { };
462 C<char const *> c;
463
464GDB will now correctly handle all of:
465
466 ptype C<char const *>
467 ptype C<char const*>
468 ptype C<const char *>
469 ptype C<const char*>
470
ccd213ac
DJ
471* New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
472
473 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
474 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
475
7ae0e2a2
UW
476 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
477 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
478 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
479
a6f3e723
SL
480 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
481 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
482
da8bd9a3
DJ
483 - Support for the sparc64-linux-gnu target is now included in
484 gdbserver.
485
d70e31dd
DE
486 - The amd64-linux build of gdbserver now supports debugging both
487 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
488
489 - The i386-linux, amd64-linux, and i386-win32 builds of gdbserver
490 now support hardware watchpoints, and will use them automatically
491 as appropriate.
492
d57a3c85
TJB
493* Python scripting
494
495 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
496 available is determined at configure time.
497
d8906c6f
TJB
498 New GDB commands can now be written in Python.
499
aadc346a
JB
500* Ada tasking support
501
502 Ada tasks can now be inspected in GDB. The following commands have
503 been introduced:
504
505 info tasks
506 Print the list of Ada tasks.
507 info task N
508 Print detailed information about task number N.
509 task
510 Print the task number of the current task.
511 task N
512 Switch the context of debugging to task number N.
513
adb483fe
DJ
514* Support for user-defined prefixed commands. The "define" command can
515add new commands to existing prefixes, e.g. "target".
516
2277426b
PA
517* Multi-inferior, multi-process debugging.
518
519 GDB now has generalized support for multi-inferior debugging. See
520 "Debugging Multiple Inferiors" in the manual for more information.
521 Although availability still depends on target support, the command
522 set is more uniform now. The GNU/Linux specific multi-forks support
523 has been migrated to this new framework. This implied some user
524 visible changes; see "New commands" and also "Removed commands"
525 below.
526
08d16641
PA
527* Target descriptions can now describe the target OS ABI. See the
528"Target Description Format" section in the user manual for more
529information.
530
e35359c5
UW
531* Target descriptions can now describe "compatible" architectures
532to indicate that the target can execute applications for a different
533architecture in addition to those for the main target architecture.
534See the "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for
535more information.
536
85e747d2
UW
537* Multi-architecture debugging.
538
539 GDB now includes general supports for debugging applications on
540 hybrid systems that use more than one single processor architecture
541 at the same time. Each such hybrid architecture still requires
542 specific support to be added. The only hybrid architecture supported
543 in this version of GDB is the Cell Broadband Engine.
544
545* GDB now supports integrated debugging of Cell/B.E. applications that
546use both the PPU and SPU architectures. To enable support for hybrid
547Cell/B.E. debugging, you need to configure GDB to support both the
548powerpc-linux or powerpc64-linux and the spu-elf targets, using the
549--enable-targets configure option.
550
11ade57a
PA
551* Non-stop mode debugging.
552
553 For some targets, GDB now supports an optional mode of operation in
554 which you can examine stopped threads while other threads continue
555 to execute freely. This is referred to as non-stop mode, with the
556 old mode referred to as all-stop mode. See the "Non-Stop Mode"
557 section in the user manual for more information.
558
559 To be able to support remote non-stop debugging, a remote stub needs
560 to implement the non-stop mode remote protocol extensions, as
561 described in the "Remote Non-Stop" section of the user manual. The
562 GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been adjusted to support these
563 extensions on linux targets.
564
d7713ae0 565* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
75feb17d 566
a96d9b2e
SDJ
567catch syscall [NAME(S) | NUMBER(S)]
568 Catch system calls. Arguments, which should be names of system
569 calls or their numbers, mean catch only those syscalls. Without
570 arguments, every syscall will be caught. When the inferior issues
571 any of the specified syscalls, GDB will stop and announce the system
572 call, both when it is called and when its call returns. This
573 feature is currently available with a native GDB running on the
574 Linux Kernel, under the following architectures: x86, x86_64,
575 PowerPC and PowerPC64.
576
08388c79
DE
577find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
578 val1 [, val2, ...]
579 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
580
d57a3c85
TJB
581maint set python print-stack
582maint show python print-stack
583 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
584
585python [CODE]
586 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
587
d7713ae0
EZ
588macro define
589macro list
590macro undef
591 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
592 interactively.
593
594info os processes
595 Show operating system information about processes.
596
2277426b
PA
597info inferiors
598 List the inferiors currently under GDB's control.
599
600inferior NUM
601 Switch focus to inferior number NUM.
602
603detach inferior NUM
604 Detach from inferior number NUM.
605
606kill inferior NUM
607 Kill inferior number NUM.
608
d7713ae0
EZ
609* New options
610
3285f3fe
UW
611set spu stop-on-load
612show spu stop-on-load
613 Control whether to stop for new SPE threads during Cell/B.E. debugging.
614
ff1a52c6
UW
615set spu auto-flush-cache
616show spu auto-flush-cache
617 Control whether to automatically flush the software-managed cache
618 during Cell/B.E. debugging.
619
d7713ae0
EZ
620set sh calling-convention
621show sh calling-convention
622 Control the calling convention used when calling SH target functions.
623
e0a3ce09 624set debug timestamp
75feb17d 625show debug timestamp
d7713ae0
EZ
626 Control display of timestamps with GDB debugging output.
627
628set disassemble-next-line
629show disassemble-next-line
630 Control display of disassembled source lines or instructions when
631 the debuggee stops.
632
633set remote noack-packet
634show remote noack-packet
635 Set/show the use of remote protocol QStartNoAckMode packet. See above
636 under "New remote packets."
637
638set remote query-attached-packet
639show remote query-attached-packet
640 Control use of remote protocol `qAttached' (query-attached) packet.
641
642set remote read-siginfo-object
643show remote read-siginfo-object
644 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:read' (read-siginfo-object)
645 packet.
646
647set remote write-siginfo-object
648show remote write-siginfo-object
649 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:write' (write-siginfo-object)
650 packet.
651
40ab02ce
MS
652set remote reverse-continue
653show remote reverse-continue
654 Control use of remote protocol 'bc' (reverse-continue) packet.
655
656set remote reverse-step
657show remote reverse-step
658 Control use of remote protocol 'bs' (reverse-step) packet.
659
d7713ae0
EZ
660set displaced-stepping
661show displaced-stepping
662 Control displaced stepping mode. Displaced stepping is a way to
663 single-step over breakpoints without removing them from the debuggee.
664 Also known as "out-of-line single-stepping".
665
666set debug displaced
667show debug displaced
668 Control display of debugging info for displaced stepping.
669
670maint set internal-error
671maint show internal-error
672 Control what GDB does when an internal error is detected.
673
674maint set internal-warning
675maint show internal-warning
676 Control what GDB does when an internal warning is detected.
75feb17d 677
ccd213ac
DJ
678set exec-wrapper
679show exec-wrapper
680unset exec-wrapper
681 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
fa4727a6 682
aad4b048
JB
683set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
684show multiple-symbols
685 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
686 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
687 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
688
74960c60
VP
689set breakpoint always-inserted
690show breakpoint always-inserted
691 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
692 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
693 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
694
0428b8f5
DJ
695set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
696show arm fallback-mode
697set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
698show arm force-mode
699 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
700 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
701 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
702 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
703
10568435
JK
704set disable-randomization
705show disable-randomization
706 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
707 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
708 multiple debugging sessions.
709
d7713ae0
EZ
710set non-stop
711show non-stop
712 Control whether other threads are stopped or not when some thread hits
713 a breakpoint.
714
b3eb342c 715set target-async
d7713ae0 716show target-async
b3eb342c
VP
717 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
718 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
719 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
720 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
721
6c7a06a3
TT
722set target-wide-charset
723show target-wide-charset
724 The target-wide-charset is the name of the character set that GDB
725 uses when printing characters whose type is wchar_t.
726
84603566
SL
727set tcp auto-retry (on|off)
728show tcp auto-retry
729set tcp connect-timeout
730show tcp connect-timeout
731 These commands allow GDB to retry failed TCP connections to a remote stub
732 with a specified timeout period; this is useful if the stub is launched
733 in parallel with GDB but may not be ready to accept connections immediately.
734
17a37d48
PP
735set libthread-db-search-path
736show libthread-db-search-path
737 Control list of directories which GDB will search for appropriate
738 libthread_db.
739
d4db2f36
PA
740set schedule-multiple (on|off)
741show schedule-multiple
742 Allow GDB to resume all threads of all processes or only threads of
743 the current process.
744
4e5d721f
DE
745set stack-cache
746show stack-cache
747 Use more aggressive caching for accesses to the stack. This improves
748 performance of remote debugging (particularly backtraces) without
749 affecting correctness.
750
910c5da8
JB
751set interactive-mode (on|off|auto)
752show interactive-mode
753 Control whether GDB runs in interactive mode (on) or not (off).
754 When in interactive mode, GDB waits for the user to answer all
755 queries. Otherwise, GDB does not wait and assumes the default
756 answer. When set to auto (the default), GDB determines which
757 mode to use based on the stdin settings.
758
2277426b
PA
759* Removed commands
760
761info forks
762 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `info
763 inferiors' command. To list checkpoints, you can still use the
764 `info checkpoints' command, which was an alias for the `info forks'
765 command.
766
767fork NUM
768 Replaced by the new `inferior' command. To switch between
769 checkpoints, you can still use the `restart' command, which was an
770 alias for the `fork' command.
771
772process PID
773 This is removed, since some targets don't have a notion of
774 processes. To switch between processes, you can still use the
775 `inferior' command using GDB's own inferior number.
776
777delete fork NUM
778 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `kill
779 inferior' command. To delete a checkpoint, you can still use the
780 `delete checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `delete
781 fork' command.
782
783detach fork NUM
784 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `detach
785 inferior' command. To detach a checkpoint, you can still use the
786 `detach checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `detach
787 fork' command.
788
a80b95ba
TG
789* New native configurations
790
791x86/x86_64 Darwin i[34567]86-*-darwin*
792
b8bfd3ed
JB
793x86_64 MinGW x86_64-*-mingw*
794
75a2d5e7
TT
795* New targets
796
c28c63d8 797Lattice Mico32 lm32-*
75a2d5e7 798x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
4c1d2973 799x86_64 DICOS x86_64-*-dicos*
5f814c3b 800S+core 3 score-*-*
75a2d5e7 801
6de3146c
PA
802* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports x86 Windows CE
803 (mingw32ce) debugging.
804
d5cbbe6e
JB
805* Removed commands
806
807catch load
808catch unload
809 These commands were actually not implemented on any target.
810
75feb17d 811*** Changes in GDB 6.8
f9ed52be 812
af5ca30d
NH
813* New native configurations
814
815NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
94a0e877 816Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
af5ca30d
NH
817
818* New targets
819
820NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
94a0e877 821Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
af5ca30d 822
7a404eba
PA
823* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
824
825 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
826 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
827 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
828 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
829
430ebac9
PA
830* GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
831(mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
832
fe6fbf8b 833* Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
8d5f9c6f 834is resolved.
fe6fbf8b
VP
835
836* GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
8d5f9c6f
DJ
837including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
838and in inlined functions.
fe6fbf8b 839
10665d76
JB
840* GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
841accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
842more than one contiguous range of addresses.
843
7cc46491
DJ
844* Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
845
d71340b8
DJ
846* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
847registers on PowerPC targets.
848
523c4513
DJ
849* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
850targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
851
a6b151f1
DJ
852* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
853commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
854
2d717e4f
DJ
855* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
856extended-remote mode.
857
24a836bd 858* hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
d001be7a
DJ
859The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
860error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
861The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
24a836bd 862
d0c678e6
UW
863* GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
864building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
865target architectures.
866
d64a946d
TJB
867* GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
868Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
869now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
870stored in two consecutive float registers.
871
ee163bf5
VP
872* The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
873breakpoints now.
874
b93b6ca7 875* Improved support for debugging Ada
d001be7a
DJ
876Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
877include:
b93b6ca7
JB
878 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
879 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
880 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
881 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
882 of an assignment
883 - Improved command completion in Ada
884 - Several bug fixes
885
d001be7a
DJ
886* GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
887process.
888
a6b151f1
DJ
889* New commands
890
6d53d0af
JB
891set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
892show print frame-arguments
893 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
894 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
895
a6b151f1
DJ
896remote put
897remote get
898remote delete
899 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
900
901* New MI commands
902
903-target-file-put
904-target-file-get
905-target-file-delete
906 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
907
908* New remote packets
909
910vFile:open:
911vFile:close:
912vFile:pread:
913vFile:pwrite:
914vFile:unlink:
915 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
d0c678e6 916
2d717e4f
DJ
917vAttach
918 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
919 mode.
920
921vRun
922 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
923
8d5f9c6f 924*** Changes in GDB 6.7
6dd09645 925
19d378fc
MS
926* Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
927bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
928Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
929
3a40aaa0
UW
930* When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
931symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
932-Bsymbolic linker option.
933
a6ec25f2
BW
934* When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
935recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
936is not supported.
937
6dd09645
JB
938* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
939frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
940
c9bb8148
DJ
941* GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
94232-bit or 64-bit register values.
943
0d5de010
DJ
944* Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
945
23181151
DJ
946* GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
947target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
948a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
949
ea37ba09
DJ
950* Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
951automatically displayed as character or string data.
952
953* The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
954arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
955as strings.
e1f48ead 956
123dc839
DJ
957* Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
958for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
8d5f9c6f 959only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
123dc839 960
05a4558a
DJ
961* GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
962iWMMXt coprocessor.
fb1e4ffc 963
7c963485
PA
964* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
965ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
966has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
967
b18be20d
DJ
968* GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
969
0ca420ce
UW
970* GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
971
31d99776
DJ
972* The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
973layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
974segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
975
a4642986
MR
976* The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
977immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
978
cfa9d6d9
DJ
979* The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
980"library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
981packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
982where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
983Windows and SymbianOS).
255e7678
DJ
984
985* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
986(DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
f5db8714
JK
987
988* GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
989according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
cfa9d6d9 990
c9bb8148
DJ
991* New commands
992
23776285
MR
993set remoteflow
994show remoteflow
995 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
996 when debugging using remote targets.
997
c9bb8148
DJ
998set mem inaccessible-by-default
999show mem inaccessible-by-default
1000 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
1001 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
1002 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
1003 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
1004 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
1005
1006set breakpoint auto-hw
1007show breakpoint auto-hw
1008 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
1009 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
1010 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
1011 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
1012 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
1013 including "next" and "finish".
1014
0e420bd8
JB
1015catch exception
1016catch exception unhandled
1017 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
1018
1019catch assert
1020 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
1021
f822c95b
DJ
1022set sysroot
1023show sysroot
1024 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
1025 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
1026 an alias to "set sysroot".
1027
83cc5c53
UW
1028info spu
1029 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
1030 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
1031 architecture.
1032
bd372731
MK
1033* New native configurations
1034
1035OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
1036
23181151
DJ
1037set tdesc filename
1038unset tdesc filename
1039show tdesc filename
1040 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
1041 not query the target for its built-in description.
1042
c9bb8148
DJ
1043* New targets
1044
54fe9172 1045OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
c9bb8148 1046MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
c077150c 1047Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
c9bb8148 1048
6dd09645
JB
1049* New remote packets
1050
1051QPassSignals:
1052 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
1053 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
1054
23181151
DJ
1055qXfer:features:read:
1056 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
1057 features.
6dd09645 1058
83cc5c53
UW
1059qXfer:spu:read:
1060qXfer:spu:write:
1061 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
1062 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
1063
cfa9d6d9
DJ
1064qXfer:libraries:read:
1065 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
1066 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
1067 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
1068 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
1069
483367ee
DJ
1070* Removed targets
1071
1072Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
1073
d08950c4
UW
1074alpha*-*-osf1*
1075alpha*-*-osf2*
7ce59000 1076d10v-*-*
483367ee
DJ
1077hppa*-*-hiux*
1078i[34567]86-ncr-*
1079i[34567]86-*-dgux*
1080i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
1081i[34567]86-*-netware*
1082i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
1083i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
1084i[34567]86-*-sco*
1085i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
1086i[34567]86-*-sysv4*
1087i[34567]86-*-sysv5*
1088i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
1089i[34567]86-*-unixware*
1090i[34567]86-*-sysv*
1091i[34567]86-*-isc*
1092m68*-cisco*-*
1093m68*-tandem-*
ad527d2e 1094mips*-*-pe
483367ee 1095rs6000-*-lynxos*
ad527d2e 1096sh*-*-pe
483367ee 1097
7ce59000
DJ
1098* Other removed features
1099
1100target abug
1101target cpu32bug
1102target est
1103target rom68k
1104
1105 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
1106
ea35711c
DJ
1107target hms
1108target e7000
1109target sh3
1110target sh3e
1111
1112 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
1113 H8/300.
1114
1115target ocd
1116
1117 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
1118 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
1119 interfaces.
1120
7ce59000
DJ
1121DWARF 1 support
1122
1123 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
1124 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
1125
54d61198
DJ
1126Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
1127
1128 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
1129 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
1130 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
1131 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
1132
ea35711c
DJ
1133MIPS ".pdr" sections
1134
1135 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
1136 in debugging information.
1137
1138Scheme support
1139
1140 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
1141 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
1142
1a69e1e4
DJ
1143set mips stack-arg-size
1144set mips saved-gpreg-size
1145
1146 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
1147
6dd09645 1148*** Changes in GDB 6.6
e374b601 1149
ca3bf3bd
DJ
1150* New targets
1151
1152Xtensa xtensa-elf
9c309e77 1153Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
ca3bf3bd 1154
6aec2e11
DJ
1155* GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
1156(mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
1157running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
1158
1159* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
1160Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
1161supported.
1162
17218d91
DJ
1163* The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
1164broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
1165
9ebce043
DJ
1166* The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
1167stub provides the required support.
1168
7d3d3ece
DJ
1169* Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
1170longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
1171
4f8253f3
JB
1172* New commands
1173
1174set substitute-path
1175unset substitute-path
1176show substitute-path
1177 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
1178 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
1179 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
1180 between compilation and debugging.
1181
9fa66fd7
AS
1182set trace-commands
1183show trace-commands
1184 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
1185 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
1186 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
1187
1f5befc1
DJ
1188* REMOVED features
1189
1190The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
1191
2ec3381a
DJ
1192Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
1193an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
1194
3d00d119
DJ
1195The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
1196
be2a5f71
DJ
1197* New remote packets
1198
1199qSupported:
1200 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
1201 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
1202 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
1203 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
1204 target.
1205
0876f84a
DJ
1206qXfer:auxv:read:
1207 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
1208 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
1209
9ebce043
DJ
1210qXfer:memory-map:read:
1211 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
1212 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
1213
1214vFlashErase:
1215vFlashWrite:
1216vFlashDone:
1217 Erase and program a flash memory device.
1218
0876f84a
DJ
1219* Removed remote packets
1220
1221qPart:auxv:read:
1222 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
1223 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
1224
e374b601 1225*** Changes in GDB 6.5
53e5f3cf 1226
96309189
MS
1227* New targets
1228
1229Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
1230
1231Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
1232
53e5f3cf
AS
1233* New commands
1234
1235init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
1236 only if it doesn't already have a value.
1237
ac264b3b
MS
1238The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
1239
1240checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
1241
1242restart <n> Return the program state to a
1243 previously saved state.
1244
1245info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
1246
1247delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
1248
1249set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
1250 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
1251
1252info forks List forks of the user program that
1253 are available to be debugged.
1254
1255fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
1256 forks of the user program that are
1257 available to be debugged.
1258
1259delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
1260 that are available to be debugged (and
1261 kill the forked process).
1262
1263detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
1264 that are available to be debugged (and
1265 allow the process to continue).
1266
3950dc3f
NS
1267* New architecture
1268
1269Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
1270
0ea3f30e
DJ
1271* Improved Windows host support
1272
1273GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
1274native console support, and remote communications using either
1275network sockets or serial ports.
1276
f79daebb
GM
1277* Improved Modula-2 language support
1278
1279GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
1280basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
1281pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
1282printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
1283written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
1284GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
1285
acab6ab2
MM
1286* REMOVED features
1287
1288The ARM rdi-share module.
1289
f4267320
DJ
1290The Netware NLM debug server.
1291
53e5f3cf 1292*** Changes in GDB 6.4
156a53ca 1293
e0ecbda1
MK
1294* New native configurations
1295
02a677ac 1296OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
e0ecbda1
MK
1297OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
1298
d64a6579
KB
1299* New targets
1300
1301Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
1302
b33a6190
AS
1303* New command line options
1304
1305--batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
1306--return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
1307 the child (debugged) program exited with.
1308--eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
1309 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
1310 specified multiple times and in conjunction
1311 with the --command (-x) option.
1312
11dced61
AC
1313* Deprecated commands removed
1314
1315The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
1316removed:
1317
1318 Command Replacement
1319 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
1320 othernames set arm disassembler
1321 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
1322 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
1323 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
1324 regs info registers
1325
6fe85783
MK
1326* New BSD user-level threads support
1327
1328It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
1329library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
1330configurations are:
1331
1332FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1333FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
1334OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
1335
1336Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
1337are not yet supported.
1338
5260ca71
MS
1339* New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
1340(Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
1341
e84ecc99
AC
1342* REMOVED configurations and files
1343
1344VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
9445aa30 1345Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
9445aa30 1346National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
156a53ca 1347
31e35378
JB
1348* New "set print array-indexes" command
1349
1350After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
1351when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
1352behavior.
1353
e85e5c83
MK
1354* VAX floating point support
1355
1356GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
1357
d91e9901
AS
1358* User-defined command support
1359
1360In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
1361to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
1362section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
1363
f2cb65ca
MC
1364*** Changes in GDB 6.3:
1365
f47b1503
AS
1366* New command line option
1367
1368GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
1369debugging.
1370
f2cb65ca
MC
1371* GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
1372
1373GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
1374information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
1375by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
1376proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
1377to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
860660cb 1378
d08c0230
AC
1379* Internationalization
1380
1381When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
1382internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
1383continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
1384
117ea3cf
PH
1385* Ada
1386
1387Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
1388implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
1389into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
1390
d08c0230
AC
1391* New native configurations
1392
1393GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
1394
1395* Remote 'p' packet
1396
1397GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
1398packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
1399
1400* END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
1401
1402GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
1403The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
1404features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
1405i386 application).
1406
1407GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
1408compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
1409continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
1410configurations:
1411
1412hppa-*-hpux
1413ia64-*-aix
1414mips-*-irix*
1415*-*-lynx
1416mips-*-linux-gnu
1417sds protocol
1418xdr protocol
1419powerpc bdm protocol
1420
1421Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
1422made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
1423
1424* OBSOLETE configurations and files
1425
1426Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1427been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1428configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1429permanently REMOVED.
1430
1431h8300-*-*
1432mcore-*-*
1433mn10300-*-*
1434ns32k-*-*
1435sh64-*-*
1436v850-*-*
1437
ebb7c577
AC
1438*** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
1439
1440* MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
1441
1442When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
1443heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
1444been fixed.
1445
1446* MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
1447
1448When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
1449fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
1450IRIX long double values).
1451
1452* VAX and "next"
1453
1454A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
1455command. This problem has been fixed.
1456
860660cb 1457*** Changes in GDB 6.2:
faae5abe 1458
0dea2468
AC
1459* Fix for ``many threads''
1460
1461On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
1462rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
1463error message:
1464
1465 ptrace: No such process.
1466 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
1467
1468This problem has been fixed.
1469
2c07db7a
AC
1470* "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
1471
1472Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
1473GDB to dump core).
1474
c23968a2
JB
1475* New ``start'' command.
1476
1477This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
1478
71009278
MK
1479* New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
1480
1481Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
1482live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
1483platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
1484
1485FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1486FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
1487NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
1488NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
1489NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
1490OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
1491OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
1492OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
1493OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
1494
3c0b7db2
AC
1495* Signal trampoline code overhauled
1496
1497Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
1498These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
1499of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
1500call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
1501signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
1502
73cc75f3
AC
1503Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
1504features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
1505include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
3c0b7db2 1506
7243600a
BF
1507* Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
1508
6f606e1c
MK
1509* New native configurations
1510
97dc871c 1511GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
0e56aeaf 1512OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
bf2ca189
MK
1513OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
1514OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
d195bc9f 1515OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 1516NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
9f076e7a 1517OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 1518
a1b461bf
AC
1519* END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
1520
1521GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
1522The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
1523including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
1524migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
1525compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
1526work, was also included.
1527
1528GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
1529module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
1530
1531h8300-*-*
1532mcore-*-*
1533mn10300-*-*
1534ns32k-*-*
1535sh64-*-*
1536v850-*-*
1537xstormy16-*-*
1538
1539Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
1540made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
1541
3c7012f5
AC
1542* REMOVED configurations and files
1543
1544Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
1545Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
1546Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
1547Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
1548Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
1549AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
1550Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
1551decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
1552riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
1553sonymips mips-sony-*
1554sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
1555
e5fe55f7
AC
1556*** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
1557
1558* TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
1559
1560The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
1561GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
1562command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
1563program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
1564with GDB".
1565
1566* Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
1567
1568Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
1569libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
1570cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
1571GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
1572shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
1573the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
1574are created.
1575
1576Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
1577
1578* Fixed ISO-C build problems
1579
1580The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
1581non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
1582compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
1583
1584* Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
1585
1586Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
1587wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
1588
1589* Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
1590
1591The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
1592permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
1593systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
1594
1595* Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
1596
1597Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
1598has been updated to use constant array sizes.
1599
1600* Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
1601
1602GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
1603its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
1604panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
1605
1606* Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
1607
1608When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
1609by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
1610not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
1611
faae5abe 1612*** Changes in GDB 6.1:
f2c06f52 1613
9175c9a3
MC
1614* Removed --with-mmalloc
1615
1616Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
1617conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
1618
3cc87ec0
MK
1619* Changes in AMD64 configurations
1620
1621The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
1622the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
1623and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
1624you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
1625
f0424ef6
MK
1626* Revised SPARC target
1627
1628The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
1629FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
03cebad2
MK
1630support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
1631from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
1632(Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
f0424ef6 1633
59659be2
ILT
1634* New C++ demangler
1635
1636GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
1637names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
1638with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
1639programs.
1640
9e08b29b
DJ
1641* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
1642
1643GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
1644arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
1645encountered these.
1646
8dfe8985
DC
1647* C++ nested types and namespaces
1648
1649GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
1650improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
1651is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
1652Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
1653namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
1654"Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
1655frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
1656if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
1657GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
1658
cced5e27
MK
1659* New native configurations
1660
1661NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
27d1e716 1662OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2031c21a 1663OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
f2cab569
MK
1664OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
1665OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
cced5e27 1666
b4b4b794
KI
1667* New debugging protocols
1668
1669M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
1670
7989c619
AC
1671* "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
1672
1673The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
1674and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
1675tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
1676
5994185b
AC
1677* OBSOLETE configurations and files
1678
1679Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1680been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1681configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1682permanently REMOVED.
1683
1684Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
1685Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
1686Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
1687Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
1688Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
1689AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
1690Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
0748d941
AC
1691decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
1692riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
1693sonymips mips-sony-*
1694sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
5994185b 1695
0ddabb4c
AC
1696* REMOVED configurations and files
1697
1698SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
1699SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4a8269c0
AC
1700Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1701Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1702H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1703HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
1704HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1705HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
1706PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
cf7c5c23 1707386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
4a8269c0
AC
1708Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
1709 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
1710 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f0424ef6
MK
1711SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
1712SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
4a8269c0
AC
1713Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1714Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
0ddabb4c 1715
c7f1390e
DJ
1716*** Changes in GDB 6.0:
1717
1fe43d45
AC
1718* Objective-C
1719
1720Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
1721integrated into GDB.
1722
e6beb428
AC
1723* New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
1724
1725DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
1726information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
1727By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
1728backtraces.
1729
1730The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
1731have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
1732DWARF 2 CFI support.
1733
1734* Hosted file I/O.
1735
1736GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
1737file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
1738remote protocol documentation for details.
1739
1740* All targets using the new architecture framework.
1741
1742All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
1743architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
1744to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
1745ppc32 on ppc64).
1746
1747* GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
1748
1749GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
1750per-thread variables.
1751
1752* GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
1753
1754GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
1755GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
1756
1757* Separate debug info.
1758
1759GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
1760automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
1761of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
1762system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
1763and optional debug files.
1764
1765* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
1766
1767DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
1768describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
1769debugger.
1770
1771GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
1772for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
1773
1774* Java
1775
1776A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
1777Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
1778considered "useable".
1779
85f8f974
DJ
1780* GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
1781
1782The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
1783commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
1784kernel.
1785
0fac0b41
DJ
1786* GDB supports logging output to a file
1787
1788There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
1789used to capture GDB's output to a file.
f2c06f52 1790
6ad8ae5c
DJ
1791* The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
1792
1793The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
1794disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
1795command.
1796
e286caf2 1797* d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
5f601589
AC
1798
1799The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
1800registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
1801
d28f9cdf
DJ
1802* Profiling support
1803
1804A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
1805be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
1806session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
1807"--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
1808data, for more informative profiling results.
1809
da0f9dcd
AC
1810* Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
1811
1812The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
1813option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
b68767c1 1814"mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
da0f9dcd
AC
1815
1816Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
1817removed.
1818
fb9b6b35
JJ
1819Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
1820Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
1821Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
1822 in a subsequent -var-update.
1823
954a4db8
MK
1824* New native configurations.
1825
1826FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1827
6760f9e6
JB
1828* Multi-arched targets.
1829
b4263afa 1830HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
85a453d5 1831Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
6760f9e6 1832
1b831c93
AC
1833* OBSOLETE configurations and files
1834
1835Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1836been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1837configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1838permanently REMOVED.
1839
8b0e5691 1840Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
67f16606 1841Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
fd2299bd 1842H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
56056df7
AC
1843HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
1844HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1845HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
78c43945 1846PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2fbce691
AC
1847Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
1848 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
1849 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f81824a9
AC
1850Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1851Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
fd2299bd 1852
5835abe7
NC
1853* REMOVED configurations and files
1854
1855V850EA ISA
1b831c93
AC
1856Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1857IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
1858i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1859i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1860i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
1861HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1862 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
1863 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
1864Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1865Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1866Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1867OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1868I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5835abe7 1869
a094c6fb
AC
1870* MIPS $fp behavior changed
1871
1872The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
1873the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
1874context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
1875address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
1876The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
1877
299ffc64 1878*** Changes in GDB 5.3:
37057839 1879
46248966
AC
1880* GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
1881
1882When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
1883`/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
1884in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
1885library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
1886shared libs like mad''.
1887
b9d14705 1888* ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
6da02953 1889
b9d14705
DJ
1890Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
1891the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
1892arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
1893powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
6da02953 1894
e0e9281e
JB
1895* GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
1896
1897GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
1898and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
1899they expand.
1900
dd73b9bb
AC
1901The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
1902invocations in expression, and shows the result.
1903
1904The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
1905macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
1906
e0e9281e
JB
1907Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
1908information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
1909your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
1910information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
1911
2250ee0c
CV
1912* Multi-arched targets.
1913
6e3ba3b8
JT
1914DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
1915DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
2250ee0c 1916NEC V850 v850-*-*
6e3ba3b8 1917National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
a1789893
GS
1918Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
1919Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
2250ee0c 1920
cd9bfe15 1921* New targets.
e33ce519 1922
456f8b9d
DB
1923Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
1924
e33ce519 1925
da8ca43d
JT
1926* New native configurations
1927
1928Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
029923d4 1929SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
45888261 1930MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
9ce5c36a 1931UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
da8ca43d 1932
cd9bfe15
AC
1933* OBSOLETE configurations and files
1934
1935Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1936been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1937configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1938permanently REMOVED.
1939
92eb23c5 1940Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
a99a9e1b 1941OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1c7cc583 1942IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
7a3085c1 1943Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
7fb623f7 1944Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
eb4c54a2 1945Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
d8ee244c
MK
1946i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1947i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1948i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
822e978b
AC
1949HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1950 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
1951 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
4d210288 1952I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
92eb23c5 1953
db034ac5
AC
1954* OBSOLETE languages
1955
1956CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
1957
cd9bfe15
AC
1958* REMOVED configurations and files
1959
1960AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1961A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1962AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1963AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1964AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1965
1966testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
1967
20f01a46
DH
1968* New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
1969
1970This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
1971commands. The default is 1024.
1972
a5941fbf
MK
1973* Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
1974
1975Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
1976
89743e04
MS
1977* New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
1978
1979These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
1980to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
1981from a file into memory (restore).
37057839 1982
9fb14e79
JB
1983* Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
1984
1985The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
1986including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
1987of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
1988
2037aebb
AC
1989*** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
1990
1991* New targets.
1992
1993Atmel AVR avr*-*-*
1994
1995* Bug fixes
1996
1997gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
1998mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
1999Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
2000
2001gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
2002dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
2003Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
2004
2005Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
2006Surprisingly enough, it works now.
2007By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
2008
2009i386 hardware watchpoint support:
2010avoid misses on second run for some targets.
2011By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
2012
37057839 2013*** Changes in GDB 5.2:
eb7cedd9 2014
1a703748
MS
2015* New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
2016
2017This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
2018really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
2019In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
2020target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
2021This can be a significant performance improvement on some
2022(notably embedded) targets.
2023
cefd4ef5
MS
2024* New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
2025
55241689
AC
2026This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
2027process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
2028GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
2029hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
cefd4ef5 2030
352ed7b4
MS
2031* New command line option
2032
2033GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
2034
2035* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
2036
2037There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
2038command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
2039a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
2040be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
2041open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
2042issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
2043a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
2044it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
2045GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
2046is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
2047
fe419ffc
RE
2048* Changes in ARM configurations.
2049
2050Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
2051configuration is fully multi-arch.
2052
eb7cedd9
MK
2053* New native configurations
2054
fe419ffc 2055ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
eb7cedd9 2056x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
55241689 2057AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
768f0842 2058Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
eb7cedd9 2059
c9f63e6b
CV
2060* New targets
2061
2062Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
2063
9b4ff276
AC
2064* OBSOLETE configurations and files
2065
2066Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2067been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2068configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2069permanently REMOVED.
2070
2071AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
2072A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2073AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2074AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2075AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2076
b4ceaee6 2077testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
9b4ff276 2078
e2caac18
AC
2079* REMOVED configurations and files
2080
2081TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
7bc65f05 2082WDC 65816 w65-*-*
7768dd6c
AC
2083PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2084PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2085PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
5e734e1f 2086Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1406caf7
AC
2087Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
2088 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
7e24f0b1 2089SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
9b567150 2090Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
3680c638
AC
2091Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
2092ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
a752853e 2093Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
e2caac18 2094
c2a727fa
TT
2095* Changes to command line processing
2096
2097The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
2098for the inferior from gdb's command line.
2099
467d8519
TT
2100* Changes to key bindings
2101
2102There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
2103
7072a954
AC
2104*** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
2105
2106Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
2107
2108Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
2109corrupted.
2110
2111Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
2112
2113Numerous documentation fixes.
2114
2115Numerous testsuite fixes.
2116
34f47bc4 2117*** Changes in GDB 5.1:
139760b7
MK
2118
2119* New native configurations
2120
2121Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
2122x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
55241689 2123MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
e23194cb
EZ
2124MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
2125ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
55241689 2126s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
139760b7 2127
bf64bfd6
AC
2128* New targets
2129
def90278 2130Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
24be5c34 2131CRIS cris-axis
55241689 2132UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
def90278 2133
17e78a56 2134* OBSOLETE configurations and files
bf64bfd6
AC
2135
2136x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
9b9c068d 2137Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
bb19ff3b
AC
2138Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
2139 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
76f4ea53
AC
2140TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2141WDC 65816 w65-*-*
4a1968f4 2142Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1b2b2c16
AC
2143PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2144PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2145PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
24f89b68 2146SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
514e603d
AC
2147Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
2148ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
d036b4d9 2149Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
bf64bfd6 2150
17e78a56
AC
2151stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
2152kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
2153
7fcca85b
AC
2154Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2155been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2156configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2157permanently REMOVED.
2158
a196c81c 2159* REMOVED configurations and files
7fcca85b
AC
2160
2161Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
2162Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
2163Pyramid pyramid-*-*
2164ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
2165Tahoe tahoe-*-*
a196c81c 2166ser-ocd.c *-*-*
bf64bfd6 2167
6d6b80e5 2168* GDB has been converted to ISO C.
e23194cb 2169
6d6b80e5 2170GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
e23194cb
EZ
2171sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
2172present.
2173
bf64bfd6
AC
2174* Other news:
2175
e23194cb
EZ
2176* "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
2177
2178* The MI enabled by default.
2179
2180The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
2181revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
2182engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
2183using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
2184which is now deprecated.
2185
2186* Support for debugging Pascal programs.
2187
2188GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
2189main features are supported:
2190
2191 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
2192
2193 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
2194 extension;
2195
2196 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
2197
2198 - a Pascal expression parser.
2199
2200However, some important features are not yet supported.
2201
2202 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
2203
2204 - there are some problems with boolean types;
2205
2206 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
2207 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
2208
2209 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
2210
2211 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
2212
2213* Changes in completion.
2214
2215Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
2216to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
2217users expect at the shell prompt.
2218
2219Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
2220`breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
2221program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
2222files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
2223be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
2224considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
2225name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
2226
2227`set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
2228
2229* New platform-independent commands:
2230
2231It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
2232hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
2233documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
2234
2235* Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
2236
d7275149
MK
2237Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
2238revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
2239many threads as your system allows you to have.
2240
e23194cb
EZ
2241Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
2242
d7275149
MK
2243Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
2244multi-threaded programs though.
e23194cb
EZ
2245
2246* Changes in MIPS configurations.
bf64bfd6
AC
2247
2248Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
2249
e23194cb
EZ
2250GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
2251debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
2252supported.)
2253
2254* Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
2255
2256Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
2257breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
2258implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
2259put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
2260and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
2261registers.
2262
2263The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
2264debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
2265watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
2266
2267* Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
2268
2269New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
2270the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
2271
2272New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
2273display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
2274IDT.
2275
2276New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
2277from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
2278New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
2279a given linear address.
2280
2281GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
2282program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
2283which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
2284
2285DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
2286
6c56c069
EZ
2287It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
2288
e23194cb
EZ
2289* Changes in documentation.
2290
2291All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
2292Documentation License.
2293
2294Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
2295manual.
2296
2297TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
2298
2299Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
2300manual.
2301
2302The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
2303documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
2304hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
2305
5d6640b1
AC
2306* GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
2307
2308The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
2309``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
2310contents of this file.
2311
1a1d8446
AC
2312* gdba.el deleted
2313
2314GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
139760b7 2315
9debab2f 2316*** Changes in GDB 5.0:
7a292a7a 2317
c63ce875
EZ
2318* Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
2319
2320Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
2321programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
2322displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
2323greater level of detail.
2324
2325* Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
2326
2327It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
2328bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
2329on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
2330written.
2331
2332* Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
2333
2334The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
2335necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
2336machines ``out of the box''.
2337
2338The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
2339possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
2340signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
2341would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
2342interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
2343
2344It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
2345standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
2346even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
2347and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
2348terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
2349
2350The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
2351enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
2352also works.
2353
2354DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
2355GDB.
2356
2357It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
2358directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
2359times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
2360breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
2361
ed9a39eb
JM
2362* New native configurations
2363
2364ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
afc05dd4 2365PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
ed9a39eb 2366
7a292a7a
SS
2367* New targets
2368
96baa820 2369Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
adf40b2e
JM
2370x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
2371PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
7a292a7a
SS
2372TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2373
085dd6e6
JM
2374* OBSOLETE configurations
2375
2376Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
2377Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
9846de1b 2378Pyramid pyramid-*-*
ed9a39eb 2379ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
104c1213 2380Tahoe tahoe-*-*
7a292a7a 2381
9debab2f
AC
2382Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
2383but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
2384these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
2385be permanently REMOVED.
2386
5330533d
SS
2387* Gould support removed
2388
2389Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
2390
bc9e5bbf
AC
2391* New features for SVR4
2392
2393On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
2394without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
2395load symbols from the running process's executable file.
2396
2397* Many C++ enhancements
2398
2399C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
2400in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
2401
adf40b2e
JM
2402* Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
2403
2404A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
2405sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
2406with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
2407``|<program> <args>'' vis:
2408
2409 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
2410 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
2411
43e526b9
JM
2412* MIPS 64 remote protocol
2413
2414A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
2415expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
2416instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
2417
2418The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
2419added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
2420
96baa820
JM
2421* ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
2422
2423The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
2424``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
2425include ``set remote P-packet''.
2426
11cf8741
JM
2427* Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
2428
2429The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
2430accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
2431``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
2432
7876dd43
DB
2433* ``apropos'' command added.
2434
2435The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
2436documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
2437try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
2438
bc9e5bbf
AC
2439* New MI interface
2440
2441A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
2442interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
7162c0ca
EZ
2443process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
2444"GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
2445enabled by configuring with:
bc9e5bbf
AC
2446
2447 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
2448
c906108c
SS
2449*** Changes in GDB-4.18:
2450
2451* New native configurations
2452
2453HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
2454HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
55241689 2455M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
c906108c
SS
2456
2457* New targets
2458
2459Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
2460Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
2461Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
2462
2463* OBSOLETE configurations
2464
2465Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
2466
2467Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
2468but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
2469these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
2470be permanently REMOVED.
2471
2472* ANSI/ISO C
2473
2474As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
2475buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
2476containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
2477use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
2478available. If this is not true, please report the affected
2479configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
2480information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
2481already.
2482
2483* Readline 2.2
2484
2485GDB now uses readline 2.2.
2486
2487* set extension-language
2488
2489You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
2490languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
2491you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
2492 set extension-language .c c++
2493The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
2494and their associated languages.
2495
2496* Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
2497
2498When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
2499you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
2500PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
2501
2502 set processor NAME
2503
2504sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
2505following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
2506
2507 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
2508 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
2509 403 IBM PowerPC 403
2510 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
2511 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
2512 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
2513 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
2514 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
2515 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
2516 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
2517 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
2518
2519At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
2520special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
2521registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
2522only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
2523
2524* HP-UX support
2525
2526Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
2527more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
2528library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
2529support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
2530for xdb and dbx commands.
2531
2532* Catchpoints
2533
2534HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
2535generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
2536to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
2537
2538This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
2539argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
2540output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
2541
2542* Debugging across forks
2543
2544On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
2545in the inferior.
2546
2547* TUI
2548
2549HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
2550it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
2551configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
2552
2553* GDB remote protocol additions
2554
2555A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
2556Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
2557fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
2558allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
2559
2560For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
2561full 64-bit address. The command
2562
2563 set remoteaddresssize 32
2564
2565can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
2566the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
2567will be discarded.
2568
2569In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
2570command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
2571
2572 maint packet heythere
2573
2574sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
2575disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
2576time.
2577
2578The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
2579target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
2580downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
2581
2582* Tracing can collect general expressions
2583
2584You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
2585further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
2586doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
2587
2588* mask-address variable for Mips
2589
2590For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
2591a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
2592of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
2593
2594* Higher serial baud rates
2595
2596GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
2597230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
2598to achieve all of these rates.)
2599
2600* i960 simulator
2601
2602The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
2603builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
2604
2605
2606*** Changes in GDB-4.17:
2607
2608* New native configurations
2609
2610Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
2611Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
2612Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
2613PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
2614PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2615Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
2616Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
2617
2618* New targets
2619
2620Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
2621Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
2622Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
2623Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
2624MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
2625MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
2626MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
2627Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
2628Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
2629Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2630NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
2631
2632* New debugging protocols
2633
2634ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
2635M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
2636DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
2637PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
2638PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
2639Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
2640
2641* DWARF 2
2642
2643All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
2644format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
2645information.
2646
2647* Java frontend
2648
2649GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
2650only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
2651
2652* solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
2653
2654For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
2655loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
2656locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
2657
2658* Live range splitting
2659
2660GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
2661range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
2662more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
2663
2664* Hurd support
2665
2666GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
2667updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
2668
2669* ARM Thumb support
2670
2671GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
2672instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
2673instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
2674accordingly.
2675
2676* MIPS16 support
2677
2678GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
2679instruction set.
2680
2681* Overlay support
2682
2683GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
2684linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
2685will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
2686control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
2687additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
2688in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
2689
2690* info symbol
2691
2692The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
2693the symbol at the specified address.
2694
2695* Trace support
2696
2697The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
2698asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
2699extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
2700includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
2701file tracepoint.c for more details.
2702
2703* MIPS simulator
2704
2705Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
2706by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
2707of most MIPS variants.
2708
2709* Sparc simulator
2710
2711Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
2712by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
2713Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
2714
2715* set architecture
2716
2717For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
2718basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
2719architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
2720the possible architectures.
2721
2722*** Changes in GDB-4.16:
2723
2724* New native configurations
2725
2726Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
2727M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
2728PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
2729PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
2730PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2731RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
2732
2733* New targets
2734
2735ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
2736I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
2737MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
2738MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
2739PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
2740Hitachi SH3 sh-*-*
2741Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2742
2743* PowerPC simulator
2744
2745The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
2746contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
2747PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
2748basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
2749performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
2750
2751* Solaris 2.5
2752
2753GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
2754
2755* Windows 95/NT native
2756
2757GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
2758To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
2759which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
2760Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
2761ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
2762
2763* dont-repeat command
2764
2765If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
2766command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
2767useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
2768extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
2769
2770* Send break instead of ^C
2771
2772The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
2773rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
2774GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
2775
2776* Remote protocol timeout
2777
2778The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
2779that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
2780to read from the target. The default value is 2.
2781
2782* Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
2783
2784By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
2785loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
2786stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
2787when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
2788in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
2789
2790Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
2791/usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
2792automatically on hpux10.
2793
2794* Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
2795
2796Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
2797
2798* Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
2799
2800When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
2801may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
2802the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
2803every character. The default value is 1050.
2804
2805* Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
2806
2807If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
2808a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
2809replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
2810details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
2811remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
2812to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
2813
2814* Speedups for remote debugging
2815
2816GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
2817the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
2818and more efficient S-record downloading.
2819
2820* Memory use reductions and statistics collection
2821
2822GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
2823Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
2824
2825*** Changes in GDB-4.15:
2826
2827* Psymtabs for XCOFF
2828
2829The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
2830can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
2831
2832* Remote targets use caching
2833
2834Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
2835remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
2836it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
2837debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
2838off' turns the the data cache off.
2839
2840* Remote targets may have threads
2841
2842The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
2843in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
2844gdb/remote.c for details.
2845
2846* NetROM support
2847
2848If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
2849support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
2850acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
2851write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
2852support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
2853another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
2854sequence is something like
2855
2856 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
2857 load <prog>
2858 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
2859
2860* Macintosh host
2861
2862GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
2863may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
2864it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
2865available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
2866device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
2867directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
2868scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
2869mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
2870
2871* Autoconf
2872
2873GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
2874but does simplify configuration and building.
2875
2876* hpux10
2877
2878GDB now supports hpux10.
2879
2880*** Changes in GDB-4.14:
2881
2882* New native configurations
2883
2884x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
2885x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
2886NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
2887Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
2888
2889* New targets
2890
2891A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2892HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
2893CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
2894PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
2895WDC 65816 w65-*-*
2896
2897* Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
2898
2899GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
2900possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
2901filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
2902the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
2903if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
2904
2905* Arguments to user-defined commands
2906
2907User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
2908Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
2909trivial example:
2910define adder
2911 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
2912
2913To execute the command use:
2914adder 1 2 3
2915
2916Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
2917Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
2918use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
2919
2920* New `if' and `while' commands
2921
2922This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
2923commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
2924expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
2925execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
2926terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
2927`else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
2928if the expression is zero.
2929
2930* Fortran source language mode
2931
2932GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
2933Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
2934variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
2935with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
2936Fortran compilers.
2937
2938* Better HPUX support
2939
2940Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
2941running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
2942processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
2943for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
2944that behavior do the following before running the program:
2945
2946 adb -w a.out
2947 __dld_flags?W 0x5
2948 control-d
2949
2950This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
2951To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
2952
2953 adb -w a.out
2954 __dld_flags?W 0x4
2955 control-d
2956
2957You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
2958the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
2959external linkage.
2960
2961GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
2962HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
2963
2964* Target byte order now dynamically selectable
2965
2966You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
2967commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
2968current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
2969"set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
2970associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
2971configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
2972
2973* New DOS host serial code
2974
2975This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
2976no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
2977a PC's serial port.
2978
2979*** Changes in GDB-4.13:
2980
2981* New "complete" command
2982
2983This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
2984were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
2985
2986* Trailing space optional in prompt
2987
2988"set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
2989allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
2990
2991* Breakpoint hit counts
2992
2993"info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
2994has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
2995can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
2996to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
2997less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
2998that breakpoint.
2999
3000* Ability to stop printing at NULL character
3001
3002"set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
3003an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
3004arrays actually contain only short strings.
3005
3006* Shared library breakpoints
3007
3008In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
3009breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
3010
3011* Hardware watchpoints
3012
3013There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
3014targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
3015
55241689 3016Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
c906108c
SS
3017
3018* Annotations
3019
3020Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
3021and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
3022
3023* Improved Irix 5 support
3024
3025GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
3026
3027* Improved HPPA support
3028
3029GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
3030
3031* New native configurations
3032
3033Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
3034HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
3035Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
3036RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
3037
3038* New targets
3039
3040OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
3041MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
3042Sparc64 sparc64-*-*
3043
3044* Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
3045
3046There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
3047This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
3048
3049* Fixes
3050
3051As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
3052and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
3053
3054*** Changes in GDB-4.12:
3055
3056* Irix 5 is now supported
3057
3058* HPPA support
3059
3060GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
3061to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
3062GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
3063of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
3064can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
3065
3066
3067*** Changes in GDB-4.11:
3068
3069* User visible changes:
3070
3071* Remote Debugging
3072
3073The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
3074target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
3075debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
3076integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
3077debugging info for the mips target).
3078
3079* DEC Alpha native support
3080
3081GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
3082debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
3083work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
3084Alpha-specific notes.
3085
3086* Preliminary thread implementation
3087
3088GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
3089
3090* LynxOS native and target support for 386
3091
3092This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
3093to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
3094for details).
3095
3096* Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
3097
3098This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
3099mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
3100call methods, ...etc.
3101
3102*** Changes in GDB-4.10:
3103
3104 * User visible changes:
3105
3106Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
3107supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
3108other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
3109somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
3110
3111Filename completion now works.
3112
3113When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
3114arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
3115addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
3116
3117All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
3118vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
3119should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
3120your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
3121to be on the far side of a thin network line.
3122
3123 * DEC alpha support
3124
3125This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
3126cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
3127
3128
3129*** Changes in GDB-4.9:
3130
3131 * Testsuite
3132
3133This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
3134The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
3135via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
3136
3137 * C++ demangling
3138
3139'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
3140emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
3141Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
3142disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
3143use gdb with AT&T cfront.
3144
3145 * Simulators
3146
3147GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
3148So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
3149Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
3150
3151 * New targets supported
3152
3153H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
3154H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
3155SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
3156Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
3157IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
3158
3159Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
3160version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
3161GO32 memory extender.
3162
3163 * New remote protocols
3164
3165MIPS remote debugging protocol.
3166
3167 * New source languages supported
3168
3169This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
3170used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
3171into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
3172
3173
3174*** Changes in GDB-4.8:
3175
3176 * HP Precision Architecture supported
3177
3178GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
3179version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
3180University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
3181compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
3182format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
3183(as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
3184
3185Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
3186
3187 * Faster and better demangling
3188
3189We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
3190demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
3191character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
3192only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
3193This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
3194increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
3195symbol lookups.
3196
3197`Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
3198from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
3199compiler does not actually implement.
3200
3201 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
3202
3203In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
3204inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
3205recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
3206very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
3207The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
3208circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
3209fix.
3210
3211The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
3212release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
3213
3214 * Improved configure script
3215
3216The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
3217you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
3218host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
3219done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
3220
3221We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
3222version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
3223`--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
3224The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
3225only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
3226We hope to make this the default in a future release.
3227
3228 * Documentation improvements
3229
3230There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
3231produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
3232before submitting changes.
3233
3234The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
3235M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
3236`info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
3237you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
3238a future texinfo-X.Y release.
3239
3240*NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
3241We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
3242been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
3243or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
3244`texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
3245around this problem.
3246
3247 * New features
3248
3249GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
3250the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
3251`print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
3252the target program.
3253
3254The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
3255how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
3256
3257 * New native hosts supported
3258
3259HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
3260386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
3261
3262 * New targets supported
3263
3264AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
3265
3266 * New file formats supported
3267
3268BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
3269HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
3270
3271 * Major bug fixes
3272
3273Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
3274
3275We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
3276printf_filtered("%s") problems.
3277
3278We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
3279for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
3280release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
3281
3282You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
3283will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
3284
3285We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
3286for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
3287especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
3288libraries.
3289
3290The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
3291information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
3292command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
3293any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
3294when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
3295
3296 * Internal improvements
3297
3298GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
3299debugging of multiple languages in the future.
3300
3301GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
3302Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
3303symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
3304contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
3305shared code that handles any of them.
3306
3307 * New command line options
3308
3309We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
3310
3311 * Mmalloc licensing
3312
3313The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
3314General Public License.
3315
3316*** Changes in GDB-4.7:
3317
3318 * Host/native/target split
3319
3320GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
3321hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
3322target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
3323local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
3324ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
3325
3326The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
3327GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
3328is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
3329code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
3330any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
3331built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
3332handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
3333
3334GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
3335It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
3336plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
3337
3338 * New hosts supported
3339
3340HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
3341386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
3342386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
3343
3344 * New targets supported
3345
3346Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
334768030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
3348
3349 * New native hosts supported
3350
3351386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
3352 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
3353386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
3354
3355 * New file formats supported
3356
3357BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
3358supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
3359format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
3360
3361 * New commands
3362
3363`show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
3364`show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
3365These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
3366
3367`info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
3368
3369You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
3370scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
3371prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
3372executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
3373
3374 * C++ improvements
3375
3376We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
3377info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
3378symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
3379
3380Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
3381
3382 * Major bug fixes
3383
3384The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
3385fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
3386by the compiler.
3387
3388We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
3389support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
3390
3391John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
3392slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
3393that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
3394purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
3395the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
3396mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
3397
3398Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
3399about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
3400completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
3401we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
3402
3403 * AMD 29k support
3404
3405A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
3406specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
3407calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
3408usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
3409in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
3410
3411We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
3412Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
3413of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
3414resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
3415
3416 * Remote interfaces
3417
3418We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
3419with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
3420message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
3421This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
3422needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
3423breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
3424each instruction being stepped through.
3425
3426The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
3427registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
3428
3429There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
3430find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
3431Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
3432processor with a serial port.
3433
3434 * Configuration
3435
3436Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
3437`table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
3438supported, and what files each one uses.
3439
3440 * Library changes
3441
3442There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
3443disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
3444Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
3445disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
3446
3447The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
3448Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
3449can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
3450grants all the rights from the General Public License.
3451
3452 * Documentation
3453
3454The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
3455reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
3456as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
3457encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
3458system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
3459bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
3460
3461And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
3462
3463
3464*** Changes in GDB-4.6:
3465
3466 * Better support for C++ function names
3467
3468GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
3469names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
3470(using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
3471single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
3472Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
3473
3474GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
3475the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
3476You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
3477lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
3478for the list of formats.
3479
3480 * G++ symbol mangling problem
3481
3482Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
3483C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
3484directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
3485can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
3486usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
3487about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
3488this problem.)
3489
3490 * New 'maintenance' command
3491
3492All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
3493the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
3494can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
3495
3496 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
3497 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
3498 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
3499 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
3500 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
3501 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
3502
3503The following commands are new:
3504
3505 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
3506 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
3507 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
3508
3509 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
3510
3511We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
3512(e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
3513be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
3514read after argv processing.
3515
3516 * New hosts supported
3517
3518Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
3519
55241689 3520GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
c906108c
SS
3521
3522We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
3523is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
3524for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
3525masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
3526fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
3527It costs extra.
3528
3529 * New targets supported
3530
3531Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
3532
3533 * More smarts about finding #include files
3534
3535GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
3536all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
3537greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
3538especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
3539the one that contains your sources.
3540
3541We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
3542breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
3543try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
3544
3545 * Interesting infernals change
3546
3547GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
3548section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
3549target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
3550stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
3551
3552 * Bug fixes (of course!)
3553
3554There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
3555 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
3556 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
3557
3558See the ChangeLog for details.
3559
3560*** Changes in GDB-4.5:
3561
3562 * New machines supported (host and target)
3563
3564IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
3565
3566SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
3567
3568 * New malloc package
3569
3570GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
3571Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
3572capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
3573This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
3574pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
3575more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
3576
3577 * info proc
3578
3579The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
3580'help info proc' for details.
3581
3582 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
3583
3584The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
3585Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
3586possible.
3587
3588 * File name changes for MS-DOS
3589
3590Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
3591support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
3592conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
3593environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
3594that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
3595in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
3596
3597 * Cross byte order fixes
3598
3599Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
3600targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
3601
3602 * New -mapped and -readnow options
3603
3604If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
3605system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
3606`symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
3607program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
3608called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
3609Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
3610and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
3611the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
3612option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
3613starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
3614
3615You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
3616the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
3617information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
3618slower, but makes future operations faster.
3619
3620The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
3621build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
3622A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
3623use is:
3624
3625 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
3626
3627The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
3628It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
3629shared across multiple host platforms.
3630
3631 * longjmp() handling
3632
3633GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
3634siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
3635all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
3636platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
3637
3638 * Solaris 2.0
3639
3640Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
3641this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
3642reading symbols.
3643
3644 * Bug fixes
3645
3646As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
3647People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
3648crashes and trashed symbol tables.
3649
3650*** Changes in GDB-4.4:
3651
3652 * New machines supported (host and target)
3653
3654SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
3655 (except core files)
3656BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
3657Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
3658
3659 * New machines supported (target)
3660
3661AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
3662
3663 * C++ support
3664
3665GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
3666The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
3667per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
3668
3669GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
3670`ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
3671extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
3672good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
3673will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
3674released.
3675
3676 * New features for SVR4
3677
3678GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
3679shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
3680only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
3681
3682The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
3683on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
3684it prints the address mappings of the process.
3685
3686If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
3687bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
3688
3689 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
3690
3691Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
3692now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
3693skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
3694make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
3695same code linked statically.
3696
3697 * New Getopt
3698
3699GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
3700version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
3701continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
3702Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
3703added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
3704future by other options that begin with the same letter.
3705
3706 * Bugs fixed
3707
3708The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
3709Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
3710See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
3711
3712
3713*** Changes in GDB-4.3:
3714
3715 * New machines supported (host and target)
3716
3717Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
3718NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
3719Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
3720
3721 * Almost SCO Unix support
3722
3723We had hoped to support:
3724SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
3725(except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
3726that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
3727about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
3728
3729 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
3730
3731GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
3732debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
3733is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
3734send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
3735reqired (if any).
3736
3737 * New Readline
3738
3739GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
3740is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
3741required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
3742
3743 * Bugs fixed
3744
3745The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
3746Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
3747See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
3748
3749 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
3750
3751GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
3752supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
3753symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
3754
3755Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
3756mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
3757debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
3758mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
3759version 2.
3760
3761Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
3762really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
3763line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
3764variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
3765situation somewhat.
3766
3767When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
3768However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
3769methods.
3770
3771We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
3772DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
3773encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
3774
3775
3776*** Changes in GDB-4.2:
3777
3778 * Improved configuration
3779
3780Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
3781Porting BFD is simpler.
3782
3783 * Stepping improved
3784
3785The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
3786of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
3787in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
3788function that has debugging information is called within the line.
3789
3790 * Bug fixing
3791
3792Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
3793
3794 * New host supported (not target)
3795
3796Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
3797
3798
3799*** Changes in GDB-4.1:
3800
3801 * Multiple source language support
3802
3803GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
3804It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
3805and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
3806language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
3807You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
3808`set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
3809
3810 * GDB and Modula-2
3811
3812GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
3813currently under development at the State University of New York at
3814Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
3815continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
3816
3817Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
3818debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
3819symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
3820
3821There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
3822in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
3823
3824 * set write on/off
3825
3826GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
3827a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
3828the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
3829by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
3830effect immediately.
3831
3832 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
3833
3834When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
3835shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
3836The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
3837examining core files.
3838
3839 * set listsize
3840
3841You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
3842The default is 10.
3843
3844 * New machines supported (host and target)
3845
3846SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
3847Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
3848Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
3849
3850 * New hosts supported (not targets)
3851
3852IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
3853
3854 * New targets supported (not hosts)
3855
3856AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
3857AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
3858Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
3859
3860 * New remote interfaces
3861
3862AMD 29000 Adapt
3863AMD 29000 Minimon
3864
3865
3866*** Changes in GDB-4.0:
3867
3868 * New Facilities
3869
3870Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
3871
3872Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
3873target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
3874is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
3875remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
3876remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
3877also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
3878using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
3879stub on the target system.
3880
3881New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
3882
3883GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
3884library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
3885object file types such as a.out and coff.
3886
3887There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
3888refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
3889
3890
3891 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
3892
3893All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
3894by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
3895
3896For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
3897``Show prompt'' produces the response:
3898Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
3899
3900What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
3901print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
3902will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
3903all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
3904
3905confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
3906 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
3907 it is already running. Default is ON.
3908
3909editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
3910 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
3911 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
3912 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
3913 Default is ON.
3914
3915history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
3916 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
3917 or the value of the environment variable
3918 GDBHISTFILE.
3919
3920history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
3921 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
3922 HISTSIZE.
3923
3924history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
3925 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
3926 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
3927
3928history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
3929 history expansion will be performed on
3930 command line input. The default is OFF.
3931
3932radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
3933 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
3934 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
3935
3936height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
3937 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
3938 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3939 variable TERM.
3940
3941width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
3942 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
3943 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3944 variable TERM.
3945
3946Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
3947``set width'' instead.
3948
3949print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
3950 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
3951 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
3952 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
3953
3954print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
3955 is OFF.
3956
3957print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
3958 "raw" form if off.
3959
3960print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
3961 like instructions.
3962
3963print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
3964
3965
3966 * Support for Epoch Environment.
3967
3968The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
3969new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
3970are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
3971window.
3972
3973
3974 * Support for Shared Libraries
3975
3976GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
3977Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
3978before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
3979happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
3980At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
3981from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
3982shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
3983It can be abbreviated ``share''.
3984
3985sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
3986 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
3987 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
3988
3989info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
3990
3991
3992 * Watchpoints
3993
3994A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
3995expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
3996tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
3997quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
3998problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
3999more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
4000
4001watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
4002
4003info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
4004
4005delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4006disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4007enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4008
4009
4010 * C++ multiple inheritance
4011
4012When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
4013for C++ programs.
4014
4015 * C++ exception handling
4016
4017Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
4018ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
4019the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
4020handler's context).
4021
4022catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
4023 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
4024 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
4025
4026info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
4027 current stack frame.
4028
4029
4030 * Minor command changes
4031
4032The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
4033command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
4034is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
4035
4036The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
4037at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
4038frames without printing.
4039
4040 * New directory command
4041
4042'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
4043The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
4044about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
4045with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
4046find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
4047
4048 * Configuring GDB for compilation
4049
4050For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
4051for more details.
4052
4053GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
4054two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
4055Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
4056where the program that you are debugging will run.
This page took 0.75799 seconds and 4 git commands to generate.