2002-09-30 David Carlton <carlton@math.stanford.edu>
[deliverable/binutils-gdb.git] / gdb / NEWS
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1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
3
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4*** Changes since GDB 5.3:
5
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6* REMOVED configurations and files
7
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9
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10* MIPS $fp behavior changed
11
12The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
13the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
14context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
15address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
16The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
17
299ffc64 18*** Changes in GDB 5.3:
37057839 19
b9d14705 20* ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
6da02953 21
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22Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
23the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
24arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
25powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
6da02953 26
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27* GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
28
29GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
30and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
31they expand.
32
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33The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
34invocations in expression, and shows the result.
35
36The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
37macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
38
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39Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
40information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
41your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
42information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
43
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44* Multi-arched targets.
45
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46DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
47DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
2250ee0c 48NEC V850 v850-*-*
6e3ba3b8 49National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
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50Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
51Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
2250ee0c 52
cd9bfe15 53* New targets.
e33ce519 54
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55Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
56
e33ce519 57
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58* New native configurations
59
60Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
029923d4 61SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
45888261 62MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
9ce5c36a 63UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
da8ca43d 64
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65* OBSOLETE configurations and files
66
67Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
68been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
69configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
70permanently REMOVED.
71
92eb23c5 72Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
a99a9e1b 73OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1c7cc583 74IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
7a3085c1 75Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
7fb623f7 76Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
eb4c54a2 77Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
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78i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
79i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
80i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
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81HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
82 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
83 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
4d210288 84I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
92eb23c5 85
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86* OBSOLETE languages
87
88CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
89
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90* REMOVED configurations and files
91
92AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
93A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
94AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
95AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
96AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
97
98testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
99
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100* New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
101
102This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
103commands. The default is 1024.
104
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105* Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
106
107Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
108
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109* New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
110
111These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
112to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
113from a file into memory (restore).
37057839 114
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115* Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
116
117The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
118including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
119of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
120
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121*** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
122
123* New targets.
124
125Atmel AVR avr*-*-*
126
127* Bug fixes
128
129gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
130mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
131Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
132
133gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
134dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
135Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
136
137Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
138Surprisingly enough, it works now.
139By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
140
141i386 hardware watchpoint support:
142avoid misses on second run for some targets.
143By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
144
37057839 145*** Changes in GDB 5.2:
eb7cedd9 146
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147* New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
148
149This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
150really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
151In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
152target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
153This can be a significant performance improvement on some
154(notably embedded) targets.
155
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156* New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
157
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158This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
159process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
160GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
161hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
cefd4ef5 162
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163* New command line option
164
165GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
166
167* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
168
169There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
170command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
171a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
172be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
173open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
174issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
175a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
176it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
177GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
178is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
179
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180* Changes in ARM configurations.
181
182Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
183configuration is fully multi-arch.
184
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185* New native configurations
186
fe419ffc 187ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
eb7cedd9 188x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
55241689 189AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
768f0842 190Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
eb7cedd9 191
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192* New targets
193
194Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
195
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196* OBSOLETE configurations and files
197
198Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
199been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
200configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
201permanently REMOVED.
202
203AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
204A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
205AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
206AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
207AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
208
b4ceaee6 209testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
9b4ff276 210
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211* REMOVED configurations and files
212
213TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
7bc65f05 214WDC 65816 w65-*-*
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215PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
216PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
217PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
5e734e1f 218Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
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219Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
220 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
7e24f0b1 221SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
9b567150 222Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
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223Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
224ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
a752853e 225Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
e2caac18 226
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227* Changes to command line processing
228
229The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
230for the inferior from gdb's command line.
231
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232* Changes to key bindings
233
234There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
235
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236*** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
237
238Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
239
240Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
241corrupted.
242
243Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
244
245Numerous documentation fixes.
246
247Numerous testsuite fixes.
248
34f47bc4 249*** Changes in GDB 5.1:
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250
251* New native configurations
252
253Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
254x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
55241689 255MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
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256MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
257ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
55241689 258s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
139760b7 259
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260* New targets
261
def90278 262Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
24be5c34 263CRIS cris-axis
55241689 264UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
def90278 265
17e78a56 266* OBSOLETE configurations and files
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267
268x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
9b9c068d 269Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
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270Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
271 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
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272TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
273WDC 65816 w65-*-*
4a1968f4 274Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
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275PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
276PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
277PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
24f89b68 278SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
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279Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
280ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
d036b4d9 281Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
bf64bfd6 282
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283stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
284kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
285
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286Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
287been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
288configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
289permanently REMOVED.
290
a196c81c 291* REMOVED configurations and files
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292
293Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
294Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
295Pyramid pyramid-*-*
296ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
297Tahoe tahoe-*-*
a196c81c 298ser-ocd.c *-*-*
bf64bfd6 299
6d6b80e5 300* GDB has been converted to ISO C.
e23194cb 301
6d6b80e5 302GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
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303sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
304present.
305
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306* Other news:
307
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308* "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
309
310* The MI enabled by default.
311
312The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
313revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
314engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
315using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
316which is now deprecated.
317
318* Support for debugging Pascal programs.
319
320GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
321main features are supported:
322
323 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
324
325 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
326 extension;
327
328 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
329
330 - a Pascal expression parser.
331
332However, some important features are not yet supported.
333
334 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
335
336 - there are some problems with boolean types;
337
338 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
339 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
340
341 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
342
343 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
344
345* Changes in completion.
346
347Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
348to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
349users expect at the shell prompt.
350
351Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
352`breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
353program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
354files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
355be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
356considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
357name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
358
359`set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
360
361* New platform-independent commands:
362
363It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
364hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
365documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
366
367* Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
368
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369Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
370revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
371many threads as your system allows you to have.
372
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373Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
374
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375Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
376multi-threaded programs though.
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377
378* Changes in MIPS configurations.
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379
380Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
381
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382GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
383debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
384supported.)
385
386* Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
387
388Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
389breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
390implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
391put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
392and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
393registers.
394
395The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
396debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
397watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
398
399* Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
400
401New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
402the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
403
404New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
405display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
406IDT.
407
408New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
409from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
410New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
411a given linear address.
412
413GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
414program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
415which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
416
417DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
418
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419It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
420
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421* Changes in documentation.
422
423All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
424Documentation License.
425
426Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
427manual.
428
429TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
430
431Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
432manual.
433
434The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
435documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
436hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
437
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438* GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
439
440The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
441``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
442contents of this file.
443
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444* gdba.el deleted
445
446GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
139760b7 447
9debab2f 448*** Changes in GDB 5.0:
7a292a7a 449
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450* Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
451
452Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
453programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
454displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
455greater level of detail.
456
457* Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
458
459It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
460bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
461on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
462written.
463
464* Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
465
466The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
467necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
468machines ``out of the box''.
469
470The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
471possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
472signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
473would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
474interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
475
476It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
477standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
478even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
479and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
480terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
481
482The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
483enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
484also works.
485
486DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
487GDB.
488
489It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
490directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
491times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
492breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
493
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494* New native configurations
495
496ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
afc05dd4 497PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
ed9a39eb 498
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499* New targets
500
96baa820 501Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
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502x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
503PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
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504TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
505
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506* OBSOLETE configurations
507
508Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
509Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
9846de1b 510Pyramid pyramid-*-*
ed9a39eb 511ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
104c1213 512Tahoe tahoe-*-*
7a292a7a 513
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514Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
515but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
516these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
517be permanently REMOVED.
518
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519* Gould support removed
520
521Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
522
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523* New features for SVR4
524
525On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
526without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
527load symbols from the running process's executable file.
528
529* Many C++ enhancements
530
531C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
532in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
533
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534* Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
535
536A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
537sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
538with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
539``|<program> <args>'' vis:
540
541 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
542 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
543
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544* MIPS 64 remote protocol
545
546A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
547expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
548instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
549
550The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
551added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
552
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553* ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
554
555The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
556``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
557include ``set remote P-packet''.
558
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559* Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
560
561The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
562accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
563``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
564
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565* ``apropos'' command added.
566
567The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
568documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
569try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
570
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571* New MI interface
572
573A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
574interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
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575process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
576"GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
577enabled by configuring with:
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578
579 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
580
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581*** Changes in GDB-4.18:
582
583* New native configurations
584
585HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
586HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
55241689 587M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
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588
589* New targets
590
591Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
592Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
593Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
594
595* OBSOLETE configurations
596
597Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
598
599Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
600but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
601these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
602be permanently REMOVED.
603
604* ANSI/ISO C
605
606As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
607buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
608containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
609use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
610available. If this is not true, please report the affected
611configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
612information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
613already.
614
615* Readline 2.2
616
617GDB now uses readline 2.2.
618
619* set extension-language
620
621You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
622languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
623you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
624 set extension-language .c c++
625The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
626and their associated languages.
627
628* Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
629
630When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
631you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
632PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
633
634 set processor NAME
635
636sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
637following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
638
639 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
640 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
641 403 IBM PowerPC 403
642 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
643 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
644 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
645 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
646 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
647 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
648 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
649 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
650
651At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
652special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
653registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
654only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
655
656* HP-UX support
657
658Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
659more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
660library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
661support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
662for xdb and dbx commands.
663
664* Catchpoints
665
666HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
667generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
668to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
669
670This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
671argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
672output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
673
674* Debugging across forks
675
676On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
677in the inferior.
678
679* TUI
680
681HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
682it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
683configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
684
685* GDB remote protocol additions
686
687A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
688Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
689fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
690allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
691
692For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
693full 64-bit address. The command
694
695 set remoteaddresssize 32
696
697can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
698the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
699will be discarded.
700
701In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
702command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
703
704 maint packet heythere
705
706sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
707disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
708time.
709
710The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
711target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
712downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
713
714* Tracing can collect general expressions
715
716You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
717further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
718doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
719
720* mask-address variable for Mips
721
722For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
723a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
724of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
725
726* Higher serial baud rates
727
728GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
729230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
730to achieve all of these rates.)
731
732* i960 simulator
733
734The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
735builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
736
737
738*** Changes in GDB-4.17:
739
740* New native configurations
741
742Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
743Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
744Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
745PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
746PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
747Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
748Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
749
750* New targets
751
752Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
753Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
754Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
755Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
756MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
757MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
758MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
759Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
760Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
761Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
762NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
763
764* New debugging protocols
765
766ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
767M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
768DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
769PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
770PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
771Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
772
773* DWARF 2
774
775All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
776format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
777information.
778
779* Java frontend
780
781GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
782only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
783
784* solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
785
786For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
787loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
788locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
789
790* Live range splitting
791
792GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
793range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
794more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
795
796* Hurd support
797
798GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
799updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
800
801* ARM Thumb support
802
803GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
804instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
805instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
806accordingly.
807
808* MIPS16 support
809
810GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
811instruction set.
812
813* Overlay support
814
815GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
816linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
817will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
818control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
819additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
820in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
821
822* info symbol
823
824The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
825the symbol at the specified address.
826
827* Trace support
828
829The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
830asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
831extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
832includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
833file tracepoint.c for more details.
834
835* MIPS simulator
836
837Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
838by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
839of most MIPS variants.
840
841* Sparc simulator
842
843Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
844by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
845Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
846
847* set architecture
848
849For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
850basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
851architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
852the possible architectures.
853
854*** Changes in GDB-4.16:
855
856* New native configurations
857
858Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
859M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
860PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
861PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
862PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
863RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
864
865* New targets
866
867ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
868I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
869MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
870MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
871PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
872Hitachi SH3 sh-*-*
873Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
874
875* PowerPC simulator
876
877The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
878contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
879PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
880basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
881performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
882
883* Solaris 2.5
884
885GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
886
887* Windows 95/NT native
888
889GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
890To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
891which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
892Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
893ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
894
895* dont-repeat command
896
897If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
898command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
899useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
900extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
901
902* Send break instead of ^C
903
904The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
905rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
906GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
907
908* Remote protocol timeout
909
910The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
911that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
912to read from the target. The default value is 2.
913
914* Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
915
916By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
917loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
918stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
919when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
920in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
921
922Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
923/usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
924automatically on hpux10.
925
926* Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
927
928Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
929
930* Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
931
932When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
933may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
934the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
935every character. The default value is 1050.
936
937* Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
938
939If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
940a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
941replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
942details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
943remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
944to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
945
946* Speedups for remote debugging
947
948GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
949the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
950and more efficient S-record downloading.
951
952* Memory use reductions and statistics collection
953
954GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
955Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
956
957*** Changes in GDB-4.15:
958
959* Psymtabs for XCOFF
960
961The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
962can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
963
964* Remote targets use caching
965
966Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
967remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
968it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
969debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
970off' turns the the data cache off.
971
972* Remote targets may have threads
973
974The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
975in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
976gdb/remote.c for details.
977
978* NetROM support
979
980If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
981support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
982acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
983write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
984support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
985another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
986sequence is something like
987
988 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
989 load <prog>
990 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
991
992* Macintosh host
993
994GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
995may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
996it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
997available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
998device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
999directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
1000scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
1001mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
1002
1003* Autoconf
1004
1005GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
1006but does simplify configuration and building.
1007
1008* hpux10
1009
1010GDB now supports hpux10.
1011
1012*** Changes in GDB-4.14:
1013
1014* New native configurations
1015
1016x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
1017x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
1018NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
1019Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
1020
1021* New targets
1022
1023A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1024HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
1025CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
1026PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
1027WDC 65816 w65-*-*
1028
1029* Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
1030
1031GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
1032possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
1033filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
1034the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
1035if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
1036
1037* Arguments to user-defined commands
1038
1039User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
1040Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
1041trivial example:
1042define adder
1043 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
1044
1045To execute the command use:
1046adder 1 2 3
1047
1048Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
1049Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
1050use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
1051
1052* New `if' and `while' commands
1053
1054This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
1055commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
1056expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
1057execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
1058terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
1059`else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
1060if the expression is zero.
1061
1062* Fortran source language mode
1063
1064GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
1065Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
1066variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
1067with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
1068Fortran compilers.
1069
1070* Better HPUX support
1071
1072Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
1073running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
1074processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
1075for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
1076that behavior do the following before running the program:
1077
1078 adb -w a.out
1079 __dld_flags?W 0x5
1080 control-d
1081
1082This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
1083To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
1084
1085 adb -w a.out
1086 __dld_flags?W 0x4
1087 control-d
1088
1089You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
1090the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
1091external linkage.
1092
1093GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
1094HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
1095
1096* Target byte order now dynamically selectable
1097
1098You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
1099commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
1100current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
1101"set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
1102associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
1103configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
1104
1105* New DOS host serial code
1106
1107This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
1108no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
1109a PC's serial port.
1110
1111*** Changes in GDB-4.13:
1112
1113* New "complete" command
1114
1115This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
1116were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
1117
1118* Trailing space optional in prompt
1119
1120"set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
1121allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
1122
1123* Breakpoint hit counts
1124
1125"info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
1126has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
1127can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
1128to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
1129less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
1130that breakpoint.
1131
1132* Ability to stop printing at NULL character
1133
1134"set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
1135an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
1136arrays actually contain only short strings.
1137
1138* Shared library breakpoints
1139
1140In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
1141breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
1142
1143* Hardware watchpoints
1144
1145There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
1146targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
1147
55241689 1148Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
c906108c
SS
1149
1150* Annotations
1151
1152Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
1153and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
1154
1155* Improved Irix 5 support
1156
1157GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
1158
1159* Improved HPPA support
1160
1161GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
1162
1163* New native configurations
1164
1165Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
1166HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1167Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
1168RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
1169
1170* New targets
1171
1172OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1173MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
1174Sparc64 sparc64-*-*
1175
1176* Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
1177
1178There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
1179This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
1180
1181* Fixes
1182
1183As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
1184and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
1185
1186*** Changes in GDB-4.12:
1187
1188* Irix 5 is now supported
1189
1190* HPPA support
1191
1192GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
1193to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
1194GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
1195of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
1196can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
1197
1198
1199*** Changes in GDB-4.11:
1200
1201* User visible changes:
1202
1203* Remote Debugging
1204
1205The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
1206target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
1207debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
1208integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
1209debugging info for the mips target).
1210
1211* DEC Alpha native support
1212
1213GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
1214debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
1215work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
1216Alpha-specific notes.
1217
1218* Preliminary thread implementation
1219
1220GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
1221
1222* LynxOS native and target support for 386
1223
1224This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
1225to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
1226for details).
1227
1228* Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
1229
1230This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
1231mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
1232call methods, ...etc.
1233
1234*** Changes in GDB-4.10:
1235
1236 * User visible changes:
1237
1238Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
1239supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
1240other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
1241somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
1242
1243Filename completion now works.
1244
1245When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
1246arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
1247addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
1248
1249All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
1250vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
1251should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
1252your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
1253to be on the far side of a thin network line.
1254
1255 * DEC alpha support
1256
1257This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
1258cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
1259
1260
1261*** Changes in GDB-4.9:
1262
1263 * Testsuite
1264
1265This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
1266The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
1267via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
1268
1269 * C++ demangling
1270
1271'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
1272emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
1273Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
1274disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
1275use gdb with AT&T cfront.
1276
1277 * Simulators
1278
1279GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
1280So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
1281Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
1282
1283 * New targets supported
1284
1285H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
1286H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1287SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
1288Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1289IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
1290
1291Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
1292version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
1293GO32 memory extender.
1294
1295 * New remote protocols
1296
1297MIPS remote debugging protocol.
1298
1299 * New source languages supported
1300
1301This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
1302used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
1303into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
1304
1305
1306*** Changes in GDB-4.8:
1307
1308 * HP Precision Architecture supported
1309
1310GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
1311version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
1312University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
1313compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
1314format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
1315(as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
1316
1317Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
1318
1319 * Faster and better demangling
1320
1321We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
1322demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
1323character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
1324only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
1325This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
1326increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
1327symbol lookups.
1328
1329`Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
1330from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
1331compiler does not actually implement.
1332
1333 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
1334
1335In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
1336inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
1337recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
1338very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
1339The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
1340circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
1341fix.
1342
1343The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
1344release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
1345
1346 * Improved configure script
1347
1348The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
1349you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
1350host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
1351done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
1352
1353We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
1354version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
1355`--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
1356The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
1357only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
1358We hope to make this the default in a future release.
1359
1360 * Documentation improvements
1361
1362There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
1363produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
1364before submitting changes.
1365
1366The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
1367M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
1368`info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
1369you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
1370a future texinfo-X.Y release.
1371
1372*NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
1373We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
1374been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
1375or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
1376`texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
1377around this problem.
1378
1379 * New features
1380
1381GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
1382the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
1383`print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
1384the target program.
1385
1386The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
1387how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
1388
1389 * New native hosts supported
1390
1391HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
1392386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
1393
1394 * New targets supported
1395
1396AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
1397
1398 * New file formats supported
1399
1400BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
1401HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
1402
1403 * Major bug fixes
1404
1405Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
1406
1407We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
1408printf_filtered("%s") problems.
1409
1410We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
1411for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
1412release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
1413
1414You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
1415will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
1416
1417We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
1418for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
1419especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
1420libraries.
1421
1422The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
1423information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
1424command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
1425any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
1426when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
1427
1428 * Internal improvements
1429
1430GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
1431debugging of multiple languages in the future.
1432
1433GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
1434Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
1435symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
1436contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
1437shared code that handles any of them.
1438
1439 * New command line options
1440
1441We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
1442
1443 * Mmalloc licensing
1444
1445The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
1446General Public License.
1447
1448*** Changes in GDB-4.7:
1449
1450 * Host/native/target split
1451
1452GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
1453hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
1454target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
1455local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
1456ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
1457
1458The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
1459GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
1460is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
1461code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
1462any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
1463built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
1464handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
1465
1466GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
1467It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
1468plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
1469
1470 * New hosts supported
1471
1472HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
1473386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
1474386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
1475
1476 * New targets supported
1477
1478Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
147968030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
1480
1481 * New native hosts supported
1482
1483386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
1484 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
1485386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
1486
1487 * New file formats supported
1488
1489BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
1490supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
1491format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
1492
1493 * New commands
1494
1495`show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
1496`show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
1497These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
1498
1499`info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
1500
1501You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
1502scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
1503prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
1504executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
1505
1506 * C++ improvements
1507
1508We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
1509info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
1510symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
1511
1512Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
1513
1514 * Major bug fixes
1515
1516The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
1517fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
1518by the compiler.
1519
1520We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
1521support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
1522
1523John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
1524slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
1525that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
1526purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
1527the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
1528mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
1529
1530Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
1531about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
1532completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
1533we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
1534
1535 * AMD 29k support
1536
1537A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
1538specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
1539calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
1540usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
1541in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
1542
1543We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
1544Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
1545of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
1546resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
1547
1548 * Remote interfaces
1549
1550We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
1551with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
1552message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
1553This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
1554needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
1555breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
1556each instruction being stepped through.
1557
1558The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
1559registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
1560
1561There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
1562find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
1563Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
1564processor with a serial port.
1565
1566 * Configuration
1567
1568Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
1569`table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
1570supported, and what files each one uses.
1571
1572 * Library changes
1573
1574There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
1575disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
1576Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
1577disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
1578
1579The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
1580Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
1581can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
1582grants all the rights from the General Public License.
1583
1584 * Documentation
1585
1586The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
1587reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
1588as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
1589encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
1590system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
1591bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
1592
1593And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
1594
1595
1596*** Changes in GDB-4.6:
1597
1598 * Better support for C++ function names
1599
1600GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
1601names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
1602(using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
1603single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
1604Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
1605
1606GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
1607the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
1608You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
1609lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
1610for the list of formats.
1611
1612 * G++ symbol mangling problem
1613
1614Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
1615C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
1616directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
1617can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
1618usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
1619about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
1620this problem.)
1621
1622 * New 'maintenance' command
1623
1624All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
1625the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
1626can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
1627
1628 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
1629 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
1630 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
1631 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
1632 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
1633 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
1634
1635The following commands are new:
1636
1637 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
1638 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
1639 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
1640
1641 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
1642
1643We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
1644(e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
1645be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
1646read after argv processing.
1647
1648 * New hosts supported
1649
1650Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
1651
55241689 1652GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
c906108c
SS
1653
1654We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
1655is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
1656for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
1657masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
1658fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
1659It costs extra.
1660
1661 * New targets supported
1662
1663Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
1664
1665 * More smarts about finding #include files
1666
1667GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
1668all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
1669greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
1670especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
1671the one that contains your sources.
1672
1673We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
1674breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
1675try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
1676
1677 * Interesting infernals change
1678
1679GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
1680section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
1681target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
1682stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
1683
1684 * Bug fixes (of course!)
1685
1686There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
1687 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
1688 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
1689
1690See the ChangeLog for details.
1691
1692*** Changes in GDB-4.5:
1693
1694 * New machines supported (host and target)
1695
1696IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
1697
1698SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
1699
1700 * New malloc package
1701
1702GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
1703Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
1704capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
1705This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
1706pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
1707more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
1708
1709 * info proc
1710
1711The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
1712'help info proc' for details.
1713
1714 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
1715
1716The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
1717Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
1718possible.
1719
1720 * File name changes for MS-DOS
1721
1722Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
1723support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
1724conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
1725environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
1726that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
1727in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
1728
1729 * Cross byte order fixes
1730
1731Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
1732targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
1733
1734 * New -mapped and -readnow options
1735
1736If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
1737system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
1738`symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
1739program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
1740called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
1741Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
1742and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
1743the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
1744option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
1745starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
1746
1747You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
1748the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
1749information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
1750slower, but makes future operations faster.
1751
1752The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
1753build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
1754A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
1755use is:
1756
1757 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
1758
1759The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
1760It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
1761shared across multiple host platforms.
1762
1763 * longjmp() handling
1764
1765GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
1766siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
1767all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
1768platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
1769
1770 * Solaris 2.0
1771
1772Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
1773this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
1774reading symbols.
1775
1776 * Bug fixes
1777
1778As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
1779People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
1780crashes and trashed symbol tables.
1781
1782*** Changes in GDB-4.4:
1783
1784 * New machines supported (host and target)
1785
1786SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
1787 (except core files)
1788BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
1789Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
1790
1791 * New machines supported (target)
1792
1793AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1794
1795 * C++ support
1796
1797GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
1798The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
1799per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
1800
1801GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
1802`ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
1803extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
1804good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
1805will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
1806released.
1807
1808 * New features for SVR4
1809
1810GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
1811shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
1812only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
1813
1814The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
1815on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
1816it prints the address mappings of the process.
1817
1818If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
1819bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
1820
1821 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
1822
1823Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
1824now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
1825skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
1826make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
1827same code linked statically.
1828
1829 * New Getopt
1830
1831GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
1832version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
1833continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
1834Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
1835added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
1836future by other options that begin with the same letter.
1837
1838 * Bugs fixed
1839
1840The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
1841Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
1842See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
1843
1844
1845*** Changes in GDB-4.3:
1846
1847 * New machines supported (host and target)
1848
1849Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
1850NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
1851Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1852
1853 * Almost SCO Unix support
1854
1855We had hoped to support:
1856SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
1857(except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
1858that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
1859about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
1860
1861 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
1862
1863GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
1864debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
1865is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
1866send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
1867reqired (if any).
1868
1869 * New Readline
1870
1871GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
1872is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
1873required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
1874
1875 * Bugs fixed
1876
1877The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
1878Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
1879See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
1880
1881 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
1882
1883GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
1884supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
1885symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
1886
1887Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
1888mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
1889debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
1890mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
1891version 2.
1892
1893Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
1894really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
1895line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
1896variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
1897situation somewhat.
1898
1899When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
1900However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
1901methods.
1902
1903We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
1904DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
1905encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
1906
1907
1908*** Changes in GDB-4.2:
1909
1910 * Improved configuration
1911
1912Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
1913Porting BFD is simpler.
1914
1915 * Stepping improved
1916
1917The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
1918of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
1919in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
1920function that has debugging information is called within the line.
1921
1922 * Bug fixing
1923
1924Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
1925
1926 * New host supported (not target)
1927
1928Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
1929
1930
1931*** Changes in GDB-4.1:
1932
1933 * Multiple source language support
1934
1935GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
1936It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
1937and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
1938language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
1939You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
1940`set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
1941
1942 * GDB and Modula-2
1943
1944GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
1945currently under development at the State University of New York at
1946Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
1947continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
1948
1949Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
1950debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
1951symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
1952
1953There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
1954in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
1955
1956 * set write on/off
1957
1958GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
1959a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
1960the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
1961by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
1962effect immediately.
1963
1964 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
1965
1966When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
1967shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
1968The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
1969examining core files.
1970
1971 * set listsize
1972
1973You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
1974The default is 10.
1975
1976 * New machines supported (host and target)
1977
1978SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
1979Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
1980Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
1981
1982 * New hosts supported (not targets)
1983
1984IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
1985
1986 * New targets supported (not hosts)
1987
1988AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1989AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1990Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
1991
1992 * New remote interfaces
1993
1994AMD 29000 Adapt
1995AMD 29000 Minimon
1996
1997
1998*** Changes in GDB-4.0:
1999
2000 * New Facilities
2001
2002Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
2003
2004Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
2005target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
2006is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
2007remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
2008remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
2009also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
2010using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
2011stub on the target system.
2012
2013New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
2014
2015GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
2016library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
2017object file types such as a.out and coff.
2018
2019There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
2020refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
2021
2022
2023 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
2024
2025All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
2026by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
2027
2028For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
2029``Show prompt'' produces the response:
2030Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
2031
2032What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
2033print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
2034will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
2035all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
2036
2037confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
2038 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
2039 it is already running. Default is ON.
2040
2041editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
2042 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
2043 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
2044 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
2045 Default is ON.
2046
2047history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
2048 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
2049 or the value of the environment variable
2050 GDBHISTFILE.
2051
2052history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
2053 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
2054 HISTSIZE.
2055
2056history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
2057 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
2058 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
2059
2060history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
2061 history expansion will be performed on
2062 command line input. The default is OFF.
2063
2064radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
2065 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
2066 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
2067
2068height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
2069 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
2070 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2071 variable TERM.
2072
2073width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
2074 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
2075 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2076 variable TERM.
2077
2078Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
2079``set width'' instead.
2080
2081print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
2082 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
2083 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
2084 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
2085
2086print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
2087 is OFF.
2088
2089print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
2090 "raw" form if off.
2091
2092print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
2093 like instructions.
2094
2095print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
2096
2097
2098 * Support for Epoch Environment.
2099
2100The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
2101new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
2102are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
2103window.
2104
2105
2106 * Support for Shared Libraries
2107
2108GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
2109Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
2110before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
2111happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
2112At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
2113from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
2114shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
2115It can be abbreviated ``share''.
2116
2117sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
2118 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
2119 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
2120
2121info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
2122
2123
2124 * Watchpoints
2125
2126A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
2127expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
2128tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
2129quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
2130problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
2131more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
2132
2133watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
2134
2135info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
2136
2137delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2138disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2139enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2140
2141
2142 * C++ multiple inheritance
2143
2144When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
2145for C++ programs.
2146
2147 * C++ exception handling
2148
2149Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
2150ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
2151the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
2152handler's context).
2153
2154catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
2155 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
2156 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
2157
2158info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
2159 current stack frame.
2160
2161
2162 * Minor command changes
2163
2164The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
2165command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
2166is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
2167
2168The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
2169at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
2170frames without printing.
2171
2172 * New directory command
2173
2174'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
2175The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
2176about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
2177with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
2178find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
2179
2180 * Configuring GDB for compilation
2181
2182For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
2183for more details.
2184
2185GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
2186two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
2187Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
2188where the program that you are debugging will run.
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