2012-02-24 Luis Machado <lgustavo@codesourcery.com>
[deliverable/binutils-gdb.git] / gdb / NEWS
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1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
3
8d5b6c2b 4*** Changes since GDB 7.4
d6e00af6 5
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6* Python scripting
7
8 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" is now deleted.
9
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10 ** A new class, gdb.printing.FlagEnumerationPrinter, can be used to
11 apply "flag enum"-style pretty-printing to any enum.
12
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13 ** gdb.lookup_symbol can now work when there is no current frame.
14
15 ** gdb.Symbol now has a 'line' attribute, holding the line number in
16 the source at which the symbol was defined.
17
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18 ** gdb.Symbol now has the new attribute 'needs_frame' and the new
19 method 'value'. The former indicates whether the symbol needs a
20 frame in order to compute its value, and the latter computes the
21 symbol's value.
22
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23* GDBserver now supports stdio connections.
24 E.g. (gdb) target remote | ssh myhost gdbserver - hello
25
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26* The binary "gdbtui" can no longer be built or installed.
27 Use "gdb -tui" instead.
28
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29* GDB will now print "flag" enums specially. A flag enum is one where
30 all the enumerator values have no bits in common when pairwise
31 "and"ed. When printing a value whose type is a flag enum, GDB will
32 show all the constants, e.g., for enum E { ONE = 1, TWO = 2}:
33 (gdb) print (enum E) 3
34 $1 = (ONE | TWO)
35
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36* The filename part of a linespec will now match trailing components
37 of a source file name. For example, "break gcc/expr.c:1000" will
38 now set a breakpoint in build/gcc/expr.c, but not
39 build/libcpp/expr.c.
40
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41* The "info proc" and "generate-core-file" commands will now also
42 work on remote targets connected to GDBserver on Linux.
43
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44* The command "info catch" has been removed. It has been disabled
45 since December 2007.
46
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47* New commands
48
49 ** "catch load" and "catch unload" can be used to stop when a shared
50 library is loaded or unloaded, respectively.
51
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52 ** "enable count" can be used to auto-disable a breakpoint after
53 several hits.
54
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55* New targets
56
57Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
58
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59*** Changes in GDB 7.4
60
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61* GDB now handles ambiguous linespecs more consistently; the existing
62 FILE:LINE support has been expanded to other types of linespecs. A
63 breakpoint will now be set on all matching locations in all
64 inferiors, and locations will be added or removed according to
65 inferior changes.
66
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67* GDB now allows you to skip uninteresting functions and files when
68 stepping with the "skip function" and "skip file" commands.
69
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70* GDB has two new commands: "set remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit"
71 and "show remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit". These allows to
72 set or show the maximum length limit (in bytes) of a remote
73 target hardware watchpoint.
74
75 This allows e.g. to use "unlimited" hardware watchpoints with the
76 gdbserver integrated in Valgrind version >= 3.7.0. Such Valgrind
77 watchpoints are slower than real hardware watchpoints but are
78 significantly faster than gdb software watchpoints.
79
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80* Python scripting
81
32d1c362 82 ** The register_pretty_printer function in module gdb.printing now takes
7d0aff21 83 an optional `replace' argument. If True, the new printer replaces any
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84 existing one.
85
3a7bf607 86 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" command has been
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87 deprecated and will be deleted in GDB 7.5.
88 A new command: "set python print-stack none|full|message" has
89 replaced it. Additionally, the default for "print-stack" is
90 now "message", which just prints the error message without
91 the stack trace.
3a7bf607 92
baacfb07 93 ** A prompt substitution hook (prompt_hook) is now available to the
3a7bf607 94 Python API.
713389e0 95
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96 ** A new Python module, gdb.prompt has been added to the GDB Python
97 modules library. This module provides functionality for
baacfb07 98 escape sequences in prompts (used by set/show
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99 extended-prompt). These escape sequences are replaced by their
100 corresponding value.
101
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102 ** Python commands and convenience-functions located in
103 'data-directory'/python/gdb/command and
104 'data-directory'/python/gdb/function are now automatically loaded
105 on GDB start-up.
106
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107 ** Blocks now provide four new attributes. global_block and
108 static_block will return the global and static blocks
109 respectively. is_static and is_global are boolean attributes
110 that indicate if the block is one of those two types.
111
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112 ** Symbols now provide the "type" attribute, the type of the symbol.
113
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114 ** The "gdb.breakpoint" function has been deprecated in favor of
115 "gdb.breakpoints".
116
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117 ** A new class "gdb.FinishBreakpoint" is provided to catch the return
118 of a function. This class is based on the "finish" command
119 available in the CLI.
120
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121 ** Type objects for struct and union types now allow access to
122 the fields using standard Python dictionary (mapping) methods.
123 For example, "some_type['myfield']" now works, as does
124 "some_type.items()".
125
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126 ** A new event "gdb.new_objfile" has been added, triggered by loading a
127 new object file.
128
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129 ** A new function, "deep_items" has been added to the gdb.types
130 module in the GDB Python modules library. This function returns
131 an iterator over the fields of a struct or union type. Unlike
132 the standard Python "iteritems" method, it will recursively traverse
133 any anonymous fields.
134
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135* MI changes
136
137 ** "*stopped" events can report several new "reason"s, such as
138 "solib-event".
139
140 ** Breakpoint changes are now notified using new async records, like
141 "=breakpoint-modified".
142
143 ** New command -ada-task-info.
144
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145* libthread-db-search-path now supports two special values: $sdir and $pdir.
146 $sdir specifies the default system locations of shared libraries.
147 $pdir specifies the directory where the libpthread used by the application
148 lives.
149
150 GDB no longer looks in $sdir and $pdir after it has searched the directories
151 mentioned in libthread-db-search-path. If you want to search those
152 directories, they must be specified in libthread-db-search-path.
153 The default value of libthread-db-search-path on GNU/Linux and Solaris
154 systems is now "$sdir:$pdir".
155
156 $pdir is not supported by gdbserver, it is currently ignored.
157 $sdir is supported by gdbserver.
158
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159* New configure option --with-iconv-bin.
160 When using the internationalization support like the one in the GNU C
161 library, GDB will invoke the "iconv" program to get a list of supported
162 character sets. If this program lives in a non-standard location, one can
163 use this option to specify where to find it.
164
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165* When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
166 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports masked hardware
167 watchpoints, which specify a mask in addition to an address to watch.
168 The mask specifies that some bits of an address (the bits which are
169 reset in the mask) should be ignored when matching the address accessed
170 by the inferior against the watchpoint address. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
171 section in the user manual for more details.
172
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173* The new option --once causes GDBserver to stop listening for connections once
174 the first connection is made. The listening port used by GDBserver will
175 become available after that.
176
71eba9c2 177* New commands "info macros" and "alias" have been added.
edc84990 178
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179* New function parameters suffix @entry specifies value of function parameter
180 at the time the function got called. Entry values are available only since
181 gcc version 4.7.
182
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183* New commands
184
185!SHELL COMMAND
186 "!" is now an alias of the "shell" command.
187 Note that no space is needed between "!" and SHELL COMMAND.
188
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189* Changed commands
190
191watch EXPRESSION mask MASK_VALUE
192 The watch command now supports the mask argument which allows creation
193 of masked watchpoints, if the current architecture supports this feature.
194
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195info auto-load-scripts [REGEXP]
196 This command was formerly named "maintenance print section-scripts".
197 It is now generally useful and is no longer a maintenance-only command.
198
71eba9c2 199info macro [-all] [--] MACRO
200 The info macro command has new options `-all' and `--'. The first for
201 printing all definitions of a macro. The second for explicitly specifying
202 the end of arguments and the beginning of the macro name in case the macro
203 name starts with a hyphen.
204
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205collect[/s] EXPRESSIONS
206 The tracepoint collect command now takes an optional modifier "/s"
207 that directs it to dereference pointer-to-character types and
208 collect the bytes of memory up to a zero byte. The behavior is
209 similar to what you see when you use the regular print command on a
210 string. An optional integer following the "/s" sets a bound on the
211 number of bytes that will be collected.
212
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213tstart [NOTES]
214 The trace start command now interprets any supplied arguments as a
215 note to be recorded with the trace run, with an effect similar to
216 setting the variable trace-notes.
217
218tstop [NOTES]
219 The trace stop command now interprets any arguments as a note to be
220 mentioned along with the tstatus report that the trace was stopped
221 with a command. The effect is similar to setting the variable
222 trace-stop-notes.
223
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224* Tracepoints can now be enabled and disabled at any time after a trace
225 experiment has been started using the standard "enable" and "disable"
226 commands. It is now possible to start a trace experiment with no enabled
227 tracepoints; GDB will display a warning, but will allow the experiment to
228 begin, assuming that tracepoints will be enabled as needed while the trace
229 is running.
230
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231* Fast tracepoints on 32-bit x86-architectures can now be placed at
232 locations with 4-byte instructions, when they were previously
233 limited to locations with instructions of 5 bytes or longer.
234
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235* New options
236
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237set extended-prompt
238show extended-prompt
239 Set the GDB prompt, and allow escape sequences to be inserted to
240 display miscellaneous information (see 'help set extended-prompt'
241 for the list of sequences). This prompt (and any information
242 accessed through the escape sequences) is updated every time the
243 prompt is displayed.
244
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245set print entry-values (both|compact|default|if-needed|no|only|preferred)
246show print entry-values
247 Set printing of frame argument values at function entry. In some cases
248 GDB can determine the value of function argument which was passed by the
249 function caller, even if the value was modified inside the called function.
250
251set debug entry-values
252show debug entry-values
253 Control display of debugging info for determining frame argument values at
254 function entry and virtual tail call frames.
255
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256set basenames-may-differ
257show basenames-may-differ
258 Set whether a source file may have multiple base names.
259 (A "base name" is the name of a file with the directory part removed.
260 Example: The base name of "/home/user/hello.c" is "hello.c".)
261 If set, GDB will canonicalize file names (e.g., expand symlinks)
262 before comparing them. Canonicalization is an expensive operation,
263 but it allows the same file be known by more than one base name.
264 If not set (the default), all source files are assumed to have just
265 one base name, and gdb will do file name comparisons more efficiently.
266
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267set trace-user
268show trace-user
269set trace-notes
270show trace-notes
271 Set a user name and notes for the current and any future trace runs.
272 This is useful for long-running and/or disconnected traces, to
273 inform others (or yourself) as to who is running the trace, supply
274 contact information, or otherwise explain what is going on.
275
276set trace-stop-notes
277show trace-stop-notes
278 Set a note attached to the trace run, that is displayed when the
279 trace has been stopped by a tstop command. This is useful for
280 instance as an explanation, if you are stopping a trace run that was
281 started by someone else.
282
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283* New remote packets
284
285QTEnable
286
287 Dynamically enable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
288
289QTDisable
290
291 Dynamically disable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
292
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293QTNotes
294
295 Set the user and notes of the trace run.
296
297qTP
298
299 Query the current status of a tracepoint.
300
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301qTMinFTPILen
302
303 Query the minimum length of instruction at which a fast tracepoint may
304 be placed.
305
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306* Dcache size (number of lines) and line-size are now runtime-configurable
307 via "set dcache line" and "set dcache line-size" commands.
308
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309* New targets
310
311Texas Instruments TMS320C6x tic6x-*-*
312
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313* New Simulators
314
315Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
316
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317*** Changes in GDB 7.3.1
318
319* The build failure for NetBSD and OpenBSD targets have now been fixed.
320
d6e00af6 321*** Changes in GDB 7.3
797054e6 322
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323* GDB has a new command: "thread find [REGEXP]".
324 It finds the thread id whose name, target id, or thread extra info
325 matches the given regular expression.
326
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327* The "catch syscall" command now works on mips*-linux* targets.
328
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329* The -data-disassemble MI command now supports modes 2 and 3 for
330 dumping the instruction opcodes.
331
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332* New command line options
333
334-data-directory DIR Specify DIR as the "data-directory".
335 This is mostly for testing purposes.
336
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337* The "maint set python auto-load on|off" command has been renamed to
338 "set auto-load-scripts on|off".
339
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340* GDB has a new command: "set directories".
341 It is like the "dir" command except that it replaces the
342 source path list instead of augmenting it.
343
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344* GDB now understands thread names.
345
346 On GNU/Linux, "info threads" will display the thread name as set by
347 prctl or pthread_setname_np.
348
349 There is also a new command, "thread name", which can be used to
350 assign a name internally for GDB to display.
351
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352* OpenCL C
353 Initial support for the OpenCL C language (http://www.khronos.org/opencl)
354 has been integrated into GDB.
355
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356* Python scripting
357
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358 ** The function gdb.Write now accepts an optional keyword 'stream'.
359 This keyword, when provided, will direct the output to either
360 stdout, stderr, or GDB's logging output.
361
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362 ** Parameters can now be be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
363 you may implement the get_set_doc and get_show_doc functions.
364 This improves how Parameter set/show documentation is processed
365 and allows for more dynamic content.
366
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367 ** Symbols, Symbol Table, Symbol Table and Line, Object Files,
368 Inferior, Inferior Thread, Blocks, and Block Iterator APIs now
369 have an is_valid method.
370
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371 ** Breakpoints can now be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
372 you may implement a 'stop' function that is executed each time
373 the inferior reaches that breakpoint.
374
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375 ** New function gdb.lookup_global_symbol looks up a global symbol.
376
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377 ** GDB values in Python are now callable if the value represents a
378 function. For example, if 'some_value' represents a function that
379 takes two integer parameters and returns a value, you can call
380 that function like so:
381
382 result = some_value (10,20)
383
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384 ** Module gdb.types has been added.
385 It contains a collection of utilities for working with gdb.Types objects:
386 get_basic_type, has_field, make_enum_dict.
387
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388 ** Module gdb.printing has been added.
389 It contains utilities for writing and registering pretty-printers.
390 New classes: PrettyPrinter, SubPrettyPrinter,
391 RegexpCollectionPrettyPrinter.
392 New function: register_pretty_printer.
393
394 ** New commands "info pretty-printers", "enable pretty-printer" and
395 "disable pretty-printer" have been added.
396
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397 ** gdb.parameter("directories") is now available.
398
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399 ** New function gdb.newest_frame returns the newest frame in the
400 selected thread.
401
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402 ** The gdb.InferiorThread class has a new "name" attribute. This
403 holds the thread's name.
404
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405 ** Python Support for Inferior events.
406 Python scripts can add observers to be notified of events
824446ad 407 occurring in the process being debugged.
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408 The following events are currently supported:
409 - gdb.events.cont Continue event.
410 - gdb.events.exited Inferior exited event.
411 - gdb.events.stop Signal received, and Breakpoint hit events.
412
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413* C++ Improvements:
414
415 ** GDB now puts template parameters in scope when debugging in an
416 instantiation. For example, if you have:
417
418 template<int X> int func (void) { return X; }
419
420 then if you step into func<5>, "print X" will show "5". This
421 feature requires proper debuginfo support from the compiler; it
422 was added to GCC 4.5.
423
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424 ** The motion commands "next", "finish", "until", and "advance" now
425 work better when exceptions are thrown. In particular, GDB will
426 no longer lose control of the inferior; instead, the GDB will
427 stop the inferior at the point at which the exception is caught.
428 This functionality requires a change in the exception handling
429 code that was introduced in GCC 4.5.
430
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431* GDB now follows GCC's rules on accessing volatile objects when
432 reading or writing target state during expression evaluation.
433 One notable difference to prior behavior is that "print x = 0"
434 no longer generates a read of x; the value of the assignment is
435 now always taken directly from the value being assigned.
436
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437* GDB now has some support for using labels in the program's source in
438 linespecs. For instance, you can use "advance label" to continue
439 execution to a label.
440
441* GDB now has support for reading and writing a new .gdb_index
442 section. This section holds a fast index of DWARF debugging
443 information and can be used to greatly speed up GDB startup and
444 operation. See the documentation for `save gdb-index' for details.
445
b56df873 446* The "watch" command now accepts an optional "-location" argument.
14c0d4e1 447 When used, this causes GDB to watch the memory referred to by the
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448 expression. Such a watchpoint is never deleted due to it going out
449 of scope.
450
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451* GDB now supports thread debugging of core dumps on GNU/Linux.
452
453 GDB now activates thread debugging using the libthread_db library
454 when debugging GNU/Linux core dumps, similarly to when debugging
455 live processes. As a result, when debugging a core dump file, GDB
456 is now able to display pthread_t ids of threads. For example, "info
457 threads" shows the same output as when debugging the process when it
458 was live. In earlier releases, you'd see something like this:
459
460 (gdb) info threads
461 * 1 LWP 6780 main () at main.c:10
462
463 While now you see this:
464
465 (gdb) info threads
466 * 1 Thread 0x7f0f5712a700 (LWP 6780) main () at main.c:10
467
468 It is also now possible to inspect TLS variables when debugging core
469 dumps.
470
471 When debugging a core dump generated on a machine other than the one
472 used to run GDB, you may need to point GDB at the correct
473 libthread_db library with the "set libthread-db-search-path"
474 command. See the user manual for more details on this command.
475
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476* When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
477 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports ranged breakpoints,
478 which stop execution of the inferior whenever it executes an instruction
479 at any address within the specified range. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
480 section in the user manual for more details.
481
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482* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
483
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484 ** GDBserver is now supported on PowerPC LynxOS (versions 4.x and 5.x),
485 and i686 LynxOS (version 5.x).
248c9dbc 486
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487 ** GDBserver is now supported on Blackfin Linux.
488
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489* New native configurations
490
491ia64 HP-UX ia64-*-hpux*
492
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493* New targets:
494
495Analog Devices, Inc. Blackfin Processor bfin-*
496
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497* Ada task switching is now supported on sparc-elf targets when
498 debugging a program using the Ravenscar Profile. For more information,
499 see the "Tasking Support when using the Ravenscar Profile" section
500 in the GDB user manual.
501
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502* Guile support was removed.
503
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504* New features in the GNU simulator
505
506 ** The --map-info flag lists all known core mappings.
507
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508 ** CFI flashes may be simulated via the "cfi" device.
509
76b8507d 510*** Changes in GDB 7.2
bfbf3774 511
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512* Shared library support for remote targets by default
513
514 When GDB is configured for a generic, non-OS specific target, like
515 for example, --target=arm-eabi or one of the many *-*-elf targets,
516 GDB now queries remote stubs for loaded shared libraries using the
517 `qXfer:libraries:read' packet. Previously, shared library support
518 was always disabled for such configurations.
519
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520* C++ Improvements:
521
522 ** Argument Dependent Lookup (ADL)
523
524 In C++ ADL lookup directs function search to the namespaces of its
525 arguments even if the namespace has not been imported.
526 For example:
527 namespace A
528 {
529 class B { };
530 void foo (B) { }
531 }
532 ...
533 A::B b
534 foo(b)
535 Here the compiler will search for `foo' in the namespace of 'b'
536 and find A::foo. GDB now supports this. This construct is commonly
537 used in the Standard Template Library for operators.
538
539 ** Improved User Defined Operator Support
540
541 In addition to member operators, GDB now supports lookup of operators
542 defined in a namespace and imported with a `using' directive, operators
543 defined in the global scope, operators imported implicitly from an
544 anonymous namespace, and the ADL operators mentioned in the previous
545 entry.
546 GDB now also supports proper overload resolution for all the previously
547 mentioned flavors of operators.
548
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549 ** static const class members
550
551 Printing of static const class members that are initialized in the
552 class definition has been fixed.
553
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554* Windows Thread Information Block access.
555
556 On Windows targets, GDB now supports displaying the Windows Thread
557 Information Block (TIB) structure. This structure is visible either
558 by using the new command `info w32 thread-information-block' or, by
559 dereferencing the new convenience variable named `$_tlb', a
560 thread-specific pointer to the TIB. This feature is also supported
561 when remote debugging using GDBserver.
562
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563* Static tracepoints
564
565 Static tracepoints are calls in the user program into a tracing
566 library. One such library is a port of the LTTng kernel tracer to
567 userspace --- UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer, http://lttng.org/ust).
568 When debugging with GDBserver, GDB now supports combining the GDB
569 tracepoint machinery with such libraries. For example: the user can
570 use GDB to probe a static tracepoint marker (a call from the user
571 program into the tracing library) with the new "strace" command (see
572 "New commands" below). This creates a "static tracepoint" in the
573 breakpoint list, that can be manipulated with the same feature set
574 as fast and regular tracepoints. E.g., collect registers, local and
575 global variables, collect trace state variables, and define
576 tracepoint conditions. In addition, the user can collect extra
577 static tracepoint marker specific data, by collecting the new
578 $_sdata internal variable. When analyzing the trace buffer, you can
579 inspect $_sdata like any other variable available to GDB. For more
580 information, see the "Tracepoints" chapter in GDB user manual. New
581 remote packets have been defined to support static tracepoints, see
582 the "New remote packets" section below.
583
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584* Better reconstruction of tracepoints after disconnected tracing
585
586 GDB will attempt to download the original source form of tracepoint
587 definitions when starting a trace run, and then will upload these
588 upon reconnection to the target, resulting in a more accurate
589 reconstruction of the tracepoints that are in use on the target.
590
591* Observer mode
592
593 You can now exercise direct control over the ways that GDB can
594 affect your program. For instance, you can disallow the setting of
595 breakpoints, so that the program can run continuously (assuming
596 non-stop mode). In addition, the "observer" variable is available
597 to switch all of the different controls; in observer mode, GDB
598 cannot affect the target's behavior at all, which is useful for
599 tasks like diagnosing live systems in the field.
600
601* The new convenience variable $_thread holds the number of the
602 current thread.
603
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604* New remote packets
605
606qGetTIBAddr
607
608 Return the address of the Windows Thread Information Block of a given thread.
609
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PA
610qRelocInsn
611
612 In response to several of the tracepoint packets, the target may now
613 also respond with a number of intermediate `qRelocInsn' request
614 packets before the final result packet, to have GDB handle
615 relocating an instruction to execute at a different address. This
616 is particularly useful for stubs that support fast tracepoints. GDB
617 reports support for this feature in the qSupported packet.
618
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PA
619qTfSTM, qTsSTM
620
621 List static tracepoint markers in the target program.
622
623qTSTMat
624
625 List static tracepoint markers at a given address in the target
626 program.
627
628qXfer:statictrace:read
629
630 Read the static trace data collected (by a `collect $_sdata'
631 tracepoint action). The remote stub reports support for this packet
632 to gdb's qSupported query.
633
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SS
634QAllow
635
636 Send the current settings of GDB's permission flags.
637
638QTDPsrc
639
640 Send part of the source (textual) form of a tracepoint definition,
641 which includes location, conditional, and action list.
642
3f7b2faa
DE
643* The source command now accepts a -s option to force searching for the
644 script in the source search path even if the script name specifies
645 a directory.
646
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PA
647* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
648
0fb4aa4b
PA
649 - GDBserver now support tracepoints (including fast tracepoints, and
650 static tracepoints). The feature is currently supported by the
651 i386-linux and amd64-linux builds. See the "Tracepoints support
652 in gdbserver" section in the manual for more information.
653
654 GDBserver JIT compiles the tracepoint's conditional agent
655 expression bytecode into native code whenever possible for low
656 overhead dynamic tracepoints conditionals. For such tracepoints,
657 an expression that examines program state is evaluated when the
658 tracepoint is reached, in order to determine whether to capture
659 trace data. If the condition is simple and false, processing the
660 tracepoint finishes very quickly and no data is gathered.
661
662 GDBserver interfaces with the UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer) library
663 for static tracepoints support.
d337e9f0 664
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665 - GDBserver now supports x86_64 Windows 64-bit debugging.
666
c8d5aac9
L
667* GDB now sends xmlRegisters= in qSupported packet to indicate that
668 it understands register description.
669
7c953934
TT
670* The --batch flag now disables pagination and queries.
671
8685c86f
L
672* X86 general purpose registers
673
674 GDB now supports reading/writing byte, word and double-word x86
675 general purpose registers directly. This means you can use, say,
676 $ah or $ax to refer, respectively, to the byte register AH and
677 16-bit word register AX that are actually portions of the 32-bit
678 register EAX or 64-bit register RAX.
679
95a42b64 680* The `commands' command now accepts a range of breakpoints to modify.
86b17b60
PA
681 A plain `commands' following a command that creates multiple
682 breakpoints affects all the breakpoints set by that command. This
683 applies to breakpoints set by `rbreak', and also applies when a
684 single `break' command creates multiple breakpoints (e.g.,
685 breakpoints on overloaded c++ functions).
95a42b64 686
8bd10a10
CM
687* The `rbreak' command now accepts a filename specification as part of
688 its argument, limiting the functions selected by the regex to those
689 in the specified file.
690
ab38a727
PA
691* Support for remote debugging Windows and SymbianOS shared libraries
692 from Unix hosts has been improved. Non Windows GDB builds now can
693 understand target reported file names that follow MS-DOS based file
694 system semantics, such as file names that include drive letters and
695 use the backslash character as directory separator. This makes it
696 possible to transparently use the "set sysroot" and "set
697 solib-search-path" on Unix hosts to point as host copies of the
698 target's shared libraries. See the new command "set
699 target-file-system-kind" described below, and the "Commands to
700 specify files" section in the user manual for more information.
701
6149aea9
PA
702* New commands
703
f1421989
HZ
704eval template, expressions...
705 Convert the values of one or more expressions under the control
706 of the string template to a command line, and call it.
707
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PA
708set target-file-system-kind unix|dos-based|auto
709show target-file-system-kind
710 Set or show the assumed file system kind for target reported file
711 names.
712
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PA
713save breakpoints <filename>
714 Save all current breakpoint definitions to a file suitable for use
715 in a later debugging session. To read the saved breakpoint
716 definitions, use the `source' command.
717
718`save tracepoints' is a new alias for `save-tracepoints'. The latter
719is now deprecated.
720
0fb4aa4b
PA
721info static-tracepoint-markers
722 Display information about static tracepoint markers in the target.
723
724strace FN | FILE:LINE | *ADDR | -m MARKER_ID
725 Define a static tracepoint by probing a marker at the given
726 function, line, address, or marker ID.
727
ca11e899
SS
728set observer on|off
729show observer
730 Enable and disable observer mode.
731
732set may-write-registers on|off
733set may-write-memory on|off
734set may-insert-breakpoints on|off
735set may-insert-tracepoints on|off
736set may-insert-fast-tracepoints on|off
737set may-interrupt on|off
738 Set individual permissions for GDB effects on the target. Note that
739 some of these settings can have undesirable or surprising
740 consequences, particularly when changed in the middle of a session.
741 For instance, disabling the writing of memory can prevent
742 breakpoints from being inserted, cause single-stepping to fail, or
743 even crash your program, if you disable after breakpoints have been
744 inserted. However, GDB should not crash.
745
746set record memory-query on|off
747show record memory-query
748 Control whether to stop the inferior if memory changes caused
749 by an instruction cannot be recorded.
750
53a71c06
CR
751* Changed commands
752
753disassemble
754 The disassemble command now supports "start,+length" form of two arguments.
755
f3e9a817
PM
756* Python scripting
757
9279c692
JB
758** GDB now provides a new directory location, called the python directory,
759 where Python scripts written for GDB can be installed. The location
760 of that directory is <data-directory>/python, where <data-directory>
761 is the GDB data directory. For more details, see section `Scripting
762 GDB using Python' in the manual.
763
adc36818 764** The GDB Python API now has access to breakpoints, symbols, symbol
595939de
PM
765 tables, program spaces, inferiors, threads and frame's code blocks.
766 Additionally, GDB Parameters can now be created from the API, and
767 manipulated via set/show in the CLI.
f870a310 768
fa33c3cd 769** New functions gdb.target_charset, gdb.target_wide_charset,
07ca107c
DE
770 gdb.progspaces, gdb.current_progspace, and gdb.string_to_argv.
771
772** New exception gdb.GdbError.
fa33c3cd
DE
773
774** Pretty-printers are now also looked up in the current program space.
f3e9a817 775
967cf477
DE
776** Pretty-printers can now be individually enabled and disabled.
777
8a1ea21f
DE
778** GDB now looks for names of Python scripts to auto-load in a
779 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts', in addition to looking
780 for a OBJFILE-gdb.py script when OBJFILE is read by the debugger.
781
a7bdde9e
VP
782* Tracepoint actions were unified with breakpoint commands. In particular,
783there are no longer differences in "info break" output for breakpoints and
784tracepoints and the "commands" command can be used for both tracepoints and
785regular breakpoints.
786
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PA
787* New targets
788
789ARM Symbian arm*-*-symbianelf*
790
6aecb9c2
JB
791* D language support.
792 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the D programming
793 language.
794
431e49aa
TJB
795* GDB now supports the extended ptrace interface for PowerPC which is
796 available since Linux kernel version 2.6.34. This automatically enables
797 any hardware breakpoints and additional hardware watchpoints available in
798 the processor. The old ptrace interface exposes just one hardware
799 watchpoint and no hardware breakpoints.
800
801* GDB is now able to use the Data Value Compare (DVC) register available on
802 embedded PowerPC processors to implement in hardware simple watchpoint
803 conditions of the form:
804
805 watch ADDRESS|VARIABLE if ADDRESS|VARIABLE == CONSTANT EXPRESSION
806
807 This works in native GDB running on Linux kernels with the extended ptrace
808 interface mentioned above.
809
bfbf3774 810*** Changes in GDB 7.1
abc7453d 811
4eef138c
TT
812* C++ Improvements
813
814 ** Namespace Support
71dee663
SW
815
816 GDB now supports importing of namespaces in C++. This enables the
817 user to inspect variables from imported namespaces. Support for
818 namepace aliasing has also been added. So, if a namespace is
819 aliased in the current scope (e.g. namepace C=A; ) the user can
820 print variables using the alias (e.g. (gdb) print C::x).
821
4eef138c
TT
822 ** Bug Fixes
823
824 All known bugs relating to the printing of virtual base class were
825 fixed. It is now possible to call overloaded static methods using a
826 qualified name.
827
828 ** Cast Operators
829
830 The C++ cast operators static_cast<>, dynamic_cast<>, const_cast<>,
831 and reinterpret_cast<> are now handled by the C++ expression parser.
832
2d1c1221
ME
833* New targets
834
835Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze-*-*
34207b9e 836Renesas RX rx-*-elf
2d1c1221
ME
837
838* New Simulators
839
840Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze
34207b9e 841Renesas RX rx
2d1c1221 842
6c95b8df
PA
843* Multi-program debugging.
844
845 GDB now has support for multi-program (a.k.a. multi-executable or
846 multi-exec) debugging. This allows for debugging multiple inferiors
847 simultaneously each running a different program under the same GDB
848 session. See "Debugging Multiple Inferiors and Programs" in the
849 manual for more information. This implied some user visible changes
850 in the multi-inferior support. For example, "info inferiors" now
851 lists inferiors that are not running yet or that have exited
852 already. See also "New commands" and "New options" below.
853
d5551862
SS
854* New tracing features
855
856 GDB's tracepoint facility now includes several new features:
857
858 ** Trace state variables
f61e138d
SS
859
860 GDB tracepoints now include support for trace state variables, which
861 are variables managed by the target agent during a tracing
862 experiment. They are useful for tracepoints that trigger each
863 other, so for instance one tracepoint can count hits in a variable,
864 and then a second tracepoint has a condition that is true when the
865 count reaches a particular value. Trace state variables share the
866 $-syntax of GDB convenience variables, and can appear in both
867 tracepoint actions and condition expressions. Use the "tvariable"
868 command to create, and "info tvariables" to view; see "Trace State
869 Variables" in the manual for more detail.
7a697b8d 870
d5551862 871 ** Fast tracepoints
7a697b8d
SS
872
873 GDB now includes an option for defining fast tracepoints, which
874 targets may implement more efficiently, such as by installing a jump
875 into the target agent rather than a trap instruction. The resulting
876 speedup can be by two orders of magnitude or more, although the
877 tradeoff is that some program locations on some target architectures
878 might not allow fast tracepoint installation, for instance if the
879 instruction to be replaced is shorter than the jump. To request a
880 fast tracepoint, use the "ftrace" command, with syntax identical to
881 the regular trace command.
882
d5551862
SS
883 ** Disconnected tracing
884
885 It is now possible to detach GDB from the target while it is running
886 a trace experiment, then reconnect later to see how the experiment
887 is going. In addition, a new variable disconnected-tracing lets you
888 tell the target agent whether to continue running a trace if the
889 connection is lost unexpectedly.
890
00bf0b85
SS
891 ** Trace files
892
893 GDB now has the ability to save the trace buffer into a file, and
894 then use that file as a target, similarly to you can do with
895 corefiles. You can select trace frames, print data that was
896 collected in them, and use tstatus to display the state of the
897 tracing run at the moment that it was saved. To create a trace
898 file, use "tsave <filename>", and to use it, do "target tfile
899 <name>".
4daf5ac0
SS
900
901 ** Circular trace buffer
902
903 You can ask the target agent to handle the trace buffer as a
904 circular buffer, discarding the oldest trace frames to make room for
905 newer ones, by setting circular-trace-buffer to on. This feature may
906 not be available for all target agents.
907
21a0512e
PP
908* Changed commands
909
910disassemble
911 The disassemble command, when invoked with two arguments, now requires
912 the arguments to be comma-separated.
913
0fe7935b
DJ
914info variables
915 The info variables command now displays variable definitions. Files
916 which only declare a variable are not shown.
917
fb2e7cb4
JB
918source
919 The source command is now capable of sourcing Python scripts.
920 This feature is dependent on the debugger being build with Python
921 support.
922
923 Related to this enhancement is also the introduction of a new command
924 "set script-extension" (see below).
925
6c95b8df
PA
926* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
927
399cd161
MS
928record save [<FILENAME>]
929 Save a file (in core file format) containing the process record
930 execution log for replay debugging at a later time.
931
932record restore <FILENAME>
933 Restore the process record execution log that was saved at an
934 earlier time, for replay debugging.
935
6c95b8df
PA
936add-inferior [-copies <N>] [-exec <FILENAME>]
937 Add a new inferior.
938
939clone-inferior [-copies <N>] [ID]
940 Make a new inferior ready to execute the same program another
941 inferior has loaded.
942
943remove-inferior ID
944 Remove an inferior.
945
946maint info program-spaces
947 List the program spaces loaded into GDB.
948
9a7071a8
JB
949set remote interrupt-sequence [Ctrl-C | BREAK | BREAK-g]
950show remote interrupt-sequence
951 Allow the user to select one of ^C, a BREAK signal or BREAK-g
952 as the sequence to the remote target in order to interrupt the execution.
953 Ctrl-C is a default. Some system prefers BREAK which is high level of
954 serial line for some certain time. Linux kernel prefers BREAK-g, a.k.a
955 Magic SysRq g. It is BREAK signal and character 'g'.
956
957set remote interrupt-on-connect [on | off]
958show remote interrupt-on-connect
959 When interrupt-on-connect is ON, gdb sends interrupt-sequence to
960 remote target when gdb connects to it. This is needed when you debug
961 Linux kernel.
962
963set remotebreak [on | off]
964show remotebreak
965Deprecated. Use "set/show remote interrupt-sequence" instead.
966
f61e138d
SS
967tvariable $NAME [ = EXP ]
968 Create or modify a trace state variable.
969
970info tvariables
971 List trace state variables and their values.
972
973delete tvariable $NAME ...
974 Delete one or more trace state variables.
975
6da95a67
SS
976teval EXPR, ...
977 Evaluate the given expressions without collecting anything into the
978 trace buffer. (Valid in tracepoint actions only.)
979
7a697b8d
SS
980ftrace FN / FILE:LINE / *ADDR
981 Define a fast tracepoint at the given function, line, or address.
982
b0f02ee9
JK
983* New expression syntax
984
985 GDB now parses the 0b prefix of binary numbers the same way as GCC does.
986 GDB now parses 0b101010 identically with 42.
987
6c95b8df
PA
988* New options
989
990set follow-exec-mode new|same
991show follow-exec-mode
992 Control whether GDB reuses the same inferior across an exec call or
993 creates a new one. This is useful to be able to restart the old
994 executable after the inferior having done an exec call.
995
236f1d4d
SS
996set default-collect EXPR, ...
997show default-collect
998 Define a list of expressions to be collected at each tracepoint.
999 This is a useful way to ensure essential items are not overlooked,
1000 such as registers or a critical global variable.
1001
d5551862
SS
1002set disconnected-tracing
1003show disconnected-tracing
1004 If set to 1, the target is instructed to continue tracing if it
1005 loses its connection to GDB. If 0, the target is to stop tracing
1006 upon disconnection.
1007
4daf5ac0
SS
1008set circular-trace-buffer
1009show circular-trace-buffer
1010 If set to on, the target is instructed to use a circular trace buffer
1011 and discard the oldest trace frames instead of stopping the trace due
1012 to a full trace buffer. If set to off, the trace stops when the buffer
1013 fills up. Some targets may not support this.
1014
fb2e7cb4
JB
1015set script-extension off|soft|strict
1016show script-extension
1017 If set to "off", the debugger does not perform any script language
1018 recognition, and all sourced files are assumed to be GDB scripts.
1019 If set to "soft" (the default), files are sourced according to
1020 filename extension, falling back to GDB scripts if the first
1021 evaluation failed.
1022 If set to "strict", files are sourced according to filename extension.
1023
2b71fc8e
JB
1024set ada trust-PAD-over-XVS on|off
1025show ada trust-PAD-over-XVS
1026 If off, activate a workaround against a bug in the debugging information
1027 generated by the compiler for PAD types (see gcc/exp_dbug.ads in
1028 the GCC sources for more information about the GNAT encoding and
1029 PAD types in particular). It is always safe to set this option to
1030 off, but this introduces a slight performance penalty. The default
1031 is on.
1032
de2e5182
TT
1033* Python API Improvements
1034
1035 ** GDB provides the new class gdb.LazyString. This is useful in
1036 some pretty-printing cases. The new method gdb.Value.lazy_string
1037 provides a simple way to create objects of this type.
1038
1039 ** The fields returned by gdb.Type.fields now have an
1040 `is_base_class' attribute.
1041
1042 ** The new method gdb.Type.range returns the range of an array type.
1043
1044 ** The new method gdb.parse_and_eval can be used to parse and
1045 evaluate an expression.
1046
f61e138d
SS
1047* New remote packets
1048
1049QTDV
1050 Define a trace state variable.
1051
1052qTV
1053 Get the current value of a trace state variable.
1054
d5551862
SS
1055QTDisconnected
1056 Set desired tracing behavior upon disconnection.
1057
4daf5ac0
SS
1058QTBuffer:circular
1059 Set the trace buffer to be linear or circular.
1060
d5551862
SS
1061qTfP, qTsP
1062 Get data about the tracepoints currently in use.
1063
2d483d34
MS
1064* Bug fixes
1065
1066Process record now works correctly with hardware watchpoints.
1067
6e0e5977
JB
1068Multiple bug fixes have been made to the mips-irix port, making it
1069much more reliable. In particular:
1070 - Debugging threaded applications is now possible again. Previously,
1071 GDB would hang while starting the program, or while waiting for
1072 the program to stop at a breakpoint.
1073 - Attaching to a running process no longer hangs.
1074 - An error occurring while loading a core file has been fixed.
1075 - Changing the value of the PC register now works again. This fixes
1076 problems observed when using the "jump" command, or when calling
1077 a function from GDB, or even when assigning a new value to $pc.
1078 - With the "finish" and "return" commands, the return value for functions
1079 returning a small array is now correctly printed.
1080 - It is now possible to break on shared library code which gets executed
1081 during a shared library init phase (code executed while executing
1082 their .init section). Previously, the breakpoint would have no effect.
1083 - GDB is now able to backtrace through the signal handler for
1084 non-threaded programs.
1085
93c26624
JK
1086PIE (Position Independent Executable) programs debugging is now supported.
1087This includes debugging execution of PIC (Position Independent Code) shared
1088libraries although for that, it should be possible to run such libraries as an
1089executable program.
1090
abc7453d 1091*** Changes in GDB 7.0
75feb17d 1092
4efc6507
DE
1093* GDB now has an interface for JIT compilation. Applications that
1094dynamically generate code can create symbol files in memory and register
1095them with GDB. For users, the feature should work transparently, and
1096for JIT developers, the interface is documented in the GDB manual in the
1097"JIT Compilation Interface" chapter.
1098
782b2b07
SS
1099* Tracepoints may now be conditional. The syntax is as for
1100breakpoints; either an "if" clause appended to the "trace" command,
1101or the "condition" command is available. GDB sends the condition to
1102the target for evaluation using the same bytecode format as is used
1103for tracepoint actions.
1104
53a71c06
CR
1105* The disassemble command now supports: an optional /r modifier, print the
1106raw instructions in hex as well as in symbolic form, and an optional /m
1107modifier to print mixed source+assembly.
e6158f16 1108
e7a8dbfb
HZ
1109* Process record and replay
1110
1111 In a architecture environment that supports ``process record and
1112 replay'', ``process record and replay'' target can record a log of
1113 the process execution, and replay it with both forward and reverse
1114 execute commands.
1115
64644d9b
MS
1116* Reverse debugging: GDB now has new commands reverse-continue, reverse-
1117step, reverse-next, reverse-finish, reverse-stepi, reverse-nexti, and
1118set execution-direction {forward|reverse}, for targets that support
1119reverse execution.
1120
b9412953
DD
1121* GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on MIPS/Linux systems. This
1122feature is available with a native GDB running on kernel version
11232.6.28 or later.
1124
6c7a06a3
TT
1125* GDB now has support for multi-byte and wide character sets on the
1126target. Strings whose character type is wchar_t, char16_t, or
1127char32_t are now correctly printed. GDB supports wide- and unicode-
1128literals in C, that is, L'x', L"string", u'x', u"string", U'x', and
1129U"string" syntax. And, GDB allows the "%ls" and "%lc" formats in
1130`printf'. This feature requires iconv to work properly; if your
1131system does not have a working iconv, GDB can use GNU libiconv. See
1132the installation instructions for more information.
1133
f1838a98
UW
1134* GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
1135remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
1136with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
1137the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
1138
55333a84
DE
1139* "info sharedlibrary" now takes an optional regex of libraries to show,
1140and it now reports if a shared library has no debugging information.
1141
7f6a6314
PM
1142* Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
1143now complete on file names.
1144
65d12d83
TT
1145* When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
1146completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
1147For instance, consider:
1148
1149 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
1150 # struct example variable;
1151 (gdb) p variable.
1152
1153If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
1154completions will be "f1" and "f2".
1155
edb3359d
DJ
1156* Inlined functions are now supported. They show up in backtraces, and
1157the "step", "next", and "finish" commands handle them automatically.
1158
2fae03e8
TT
1159* GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
1160operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
1161macros.
1162
47a3467a 1163* GDB now supports inspecting extra signal information, exported by
58d6951d
DJ
1164the new $_siginfo convenience variable. The feature is currently
1165implemented on linux ARM, i386 and amd64.
1166
1167* GDB can now display the VFP floating point registers and NEON vector
1168registers on ARM targets. Both ARM GNU/Linux native GDB and gdbserver
1169can provide these registers (requires Linux 2.6.30 or later). Remote
1170and simulator targets may also provide them.
47a3467a 1171
08388c79
DE
1172* New remote packets
1173
1174qSearch:memory:
1175 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
1176
a6f3e723
SL
1177QStartNoAckMode
1178 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
1179 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
1180 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
1181
d7713ae0
EZ
1182vKill
1183 Kill the process with the specified process ID. Use this in preference
1184 to `k' when multiprocess protocol extensions are supported.
1185
07e059b5
VP
1186qXfer:osdata:read
1187 Obtains additional operating system information
1188
47a3467a
PA
1189qXfer:siginfo:read
1190qXfer:siginfo:write
1191 Read or write additional signal information.
1192
060871df
PA
1193* Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
1194
1195 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
1196 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
1197 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
1198
c055b101 1199* GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
a0ef4274 1200DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
c055b101
CV
1201
1202* The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
a0ef4274
DJ
1203and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
1204`set/show sh calling-convention'.
c055b101 1205
31fffb02
CS
1206* GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
1207with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
1208
88d8a8e0
JB
1209* 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
1210
7f99b190
JB
1211* Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
1212
ccd213ac
DJ
1213* Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
1214which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
1215
1fddbabb 1216* The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
31fffb02 1217list of section offsets.
1fddbabb 1218
a0ef4274
DJ
1219* On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
1220conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
1221have also been fixed.
1222
bfb8797a 1223* GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
158c7665
PH
1224From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
1225are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
bfb8797a 1226
71c25dea
TT
1227* GDB now parses C++ symbol and type names more flexibly. For
1228example, given:
1229
1230 template<typename T> class C { };
1231 C<char const *> c;
1232
1233GDB will now correctly handle all of:
1234
1235 ptype C<char const *>
1236 ptype C<char const*>
1237 ptype C<const char *>
1238 ptype C<const char*>
1239
ccd213ac
DJ
1240* New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
1241
1242 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
1243 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
1244
7ae0e2a2
UW
1245 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
1246 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
1247 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
1248
a6f3e723
SL
1249 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
1250 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
1251
da8bd9a3
DJ
1252 - Support for the sparc64-linux-gnu target is now included in
1253 gdbserver.
1254
d70e31dd
DE
1255 - The amd64-linux build of gdbserver now supports debugging both
1256 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
1257
1258 - The i386-linux, amd64-linux, and i386-win32 builds of gdbserver
1259 now support hardware watchpoints, and will use them automatically
1260 as appropriate.
1261
d57a3c85
TJB
1262* Python scripting
1263
1264 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
1265 available is determined at configure time.
1266
d8906c6f
TJB
1267 New GDB commands can now be written in Python.
1268
aadc346a
JB
1269* Ada tasking support
1270
1271 Ada tasks can now be inspected in GDB. The following commands have
1272 been introduced:
1273
1274 info tasks
1275 Print the list of Ada tasks.
1276 info task N
1277 Print detailed information about task number N.
1278 task
1279 Print the task number of the current task.
1280 task N
1281 Switch the context of debugging to task number N.
1282
adb483fe
DJ
1283* Support for user-defined prefixed commands. The "define" command can
1284add new commands to existing prefixes, e.g. "target".
1285
2277426b
PA
1286* Multi-inferior, multi-process debugging.
1287
1288 GDB now has generalized support for multi-inferior debugging. See
1289 "Debugging Multiple Inferiors" in the manual for more information.
1290 Although availability still depends on target support, the command
1291 set is more uniform now. The GNU/Linux specific multi-forks support
1292 has been migrated to this new framework. This implied some user
1293 visible changes; see "New commands" and also "Removed commands"
1294 below.
1295
08d16641
PA
1296* Target descriptions can now describe the target OS ABI. See the
1297"Target Description Format" section in the user manual for more
1298information.
1299
e35359c5
UW
1300* Target descriptions can now describe "compatible" architectures
1301to indicate that the target can execute applications for a different
1302architecture in addition to those for the main target architecture.
1303See the "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for
1304more information.
1305
85e747d2
UW
1306* Multi-architecture debugging.
1307
1308 GDB now includes general supports for debugging applications on
1309 hybrid systems that use more than one single processor architecture
1310 at the same time. Each such hybrid architecture still requires
1311 specific support to be added. The only hybrid architecture supported
1312 in this version of GDB is the Cell Broadband Engine.
1313
1314* GDB now supports integrated debugging of Cell/B.E. applications that
1315use both the PPU and SPU architectures. To enable support for hybrid
1316Cell/B.E. debugging, you need to configure GDB to support both the
1317powerpc-linux or powerpc64-linux and the spu-elf targets, using the
1318--enable-targets configure option.
1319
11ade57a
PA
1320* Non-stop mode debugging.
1321
1322 For some targets, GDB now supports an optional mode of operation in
1323 which you can examine stopped threads while other threads continue
1324 to execute freely. This is referred to as non-stop mode, with the
1325 old mode referred to as all-stop mode. See the "Non-Stop Mode"
1326 section in the user manual for more information.
1327
1328 To be able to support remote non-stop debugging, a remote stub needs
1329 to implement the non-stop mode remote protocol extensions, as
1330 described in the "Remote Non-Stop" section of the user manual. The
1331 GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been adjusted to support these
1332 extensions on linux targets.
1333
d7713ae0 1334* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
75feb17d 1335
a96d9b2e
SDJ
1336catch syscall [NAME(S) | NUMBER(S)]
1337 Catch system calls. Arguments, which should be names of system
1338 calls or their numbers, mean catch only those syscalls. Without
1339 arguments, every syscall will be caught. When the inferior issues
1340 any of the specified syscalls, GDB will stop and announce the system
1341 call, both when it is called and when its call returns. This
1342 feature is currently available with a native GDB running on the
1343 Linux Kernel, under the following architectures: x86, x86_64,
1344 PowerPC and PowerPC64.
1345
08388c79
DE
1346find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
1347 val1 [, val2, ...]
1348 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
1349
d57a3c85
TJB
1350maint set python print-stack
1351maint show python print-stack
1352 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
1353
1354python [CODE]
1355 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
1356
d7713ae0
EZ
1357macro define
1358macro list
1359macro undef
1360 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
1361 interactively.
1362
1363info os processes
1364 Show operating system information about processes.
1365
2277426b
PA
1366info inferiors
1367 List the inferiors currently under GDB's control.
1368
1369inferior NUM
1370 Switch focus to inferior number NUM.
1371
1372detach inferior NUM
1373 Detach from inferior number NUM.
1374
1375kill inferior NUM
1376 Kill inferior number NUM.
1377
d7713ae0
EZ
1378* New options
1379
3285f3fe
UW
1380set spu stop-on-load
1381show spu stop-on-load
1382 Control whether to stop for new SPE threads during Cell/B.E. debugging.
1383
ff1a52c6
UW
1384set spu auto-flush-cache
1385show spu auto-flush-cache
1386 Control whether to automatically flush the software-managed cache
1387 during Cell/B.E. debugging.
1388
d7713ae0
EZ
1389set sh calling-convention
1390show sh calling-convention
1391 Control the calling convention used when calling SH target functions.
1392
e0a3ce09 1393set debug timestamp
75feb17d 1394show debug timestamp
d7713ae0
EZ
1395 Control display of timestamps with GDB debugging output.
1396
1397set disassemble-next-line
1398show disassemble-next-line
1399 Control display of disassembled source lines or instructions when
1400 the debuggee stops.
1401
1402set remote noack-packet
1403show remote noack-packet
1404 Set/show the use of remote protocol QStartNoAckMode packet. See above
1405 under "New remote packets."
1406
1407set remote query-attached-packet
1408show remote query-attached-packet
1409 Control use of remote protocol `qAttached' (query-attached) packet.
1410
1411set remote read-siginfo-object
1412show remote read-siginfo-object
1413 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:read' (read-siginfo-object)
1414 packet.
1415
1416set remote write-siginfo-object
1417show remote write-siginfo-object
1418 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:write' (write-siginfo-object)
1419 packet.
1420
40ab02ce
MS
1421set remote reverse-continue
1422show remote reverse-continue
1423 Control use of remote protocol 'bc' (reverse-continue) packet.
1424
1425set remote reverse-step
1426show remote reverse-step
1427 Control use of remote protocol 'bs' (reverse-step) packet.
1428
d7713ae0
EZ
1429set displaced-stepping
1430show displaced-stepping
1431 Control displaced stepping mode. Displaced stepping is a way to
1432 single-step over breakpoints without removing them from the debuggee.
1433 Also known as "out-of-line single-stepping".
1434
1435set debug displaced
1436show debug displaced
1437 Control display of debugging info for displaced stepping.
1438
1439maint set internal-error
1440maint show internal-error
1441 Control what GDB does when an internal error is detected.
1442
1443maint set internal-warning
1444maint show internal-warning
1445 Control what GDB does when an internal warning is detected.
75feb17d 1446
ccd213ac
DJ
1447set exec-wrapper
1448show exec-wrapper
1449unset exec-wrapper
1450 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
fa4727a6 1451
aad4b048
JB
1452set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
1453show multiple-symbols
1454 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
1455 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
1456 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
1457
74960c60
VP
1458set breakpoint always-inserted
1459show breakpoint always-inserted
1460 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
1461 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
1462 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
1463
0428b8f5
DJ
1464set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
1465show arm fallback-mode
1466set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
1467show arm force-mode
1468 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
1469 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
1470 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
1471 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
1472
10568435
JK
1473set disable-randomization
1474show disable-randomization
1475 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
1476 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
1477 multiple debugging sessions.
1478
d7713ae0
EZ
1479set non-stop
1480show non-stop
1481 Control whether other threads are stopped or not when some thread hits
1482 a breakpoint.
1483
b3eb342c 1484set target-async
d7713ae0 1485show target-async
b3eb342c
VP
1486 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
1487 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
1488 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
1489 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
1490
6c7a06a3
TT
1491set target-wide-charset
1492show target-wide-charset
1493 The target-wide-charset is the name of the character set that GDB
1494 uses when printing characters whose type is wchar_t.
1495
84603566
SL
1496set tcp auto-retry (on|off)
1497show tcp auto-retry
1498set tcp connect-timeout
1499show tcp connect-timeout
1500 These commands allow GDB to retry failed TCP connections to a remote stub
1501 with a specified timeout period; this is useful if the stub is launched
1502 in parallel with GDB but may not be ready to accept connections immediately.
1503
17a37d48
PP
1504set libthread-db-search-path
1505show libthread-db-search-path
1506 Control list of directories which GDB will search for appropriate
1507 libthread_db.
1508
d4db2f36
PA
1509set schedule-multiple (on|off)
1510show schedule-multiple
1511 Allow GDB to resume all threads of all processes or only threads of
1512 the current process.
1513
4e5d721f
DE
1514set stack-cache
1515show stack-cache
1516 Use more aggressive caching for accesses to the stack. This improves
1517 performance of remote debugging (particularly backtraces) without
1518 affecting correctness.
1519
910c5da8
JB
1520set interactive-mode (on|off|auto)
1521show interactive-mode
1522 Control whether GDB runs in interactive mode (on) or not (off).
1523 When in interactive mode, GDB waits for the user to answer all
1524 queries. Otherwise, GDB does not wait and assumes the default
1525 answer. When set to auto (the default), GDB determines which
1526 mode to use based on the stdin settings.
1527
2277426b
PA
1528* Removed commands
1529
1530info forks
1531 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `info
1532 inferiors' command. To list checkpoints, you can still use the
1533 `info checkpoints' command, which was an alias for the `info forks'
1534 command.
1535
1536fork NUM
1537 Replaced by the new `inferior' command. To switch between
1538 checkpoints, you can still use the `restart' command, which was an
1539 alias for the `fork' command.
1540
1541process PID
1542 This is removed, since some targets don't have a notion of
1543 processes. To switch between processes, you can still use the
1544 `inferior' command using GDB's own inferior number.
1545
1546delete fork NUM
1547 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `kill
1548 inferior' command. To delete a checkpoint, you can still use the
1549 `delete checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `delete
1550 fork' command.
1551
1552detach fork NUM
1553 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `detach
1554 inferior' command. To detach a checkpoint, you can still use the
1555 `detach checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `detach
1556 fork' command.
1557
a80b95ba
TG
1558* New native configurations
1559
1560x86/x86_64 Darwin i[34567]86-*-darwin*
1561
b8bfd3ed
JB
1562x86_64 MinGW x86_64-*-mingw*
1563
75a2d5e7
TT
1564* New targets
1565
c28c63d8 1566Lattice Mico32 lm32-*
75a2d5e7 1567x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
4c1d2973 1568x86_64 DICOS x86_64-*-dicos*
5f814c3b 1569S+core 3 score-*-*
75a2d5e7 1570
6de3146c
PA
1571* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports x86 Windows CE
1572 (mingw32ce) debugging.
1573
d5cbbe6e
JB
1574* Removed commands
1575
1576catch load
1577catch unload
1578 These commands were actually not implemented on any target.
1579
75feb17d 1580*** Changes in GDB 6.8
f9ed52be 1581
af5ca30d
NH
1582* New native configurations
1583
1584NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
94a0e877 1585Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
af5ca30d
NH
1586
1587* New targets
1588
1589NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
94a0e877 1590Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
af5ca30d 1591
7a404eba
PA
1592* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
1593
1594 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
1595 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
1596 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
1597 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
1598
430ebac9
PA
1599* GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
1600(mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
1601
fe6fbf8b 1602* Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
8d5f9c6f 1603is resolved.
fe6fbf8b
VP
1604
1605* GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
8d5f9c6f
DJ
1606including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
1607and in inlined functions.
fe6fbf8b 1608
10665d76
JB
1609* GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
1610accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
1611more than one contiguous range of addresses.
1612
7cc46491
DJ
1613* Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
1614
d71340b8
DJ
1615* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
1616registers on PowerPC targets.
1617
523c4513
DJ
1618* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
1619targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
1620
a6b151f1
DJ
1621* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
1622commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
1623
2d717e4f
DJ
1624* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
1625extended-remote mode.
1626
24a836bd 1627* hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
d001be7a
DJ
1628The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
1629error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
1630The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
24a836bd 1631
d0c678e6
UW
1632* GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
1633building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
1634target architectures.
1635
d64a946d
TJB
1636* GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
1637Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
1638now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
1639stored in two consecutive float registers.
1640
ee163bf5
VP
1641* The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
1642breakpoints now.
1643
b93b6ca7 1644* Improved support for debugging Ada
d001be7a
DJ
1645Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
1646include:
b93b6ca7
JB
1647 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
1648 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
1649 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
1650 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
1651 of an assignment
1652 - Improved command completion in Ada
1653 - Several bug fixes
1654
d001be7a
DJ
1655* GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
1656process.
1657
a6b151f1
DJ
1658* New commands
1659
6d53d0af
JB
1660set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
1661show print frame-arguments
1662 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
1663 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
1664
a6b151f1
DJ
1665remote put
1666remote get
1667remote delete
1668 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
1669
1670* New MI commands
1671
1672-target-file-put
1673-target-file-get
1674-target-file-delete
1675 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
1676
1677* New remote packets
1678
1679vFile:open:
1680vFile:close:
1681vFile:pread:
1682vFile:pwrite:
1683vFile:unlink:
1684 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
d0c678e6 1685
2d717e4f
DJ
1686vAttach
1687 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
1688 mode.
1689
1690vRun
1691 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
1692
8d5f9c6f 1693*** Changes in GDB 6.7
6dd09645 1694
19d378fc
MS
1695* Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
1696bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
1697Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
1698
3a40aaa0
UW
1699* When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
1700symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
1701-Bsymbolic linker option.
1702
a6ec25f2
BW
1703* When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
1704recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
1705is not supported.
1706
6dd09645
JB
1707* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
1708frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
1709
c9bb8148
DJ
1710* GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
171132-bit or 64-bit register values.
1712
0d5de010
DJ
1713* Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
1714
23181151
DJ
1715* GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
1716target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
1717a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
1718
ea37ba09
DJ
1719* Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
1720automatically displayed as character or string data.
1721
1722* The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
1723arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
1724as strings.
e1f48ead 1725
123dc839
DJ
1726* Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
1727for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
8d5f9c6f 1728only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
123dc839 1729
05a4558a
DJ
1730* GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
1731iWMMXt coprocessor.
fb1e4ffc 1732
7c963485
PA
1733* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
1734ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
1735has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
1736
b18be20d
DJ
1737* GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
1738
0ca420ce
UW
1739* GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
1740
31d99776
DJ
1741* The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
1742layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
1743segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
1744
a4642986
MR
1745* The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
1746immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
1747
cfa9d6d9
DJ
1748* The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
1749"library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
1750packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
1751where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
1752Windows and SymbianOS).
255e7678
DJ
1753
1754* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
1755(DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
f5db8714
JK
1756
1757* GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
1758according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
cfa9d6d9 1759
c9bb8148
DJ
1760* New commands
1761
23776285
MR
1762set remoteflow
1763show remoteflow
1764 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
1765 when debugging using remote targets.
1766
c9bb8148
DJ
1767set mem inaccessible-by-default
1768show mem inaccessible-by-default
1769 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
1770 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
1771 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
1772 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
1773 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
1774
1775set breakpoint auto-hw
1776show breakpoint auto-hw
1777 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
1778 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
1779 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
1780 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
1781 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
1782 including "next" and "finish".
1783
0e420bd8
JB
1784catch exception
1785catch exception unhandled
1786 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
1787
1788catch assert
1789 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
1790
f822c95b
DJ
1791set sysroot
1792show sysroot
1793 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
1794 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
1795 an alias to "set sysroot".
1796
83cc5c53
UW
1797info spu
1798 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
1799 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
1800 architecture.
1801
bd372731
MK
1802* New native configurations
1803
1804OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
1805
23181151
DJ
1806set tdesc filename
1807unset tdesc filename
1808show tdesc filename
1809 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
1810 not query the target for its built-in description.
1811
c9bb8148
DJ
1812* New targets
1813
54fe9172 1814OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
c9bb8148 1815MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
c077150c 1816Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
c9bb8148 1817
6dd09645
JB
1818* New remote packets
1819
1820QPassSignals:
1821 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
1822 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
1823
23181151
DJ
1824qXfer:features:read:
1825 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
1826 features.
6dd09645 1827
83cc5c53
UW
1828qXfer:spu:read:
1829qXfer:spu:write:
1830 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
1831 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
1832
cfa9d6d9
DJ
1833qXfer:libraries:read:
1834 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
1835 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
1836 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
1837 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
1838
483367ee
DJ
1839* Removed targets
1840
1841Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
1842
d08950c4
UW
1843alpha*-*-osf1*
1844alpha*-*-osf2*
7ce59000 1845d10v-*-*
483367ee
DJ
1846hppa*-*-hiux*
1847i[34567]86-ncr-*
1848i[34567]86-*-dgux*
1849i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
1850i[34567]86-*-netware*
1851i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
1852i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
1853i[34567]86-*-sco*
1854i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
1855i[34567]86-*-sysv4*
1856i[34567]86-*-sysv5*
1857i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
1858i[34567]86-*-unixware*
1859i[34567]86-*-sysv*
1860i[34567]86-*-isc*
1861m68*-cisco*-*
1862m68*-tandem-*
ad527d2e 1863mips*-*-pe
483367ee 1864rs6000-*-lynxos*
ad527d2e 1865sh*-*-pe
483367ee 1866
7ce59000
DJ
1867* Other removed features
1868
1869target abug
1870target cpu32bug
1871target est
1872target rom68k
1873
1874 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
1875
ea35711c
DJ
1876target hms
1877target e7000
1878target sh3
1879target sh3e
1880
1881 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
1882 H8/300.
1883
1884target ocd
1885
1886 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
1887 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
1888 interfaces.
1889
7ce59000
DJ
1890DWARF 1 support
1891
1892 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
1893 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
1894
54d61198
DJ
1895Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
1896
1897 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
1898 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
1899 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
1900 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
1901
ea35711c
DJ
1902MIPS ".pdr" sections
1903
1904 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
1905 in debugging information.
1906
1907Scheme support
1908
1909 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
1910 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
1911
1a69e1e4
DJ
1912set mips stack-arg-size
1913set mips saved-gpreg-size
1914
1915 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
1916
6dd09645 1917*** Changes in GDB 6.6
e374b601 1918
ca3bf3bd
DJ
1919* New targets
1920
1921Xtensa xtensa-elf
9c309e77 1922Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
ca3bf3bd 1923
6aec2e11
DJ
1924* GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
1925(mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
1926running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
1927
1928* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
1929Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
1930supported.
1931
17218d91
DJ
1932* The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
1933broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
1934
9ebce043
DJ
1935* The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
1936stub provides the required support.
1937
7d3d3ece
DJ
1938* Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
1939longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
1940
4f8253f3
JB
1941* New commands
1942
1943set substitute-path
1944unset substitute-path
1945show substitute-path
1946 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
1947 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
1948 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
1949 between compilation and debugging.
1950
9fa66fd7
AS
1951set trace-commands
1952show trace-commands
1953 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
1954 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
1955 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
1956
1f5befc1
DJ
1957* REMOVED features
1958
1959The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
1960
2ec3381a
DJ
1961Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
1962an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
1963
3d00d119
DJ
1964The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
1965
be2a5f71
DJ
1966* New remote packets
1967
1968qSupported:
1969 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
1970 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
1971 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
1972 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
1973 target.
1974
0876f84a
DJ
1975qXfer:auxv:read:
1976 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
1977 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
1978
9ebce043
DJ
1979qXfer:memory-map:read:
1980 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
1981 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
1982
1983vFlashErase:
1984vFlashWrite:
1985vFlashDone:
1986 Erase and program a flash memory device.
1987
0876f84a
DJ
1988* Removed remote packets
1989
1990qPart:auxv:read:
1991 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
1992 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
1993
e374b601 1994*** Changes in GDB 6.5
53e5f3cf 1995
96309189
MS
1996* New targets
1997
1998Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
1999
2000Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
2001
53e5f3cf
AS
2002* New commands
2003
2004init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
2005 only if it doesn't already have a value.
2006
ac264b3b
MS
2007The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
2008
2009checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
2010
2011restart <n> Return the program state to a
2012 previously saved state.
2013
2014info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
2015
2016delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
2017
2018set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
2019 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
2020
2021info forks List forks of the user program that
2022 are available to be debugged.
2023
2024fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
2025 forks of the user program that are
2026 available to be debugged.
2027
2028delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
2029 that are available to be debugged (and
2030 kill the forked process).
2031
2032detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
2033 that are available to be debugged (and
2034 allow the process to continue).
2035
3950dc3f
NS
2036* New architecture
2037
2038Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
2039
0ea3f30e
DJ
2040* Improved Windows host support
2041
2042GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
2043native console support, and remote communications using either
2044network sockets or serial ports.
2045
f79daebb
GM
2046* Improved Modula-2 language support
2047
2048GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
2049basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
2050pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
2051printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
2052written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
2053GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
2054
acab6ab2
MM
2055* REMOVED features
2056
2057The ARM rdi-share module.
2058
f4267320
DJ
2059The Netware NLM debug server.
2060
53e5f3cf 2061*** Changes in GDB 6.4
156a53ca 2062
e0ecbda1
MK
2063* New native configurations
2064
02a677ac 2065OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
e0ecbda1
MK
2066OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
2067
d64a6579
KB
2068* New targets
2069
2070Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
2071
b33a6190
AS
2072* New command line options
2073
2074--batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
2075--return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
2076 the child (debugged) program exited with.
2077--eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
2078 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
2079 specified multiple times and in conjunction
2080 with the --command (-x) option.
2081
11dced61
AC
2082* Deprecated commands removed
2083
2084The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
2085removed:
2086
2087 Command Replacement
2088 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
2089 othernames set arm disassembler
2090 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
2091 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
2092 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
2093 regs info registers
2094
6fe85783
MK
2095* New BSD user-level threads support
2096
2097It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
2098library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
2099configurations are:
2100
2101FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
2102FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
2103OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
2104
2105Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
2106are not yet supported.
2107
5260ca71
MS
2108* New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
2109(Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
2110
e84ecc99
AC
2111* REMOVED configurations and files
2112
2113VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
9445aa30 2114Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
9445aa30 2115National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
156a53ca 2116
31e35378
JB
2117* New "set print array-indexes" command
2118
2119After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
2120when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
2121behavior.
2122
e85e5c83
MK
2123* VAX floating point support
2124
2125GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
2126
d91e9901
AS
2127* User-defined command support
2128
2129In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
2130to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
2131section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
2132
f2cb65ca
MC
2133*** Changes in GDB 6.3:
2134
f47b1503
AS
2135* New command line option
2136
2137GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
2138debugging.
2139
f2cb65ca
MC
2140* GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
2141
2142GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
2143information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
2144by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
2145proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
2146to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
860660cb 2147
d08c0230
AC
2148* Internationalization
2149
2150When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
2151internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
2152continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
2153
117ea3cf
PH
2154* Ada
2155
2156Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
2157implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
2158into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
2159
d08c0230
AC
2160* New native configurations
2161
2162GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
2163
2164* Remote 'p' packet
2165
2166GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
2167packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
2168
2169* END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
2170
2171GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
2172The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
2173features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
2174i386 application).
2175
2176GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
2177compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
2178continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
2179configurations:
2180
2181hppa-*-hpux
2182ia64-*-aix
2183mips-*-irix*
2184*-*-lynx
2185mips-*-linux-gnu
2186sds protocol
2187xdr protocol
2188powerpc bdm protocol
2189
2190Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
2191made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
2192
2193* OBSOLETE configurations and files
2194
2195Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2196been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2197configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2198permanently REMOVED.
2199
2200h8300-*-*
2201mcore-*-*
2202mn10300-*-*
2203ns32k-*-*
2204sh64-*-*
2205v850-*-*
2206
ebb7c577
AC
2207*** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
2208
2209* MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
2210
2211When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
2212heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
2213been fixed.
2214
2215* MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
2216
2217When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
2218fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
2219IRIX long double values).
2220
2221* VAX and "next"
2222
2223A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
2224command. This problem has been fixed.
2225
860660cb 2226*** Changes in GDB 6.2:
faae5abe 2227
0dea2468
AC
2228* Fix for ``many threads''
2229
2230On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
2231rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
2232error message:
2233
2234 ptrace: No such process.
2235 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
2236
2237This problem has been fixed.
2238
2c07db7a
AC
2239* "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
2240
2241Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
2242GDB to dump core).
2243
c23968a2
JB
2244* New ``start'' command.
2245
2246This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
2247
71009278
MK
2248* New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
2249
2250Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
2251live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
2252platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
2253
2254FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
2255FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
2256NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
2257NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
2258NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
2259OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2260OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
2261OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
2262OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
2263
3c0b7db2
AC
2264* Signal trampoline code overhauled
2265
2266Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
2267These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
2268of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
2269call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
2270signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
2271
73cc75f3
AC
2272Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
2273features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
2274include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
3c0b7db2 2275
7243600a
BF
2276* Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
2277
6f606e1c
MK
2278* New native configurations
2279
97dc871c 2280GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
0e56aeaf 2281OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
bf2ca189
MK
2282OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
2283OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
d195bc9f 2284OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 2285NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
9f076e7a 2286OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 2287
a1b461bf
AC
2288* END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
2289
2290GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
2291The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
2292including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
2293migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
2294compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
2295work, was also included.
2296
2297GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
2298module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
2299
2300h8300-*-*
2301mcore-*-*
2302mn10300-*-*
2303ns32k-*-*
2304sh64-*-*
2305v850-*-*
2306xstormy16-*-*
2307
2308Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
2309made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
2310
3c7012f5
AC
2311* REMOVED configurations and files
2312
2313Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
2314Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
2315Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
2316Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
2317Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
2318AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
2319Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
2320decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
2321riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
2322sonymips mips-sony-*
2323sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
2324
e5fe55f7
AC
2325*** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
2326
2327* TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
2328
2329The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
2330GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
2331command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
2332program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
2333with GDB".
2334
2335* Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
2336
2337Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
2338libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
2339cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
2340GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
2341shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
2342the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
2343are created.
2344
2345Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
2346
2347* Fixed ISO-C build problems
2348
2349The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
2350non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
2351compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
2352
2353* Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
2354
2355Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
2356wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
2357
2358* Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
2359
2360The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
2361permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
2362systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
2363
2364* Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
2365
2366Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
2367has been updated to use constant array sizes.
2368
2369* Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
2370
2371GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
2372its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
2373panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
2374
2375* Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
2376
2377When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
2378by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
2379not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
2380
faae5abe 2381*** Changes in GDB 6.1:
f2c06f52 2382
9175c9a3
MC
2383* Removed --with-mmalloc
2384
2385Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
2386conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
2387
3cc87ec0
MK
2388* Changes in AMD64 configurations
2389
2390The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
2391the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
2392and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
2393you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
2394
f0424ef6
MK
2395* Revised SPARC target
2396
2397The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
2398FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
03cebad2
MK
2399support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
2400from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
2401(Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
f0424ef6 2402
59659be2
ILT
2403* New C++ demangler
2404
2405GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
2406names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
2407with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
2408programs.
2409
9e08b29b
DJ
2410* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
2411
2412GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
2413arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
2414encountered these.
2415
8dfe8985
DC
2416* C++ nested types and namespaces
2417
2418GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
2419improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
2420is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
2421Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
2422namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
2423"Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
2424frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
2425if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
2426GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
2427
cced5e27
MK
2428* New native configurations
2429
2430NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
27d1e716 2431OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2031c21a 2432OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
f2cab569
MK
2433OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
2434OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
cced5e27 2435
b4b4b794
KI
2436* New debugging protocols
2437
2438M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
2439
7989c619
AC
2440* "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
2441
2442The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
2443and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
2444tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
2445
5994185b
AC
2446* OBSOLETE configurations and files
2447
2448Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2449been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2450configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2451permanently REMOVED.
2452
2453Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
2454Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
2455Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
2456Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
2457Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
2458AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
2459Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
0748d941
AC
2460decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
2461riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
2462sonymips mips-sony-*
2463sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
5994185b 2464
0ddabb4c
AC
2465* REMOVED configurations and files
2466
2467SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
2468SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4a8269c0
AC
2469Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2470Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
2471H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2472HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
2473HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2474HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
2475PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
cf7c5c23 2476386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
4a8269c0
AC
2477Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
2478 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
2479 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f0424ef6
MK
2480SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
2481SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
4a8269c0
AC
2482Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2483Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
0ddabb4c 2484
c7f1390e
DJ
2485*** Changes in GDB 6.0:
2486
1fe43d45
AC
2487* Objective-C
2488
2489Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
2490integrated into GDB.
2491
e6beb428
AC
2492* New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
2493
2494DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
2495information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
2496By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
2497backtraces.
2498
2499The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
2500have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
2501DWARF 2 CFI support.
2502
2503* Hosted file I/O.
2504
2505GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
2506file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
2507remote protocol documentation for details.
2508
2509* All targets using the new architecture framework.
2510
2511All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
2512architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
2513to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
2514ppc32 on ppc64).
2515
2516* GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
2517
2518GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
2519per-thread variables.
2520
2521* GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
2522
2523GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
2524GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
2525
2526* Separate debug info.
2527
2528GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
2529automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
2530of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
2531system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
2532and optional debug files.
2533
2534* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
2535
2536DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
2537describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
2538debugger.
2539
2540GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
2541for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
2542
2543* Java
2544
2545A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
2546Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
2547considered "useable".
2548
85f8f974
DJ
2549* GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
2550
2551The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
2552commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
2553kernel.
2554
0fac0b41
DJ
2555* GDB supports logging output to a file
2556
2557There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
2558used to capture GDB's output to a file.
f2c06f52 2559
6ad8ae5c
DJ
2560* The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
2561
2562The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
2563disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
2564command.
2565
e286caf2 2566* d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
5f601589
AC
2567
2568The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
2569registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
2570
d28f9cdf
DJ
2571* Profiling support
2572
2573A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
2574be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
2575session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
2576"--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
2577data, for more informative profiling results.
2578
da0f9dcd
AC
2579* Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
2580
2581The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
2582option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
b68767c1 2583"mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
da0f9dcd
AC
2584
2585Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
2586removed.
2587
fb9b6b35
JJ
2588Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
2589Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
2590Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
2591 in a subsequent -var-update.
2592
954a4db8
MK
2593* New native configurations.
2594
2595FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
2596
6760f9e6
JB
2597* Multi-arched targets.
2598
b4263afa 2599HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
85a453d5 2600Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
6760f9e6 2601
1b831c93
AC
2602* OBSOLETE configurations and files
2603
2604Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2605been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2606configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2607permanently REMOVED.
2608
8b0e5691 2609Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
67f16606 2610Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
fd2299bd 2611H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
56056df7
AC
2612HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
2613HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2614HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
78c43945 2615PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2fbce691
AC
2616Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
2617 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
2618 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f81824a9
AC
2619Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2620Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
fd2299bd 2621
5835abe7
NC
2622* REMOVED configurations and files
2623
2624V850EA ISA
1b831c93
AC
2625Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2626IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
2627i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
2628i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
2629i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
2630HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
2631 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
2632 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
2633Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
2634Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
2635Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
2636OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2637I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5835abe7 2638
a094c6fb
AC
2639* MIPS $fp behavior changed
2640
2641The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
2642the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
2643context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
2644address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
2645The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
2646
299ffc64 2647*** Changes in GDB 5.3:
37057839 2648
46248966
AC
2649* GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
2650
2651When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
2652`/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
2653in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
2654library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
2655shared libs like mad''.
2656
b9d14705 2657* ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
6da02953 2658
b9d14705
DJ
2659Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
2660the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
2661arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
2662powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
6da02953 2663
e0e9281e
JB
2664* GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
2665
2666GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
2667and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
2668they expand.
2669
dd73b9bb
AC
2670The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
2671invocations in expression, and shows the result.
2672
2673The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
2674macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
2675
e0e9281e
JB
2676Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
2677information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
2678your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
2679information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
2680
2250ee0c
CV
2681* Multi-arched targets.
2682
6e3ba3b8
JT
2683DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
2684DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
2250ee0c 2685NEC V850 v850-*-*
6e3ba3b8 2686National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
a1789893
GS
2687Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
2688Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
2250ee0c 2689
cd9bfe15 2690* New targets.
e33ce519 2691
456f8b9d
DB
2692Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
2693
e33ce519 2694
da8ca43d
JT
2695* New native configurations
2696
2697Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
029923d4 2698SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
45888261 2699MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
9ce5c36a 2700UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
da8ca43d 2701
cd9bfe15
AC
2702* OBSOLETE configurations and files
2703
2704Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2705been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2706configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2707permanently REMOVED.
2708
92eb23c5 2709Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
a99a9e1b 2710OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1c7cc583 2711IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
7a3085c1 2712Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
7fb623f7 2713Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
eb4c54a2 2714Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
d8ee244c
MK
2715i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
2716i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
2717i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
822e978b
AC
2718HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
2719 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
2720 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
4d210288 2721I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
92eb23c5 2722
db034ac5
AC
2723* OBSOLETE languages
2724
2725CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
2726
cd9bfe15
AC
2727* REMOVED configurations and files
2728
2729AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
2730A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2731AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2732AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2733AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2734
2735testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
2736
20f01a46
DH
2737* New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
2738
2739This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
2740commands. The default is 1024.
2741
a5941fbf
MK
2742* Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
2743
2744Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
2745
89743e04
MS
2746* New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
2747
2748These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
2749to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
2750from a file into memory (restore).
37057839 2751
9fb14e79
JB
2752* Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
2753
2754The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
2755including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
2756of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
2757
2037aebb
AC
2758*** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
2759
2760* New targets.
2761
2762Atmel AVR avr*-*-*
2763
2764* Bug fixes
2765
2766gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
2767mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
2768Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
2769
2770gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
2771dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
2772Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
2773
2774Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
2775Surprisingly enough, it works now.
2776By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
2777
2778i386 hardware watchpoint support:
2779avoid misses on second run for some targets.
2780By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
2781
37057839 2782*** Changes in GDB 5.2:
eb7cedd9 2783
1a703748
MS
2784* New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
2785
2786This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
2787really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
2788In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
2789target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
2790This can be a significant performance improvement on some
2791(notably embedded) targets.
2792
cefd4ef5
MS
2793* New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
2794
55241689
AC
2795This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
2796process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
2797GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
2798hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
cefd4ef5 2799
352ed7b4
MS
2800* New command line option
2801
2802GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
2803
2804* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
2805
2806There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
2807command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
2808a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
2809be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
2810open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
2811issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
2812a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
2813it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
2814GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
2815is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
2816
fe419ffc
RE
2817* Changes in ARM configurations.
2818
2819Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
2820configuration is fully multi-arch.
2821
eb7cedd9
MK
2822* New native configurations
2823
fe419ffc 2824ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
eb7cedd9 2825x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
55241689 2826AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
768f0842 2827Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
eb7cedd9 2828
c9f63e6b
CV
2829* New targets
2830
2831Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
2832
9b4ff276
AC
2833* OBSOLETE configurations and files
2834
2835Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2836been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2837configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2838permanently REMOVED.
2839
2840AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
2841A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2842AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2843AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2844AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2845
b4ceaee6 2846testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
9b4ff276 2847
e2caac18
AC
2848* REMOVED configurations and files
2849
2850TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
7bc65f05 2851WDC 65816 w65-*-*
7768dd6c
AC
2852PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2853PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2854PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
5e734e1f 2855Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1406caf7
AC
2856Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
2857 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
7e24f0b1 2858SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
9b567150 2859Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
3680c638
AC
2860Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
2861ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
a752853e 2862Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
e2caac18 2863
c2a727fa
TT
2864* Changes to command line processing
2865
2866The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
2867for the inferior from gdb's command line.
2868
467d8519
TT
2869* Changes to key bindings
2870
2871There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
2872
7072a954
AC
2873*** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
2874
2875Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
2876
2877Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
2878corrupted.
2879
2880Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
2881
2882Numerous documentation fixes.
2883
2884Numerous testsuite fixes.
2885
34f47bc4 2886*** Changes in GDB 5.1:
139760b7
MK
2887
2888* New native configurations
2889
2890Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
2891x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
55241689 2892MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
e23194cb
EZ
2893MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
2894ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
55241689 2895s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
139760b7 2896
bf64bfd6
AC
2897* New targets
2898
def90278 2899Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
24be5c34 2900CRIS cris-axis
55241689 2901UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
def90278 2902
17e78a56 2903* OBSOLETE configurations and files
bf64bfd6
AC
2904
2905x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
9b9c068d 2906Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
bb19ff3b
AC
2907Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
2908 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
76f4ea53
AC
2909TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2910WDC 65816 w65-*-*
4a1968f4 2911Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1b2b2c16
AC
2912PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2913PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2914PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
24f89b68 2915SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
514e603d
AC
2916Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
2917ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
d036b4d9 2918Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
bf64bfd6 2919
17e78a56
AC
2920stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
2921kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
2922
7fcca85b
AC
2923Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2924been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2925configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2926permanently REMOVED.
2927
a196c81c 2928* REMOVED configurations and files
7fcca85b
AC
2929
2930Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
2931Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
2932Pyramid pyramid-*-*
2933ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
2934Tahoe tahoe-*-*
a196c81c 2935ser-ocd.c *-*-*
bf64bfd6 2936
6d6b80e5 2937* GDB has been converted to ISO C.
e23194cb 2938
6d6b80e5 2939GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
e23194cb
EZ
2940sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
2941present.
2942
bf64bfd6
AC
2943* Other news:
2944
e23194cb
EZ
2945* "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
2946
2947* The MI enabled by default.
2948
2949The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
2950revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
2951engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
2952using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
2953which is now deprecated.
2954
2955* Support for debugging Pascal programs.
2956
2957GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
2958main features are supported:
2959
2960 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
2961
2962 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
2963 extension;
2964
2965 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
2966
2967 - a Pascal expression parser.
2968
2969However, some important features are not yet supported.
2970
2971 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
2972
2973 - there are some problems with boolean types;
2974
2975 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
2976 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
2977
2978 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
2979
2980 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
2981
2982* Changes in completion.
2983
2984Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
2985to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
2986users expect at the shell prompt.
2987
2988Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
2989`breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
2990program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
2991files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
2992be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
2993considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
2994name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
2995
2996`set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
2997
2998* New platform-independent commands:
2999
3000It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
3001hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
3002documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
3003
3004* Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
3005
d7275149
MK
3006Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
3007revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
3008many threads as your system allows you to have.
3009
e23194cb
EZ
3010Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
3011
d7275149
MK
3012Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
3013multi-threaded programs though.
e23194cb
EZ
3014
3015* Changes in MIPS configurations.
bf64bfd6
AC
3016
3017Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
3018
e23194cb
EZ
3019GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
3020debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
3021supported.)
3022
3023* Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
3024
3025Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
3026breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
3027implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
3028put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
3029and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
3030registers.
3031
3032The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
3033debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
3034watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
3035
3036* Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
3037
3038New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
3039the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
3040
3041New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
3042display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
3043IDT.
3044
3045New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
3046from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
3047New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
3048a given linear address.
3049
3050GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
3051program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
3052which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
3053
3054DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
3055
6c56c069
EZ
3056It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
3057
e23194cb
EZ
3058* Changes in documentation.
3059
3060All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
3061Documentation License.
3062
3063Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
3064manual.
3065
3066TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
3067
3068Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
3069manual.
3070
3071The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
3072documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
3073hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
3074
5d6640b1
AC
3075* GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
3076
3077The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
3078``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
3079contents of this file.
3080
1a1d8446
AC
3081* gdba.el deleted
3082
3083GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
139760b7 3084
9debab2f 3085*** Changes in GDB 5.0:
7a292a7a 3086
c63ce875
EZ
3087* Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
3088
3089Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
3090programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
3091displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
3092greater level of detail.
3093
3094* Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
3095
3096It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
3097bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
3098on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
3099written.
3100
3101* Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
3102
3103The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
3104necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
3105machines ``out of the box''.
3106
3107The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
3108possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
3109signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
3110would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
3111interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
3112
3113It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
3114standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
3115even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
3116and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
3117terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
3118
3119The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
3120enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
3121also works.
3122
3123DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
3124GDB.
3125
3126It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
3127directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
3128times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
3129breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
3130
ed9a39eb
JM
3131* New native configurations
3132
3133ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
afc05dd4 3134PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
ed9a39eb 3135
7a292a7a
SS
3136* New targets
3137
96baa820 3138Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
adf40b2e
JM
3139x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
3140PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
7a292a7a
SS
3141TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
3142
085dd6e6
JM
3143* OBSOLETE configurations
3144
3145Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
3146Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
9846de1b 3147Pyramid pyramid-*-*
ed9a39eb 3148ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
104c1213 3149Tahoe tahoe-*-*
7a292a7a 3150
9debab2f
AC
3151Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
3152but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
3153these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
3154be permanently REMOVED.
3155
5330533d
SS
3156* Gould support removed
3157
3158Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
3159
bc9e5bbf
AC
3160* New features for SVR4
3161
3162On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
3163without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
3164load symbols from the running process's executable file.
3165
3166* Many C++ enhancements
3167
3168C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
3169in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
3170
adf40b2e
JM
3171* Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
3172
3173A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
3174sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
3175with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
3176``|<program> <args>'' vis:
3177
3178 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
3179 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
3180
43e526b9
JM
3181* MIPS 64 remote protocol
3182
3183A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
3184expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
3185instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
3186
3187The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
3188added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
3189
96baa820
JM
3190* ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
3191
3192The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
3193``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
3194include ``set remote P-packet''.
3195
11cf8741
JM
3196* Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
3197
3198The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
3199accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
3200``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
3201
7876dd43
DB
3202* ``apropos'' command added.
3203
3204The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
3205documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
3206try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
3207
bc9e5bbf
AC
3208* New MI interface
3209
3210A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
3211interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
7162c0ca
EZ
3212process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
3213"GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
3214enabled by configuring with:
bc9e5bbf
AC
3215
3216 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
3217
c906108c
SS
3218*** Changes in GDB-4.18:
3219
3220* New native configurations
3221
3222HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
3223HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
55241689 3224M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
c906108c
SS
3225
3226* New targets
3227
3228Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
3229Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
3230Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
3231
3232* OBSOLETE configurations
3233
3234Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
3235
3236Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
3237but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
3238these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
3239be permanently REMOVED.
3240
3241* ANSI/ISO C
3242
3243As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
3244buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
3245containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
3246use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
3247available. If this is not true, please report the affected
3248configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
3249information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
3250already.
3251
3252* Readline 2.2
3253
3254GDB now uses readline 2.2.
3255
3256* set extension-language
3257
3258You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
3259languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
3260you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
3261 set extension-language .c c++
3262The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
3263and their associated languages.
3264
3265* Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
3266
3267When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
3268you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
3269PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
3270
3271 set processor NAME
3272
3273sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
3274following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
3275
3276 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
3277 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
3278 403 IBM PowerPC 403
3279 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
3280 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
3281 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
3282 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
3283 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
3284 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
3285 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
3286 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
3287
3288At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
3289special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
3290registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
3291only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
3292
3293* HP-UX support
3294
3295Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
3296more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
3297library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
3298support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
3299for xdb and dbx commands.
3300
3301* Catchpoints
3302
3303HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
3304generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
3305to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
3306
3307This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
3308argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
3309output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
3310
3311* Debugging across forks
3312
3313On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
3314in the inferior.
3315
3316* TUI
3317
3318HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
3319it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
3320configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
3321
3322* GDB remote protocol additions
3323
3324A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
3325Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
3326fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
3327allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
3328
3329For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
3330full 64-bit address. The command
3331
3332 set remoteaddresssize 32
3333
3334can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
3335the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
3336will be discarded.
3337
3338In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
3339command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
3340
3341 maint packet heythere
3342
3343sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
3344disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
3345time.
3346
3347The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
3348target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
3349downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
3350
3351* Tracing can collect general expressions
3352
3353You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
3354further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
3355doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
3356
3357* mask-address variable for Mips
3358
3359For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
3360a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
3361of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
3362
3363* Higher serial baud rates
3364
3365GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
3366230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
3367to achieve all of these rates.)
3368
3369* i960 simulator
3370
3371The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
3372builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
3373
3374
3375*** Changes in GDB-4.17:
3376
3377* New native configurations
3378
3379Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
3380Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
3381Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
3382PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
3383PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
3384Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
3385Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
3386
3387* New targets
3388
3389Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
3390Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
3391Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
3392Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
3393MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
3394MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
3395MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
3396Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
3397Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
3398Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
3399NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
3400
3401* New debugging protocols
3402
3403ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
3404M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
3405DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
3406PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
3407PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
3408Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
3409
3410* DWARF 2
3411
3412All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
3413format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
3414information.
3415
3416* Java frontend
3417
3418GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
3419only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
3420
3421* solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
3422
3423For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
3424loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
3425locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
3426
3427* Live range splitting
3428
3429GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
3430range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
3431more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
3432
3433* Hurd support
3434
3435GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
3436updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
3437
3438* ARM Thumb support
3439
3440GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
3441instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
3442instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
3443accordingly.
3444
3445* MIPS16 support
3446
3447GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
3448instruction set.
3449
3450* Overlay support
3451
3452GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
3453linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
3454will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
3455control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
3456additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
3457in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
3458
3459* info symbol
3460
3461The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
3462the symbol at the specified address.
3463
3464* Trace support
3465
3466The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
3467asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
3468extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
3469includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
3470file tracepoint.c for more details.
3471
3472* MIPS simulator
3473
3474Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
3475by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
3476of most MIPS variants.
3477
3478* Sparc simulator
3479
3480Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
3481by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
3482Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
3483
3484* set architecture
3485
3486For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
3487basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
3488architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
3489the possible architectures.
3490
3491*** Changes in GDB-4.16:
3492
3493* New native configurations
3494
3495Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
3496M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
3497PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
3498PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
3499PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
3500RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
3501
3502* New targets
3503
3504ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
3505I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
3506MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
3507MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
3508PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
3509Hitachi SH3 sh-*-*
3510Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
3511
3512* PowerPC simulator
3513
3514The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
3515contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
3516PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
3517basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
3518performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
3519
3520* Solaris 2.5
3521
3522GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
3523
3524* Windows 95/NT native
3525
3526GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
3527To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
3528which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
3529Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
3530ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
3531
3532* dont-repeat command
3533
3534If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
3535command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
3536useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
3537extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
3538
3539* Send break instead of ^C
3540
3541The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
3542rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
3543GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
3544
3545* Remote protocol timeout
3546
3547The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
3548that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
3549to read from the target. The default value is 2.
3550
3551* Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
3552
3553By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
3554loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
3555stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
3556when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
3557in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
3558
3559Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
3560/usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
3561automatically on hpux10.
3562
3563* Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
3564
3565Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
3566
3567* Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
3568
3569When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
3570may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
3571the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
3572every character. The default value is 1050.
3573
3574* Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
3575
3576If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
3577a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
3578replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
3579details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
3580remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
3581to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
3582
3583* Speedups for remote debugging
3584
3585GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
3586the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
3587and more efficient S-record downloading.
3588
3589* Memory use reductions and statistics collection
3590
3591GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
3592Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
3593
3594*** Changes in GDB-4.15:
3595
3596* Psymtabs for XCOFF
3597
3598The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
3599can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
3600
3601* Remote targets use caching
3602
3603Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
3604remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
3605it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
3606debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
3607off' turns the the data cache off.
3608
3609* Remote targets may have threads
3610
3611The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
3612in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
3613gdb/remote.c for details.
3614
3615* NetROM support
3616
3617If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
3618support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
3619acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
3620write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
3621support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
3622another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
3623sequence is something like
3624
3625 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
3626 load <prog>
3627 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
3628
3629* Macintosh host
3630
3631GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
3632may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
3633it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
3634available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
3635device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
3636directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
3637scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
3638mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
3639
3640* Autoconf
3641
3642GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
3643but does simplify configuration and building.
3644
3645* hpux10
3646
3647GDB now supports hpux10.
3648
3649*** Changes in GDB-4.14:
3650
3651* New native configurations
3652
3653x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
3654x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
3655NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
3656Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
3657
3658* New targets
3659
3660A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
3661HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
3662CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
3663PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
3664WDC 65816 w65-*-*
3665
3666* Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
3667
3668GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
3669possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
3670filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
3671the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
3672if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
3673
3674* Arguments to user-defined commands
3675
3676User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
3677Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
3678trivial example:
3679define adder
3680 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
3681
3682To execute the command use:
3683adder 1 2 3
3684
3685Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
3686Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
3687use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
3688
3689* New `if' and `while' commands
3690
3691This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
3692commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
3693expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
3694execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
3695terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
3696`else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
3697if the expression is zero.
3698
3699* Fortran source language mode
3700
3701GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
3702Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
3703variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
3704with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
3705Fortran compilers.
3706
3707* Better HPUX support
3708
3709Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
3710running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
3711processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
3712for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
3713that behavior do the following before running the program:
3714
3715 adb -w a.out
3716 __dld_flags?W 0x5
3717 control-d
3718
3719This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
3720To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
3721
3722 adb -w a.out
3723 __dld_flags?W 0x4
3724 control-d
3725
3726You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
3727the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
3728external linkage.
3729
3730GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
3731HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
3732
3733* Target byte order now dynamically selectable
3734
3735You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
3736commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
3737current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
3738"set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
3739associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
3740configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
3741
3742* New DOS host serial code
3743
3744This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
3745no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
3746a PC's serial port.
3747
3748*** Changes in GDB-4.13:
3749
3750* New "complete" command
3751
3752This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
3753were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
3754
3755* Trailing space optional in prompt
3756
3757"set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
3758allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
3759
3760* Breakpoint hit counts
3761
3762"info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
3763has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
3764can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
3765to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
3766less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
3767that breakpoint.
3768
3769* Ability to stop printing at NULL character
3770
3771"set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
3772an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
3773arrays actually contain only short strings.
3774
3775* Shared library breakpoints
3776
3777In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
3778breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
3779
3780* Hardware watchpoints
3781
3782There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
3783targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
3784
55241689 3785Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
c906108c
SS
3786
3787* Annotations
3788
3789Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
3790and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
3791
3792* Improved Irix 5 support
3793
3794GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
3795
3796* Improved HPPA support
3797
3798GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
3799
3800* New native configurations
3801
3802Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
3803HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
3804Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
3805RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
3806
3807* New targets
3808
3809OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
3810MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
3811Sparc64 sparc64-*-*
3812
3813* Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
3814
3815There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
3816This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
3817
3818* Fixes
3819
3820As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
3821and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
3822
3823*** Changes in GDB-4.12:
3824
3825* Irix 5 is now supported
3826
3827* HPPA support
3828
3829GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
3830to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
3831GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
3832of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
3833can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
3834
3835
3836*** Changes in GDB-4.11:
3837
3838* User visible changes:
3839
3840* Remote Debugging
3841
3842The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
3843target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
3844debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
3845integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
3846debugging info for the mips target).
3847
3848* DEC Alpha native support
3849
3850GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
3851debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
3852work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
3853Alpha-specific notes.
3854
3855* Preliminary thread implementation
3856
3857GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
3858
3859* LynxOS native and target support for 386
3860
3861This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
3862to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
3863for details).
3864
3865* Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
3866
3867This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
3868mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
3869call methods, ...etc.
3870
3871*** Changes in GDB-4.10:
3872
3873 * User visible changes:
3874
3875Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
3876supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
3877other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
3878somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
3879
3880Filename completion now works.
3881
3882When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
3883arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
3884addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
3885
3886All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
3887vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
3888should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
3889your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
3890to be on the far side of a thin network line.
3891
3892 * DEC alpha support
3893
3894This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
3895cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
3896
3897
3898*** Changes in GDB-4.9:
3899
3900 * Testsuite
3901
3902This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
3903The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
3904via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
3905
3906 * C++ demangling
3907
3908'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
3909emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
3910Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
3911disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
3912use gdb with AT&T cfront.
3913
3914 * Simulators
3915
3916GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
3917So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
3918Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
3919
3920 * New targets supported
3921
3922H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
3923H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
3924SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
3925Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
3926IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
3927
3928Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
3929version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
3930GO32 memory extender.
3931
3932 * New remote protocols
3933
3934MIPS remote debugging protocol.
3935
3936 * New source languages supported
3937
3938This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
3939used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
3940into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
3941
3942
3943*** Changes in GDB-4.8:
3944
3945 * HP Precision Architecture supported
3946
3947GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
3948version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
3949University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
3950compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
3951format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
3952(as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
3953
3954Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
3955
3956 * Faster and better demangling
3957
3958We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
3959demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
3960character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
3961only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
3962This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
3963increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
3964symbol lookups.
3965
3966`Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
3967from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
3968compiler does not actually implement.
3969
3970 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
3971
3972In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
3973inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
3974recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
3975very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
3976The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
3977circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
3978fix.
3979
3980The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
3981release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
3982
3983 * Improved configure script
3984
3985The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
3986you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
3987host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
3988done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
3989
3990We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
3991version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
3992`--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
3993The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
3994only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
3995We hope to make this the default in a future release.
3996
3997 * Documentation improvements
3998
3999There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
4000produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
4001before submitting changes.
4002
4003The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
4004M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
4005`info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
4006you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
4007a future texinfo-X.Y release.
4008
4009*NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
4010We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
4011been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
4012or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
4013`texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
4014around this problem.
4015
4016 * New features
4017
4018GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
4019the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
4020`print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
4021the target program.
4022
4023The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
4024how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
4025
4026 * New native hosts supported
4027
4028HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
4029386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
4030
4031 * New targets supported
4032
4033AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
4034
4035 * New file formats supported
4036
4037BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
4038HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
4039
4040 * Major bug fixes
4041
4042Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
4043
4044We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
4045printf_filtered("%s") problems.
4046
4047We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
4048for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
4049release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
4050
4051You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
4052will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
4053
4054We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
4055for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
4056especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
4057libraries.
4058
4059The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
4060information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
4061command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
4062any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
4063when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
4064
4065 * Internal improvements
4066
4067GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
4068debugging of multiple languages in the future.
4069
4070GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
4071Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
4072symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
4073contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
4074shared code that handles any of them.
4075
4076 * New command line options
4077
4078We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
4079
4080 * Mmalloc licensing
4081
4082The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
4083General Public License.
4084
4085*** Changes in GDB-4.7:
4086
4087 * Host/native/target split
4088
4089GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
4090hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
4091target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
4092local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
4093ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
4094
4095The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
4096GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
4097is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
4098code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
4099any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
4100built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
4101handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
4102
4103GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
4104It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
4105plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
4106
4107 * New hosts supported
4108
4109HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
4110386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
4111386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
4112
4113 * New targets supported
4114
4115Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
411668030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
4117
4118 * New native hosts supported
4119
4120386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
4121 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
4122386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
4123
4124 * New file formats supported
4125
4126BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
4127supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
4128format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
4129
4130 * New commands
4131
4132`show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
4133`show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
4134These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
4135
4136`info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
4137
4138You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
4139scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
4140prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
4141executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
4142
4143 * C++ improvements
4144
4145We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
4146info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
4147symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
4148
4149Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
4150
4151 * Major bug fixes
4152
4153The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
4154fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
4155by the compiler.
4156
4157We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
4158support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
4159
4160John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
4161slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
4162that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
4163purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
4164the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
4165mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
4166
4167Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
4168about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
4169completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
4170we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
4171
4172 * AMD 29k support
4173
4174A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
4175specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
4176calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
4177usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
4178in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
4179
4180We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
4181Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
4182of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
4183resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
4184
4185 * Remote interfaces
4186
4187We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
4188with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
4189message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
4190This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
4191needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
4192breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
4193each instruction being stepped through.
4194
4195The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
4196registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
4197
4198There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
4199find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
4200Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
4201processor with a serial port.
4202
4203 * Configuration
4204
4205Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
4206`table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
4207supported, and what files each one uses.
4208
4209 * Library changes
4210
4211There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
4212disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
4213Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
4214disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
4215
4216The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
4217Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
4218can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
4219grants all the rights from the General Public License.
4220
4221 * Documentation
4222
4223The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
4224reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
4225as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
4226encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
4227system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
4228bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
4229
4230And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
4231
4232
4233*** Changes in GDB-4.6:
4234
4235 * Better support for C++ function names
4236
4237GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
4238names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
4239(using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
4240single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
4241Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
4242
4243GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
4244the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
4245You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
4246lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
4247for the list of formats.
4248
4249 * G++ symbol mangling problem
4250
4251Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
4252C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
4253directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
4254can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
4255usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
4256about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
4257this problem.)
4258
4259 * New 'maintenance' command
4260
4261All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
4262the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
4263can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
4264
4265 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
4266 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
4267 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
4268 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
4269 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
4270 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
4271
4272The following commands are new:
4273
4274 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
4275 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
4276 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
4277
4278 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
4279
4280We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
4281(e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
4282be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
4283read after argv processing.
4284
4285 * New hosts supported
4286
4287Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
4288
55241689 4289GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
c906108c
SS
4290
4291We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
4292is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
4293for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
4294masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
4295fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
4296It costs extra.
4297
4298 * New targets supported
4299
4300Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
4301
4302 * More smarts about finding #include files
4303
4304GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
4305all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
4306greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
4307especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
4308the one that contains your sources.
4309
4310We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
4311breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
4312try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
4313
4314 * Interesting infernals change
4315
4316GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
4317section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
4318target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
4319stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
4320
4321 * Bug fixes (of course!)
4322
4323There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
4324 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
4325 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
4326
4327See the ChangeLog for details.
4328
4329*** Changes in GDB-4.5:
4330
4331 * New machines supported (host and target)
4332
4333IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
4334
4335SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
4336
4337 * New malloc package
4338
4339GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
4340Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
4341capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
4342This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
4343pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
4344more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
4345
4346 * info proc
4347
4348The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
4349'help info proc' for details.
4350
4351 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
4352
4353The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
4354Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
4355possible.
4356
4357 * File name changes for MS-DOS
4358
4359Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
4360support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
4361conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
4362environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
4363that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
4364in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
4365
4366 * Cross byte order fixes
4367
4368Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
4369targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
4370
4371 * New -mapped and -readnow options
4372
4373If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
4374system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
4375`symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
4376program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
4377called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
4378Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
4379and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
4380the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
4381option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
4382starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
4383
4384You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
4385the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
4386information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
4387slower, but makes future operations faster.
4388
4389The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
4390build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
4391A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
4392use is:
4393
4394 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
4395
4396The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
4397It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
4398shared across multiple host platforms.
4399
4400 * longjmp() handling
4401
4402GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
4403siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
4404all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
4405platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
4406
4407 * Solaris 2.0
4408
4409Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
4410this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
4411reading symbols.
4412
4413 * Bug fixes
4414
4415As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
4416People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
4417crashes and trashed symbol tables.
4418
4419*** Changes in GDB-4.4:
4420
4421 * New machines supported (host and target)
4422
4423SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
4424 (except core files)
4425BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
4426Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
4427
4428 * New machines supported (target)
4429
4430AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
4431
4432 * C++ support
4433
4434GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
4435The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
4436per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
4437
4438GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
4439`ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
4440extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
4441good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
4442will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
4443released.
4444
4445 * New features for SVR4
4446
4447GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
4448shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
4449only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
4450
4451The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
4452on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
4453it prints the address mappings of the process.
4454
4455If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
4456bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
4457
4458 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
4459
4460Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
4461now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
4462skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
4463make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
4464same code linked statically.
4465
4466 * New Getopt
4467
4468GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
4469version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
4470continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
4471Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
4472added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
4473future by other options that begin with the same letter.
4474
4475 * Bugs fixed
4476
4477The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
4478Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
4479See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
4480
4481
4482*** Changes in GDB-4.3:
4483
4484 * New machines supported (host and target)
4485
4486Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
4487NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
4488Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
4489
4490 * Almost SCO Unix support
4491
4492We had hoped to support:
4493SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
4494(except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
4495that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
4496about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
4497
4498 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
4499
4500GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
4501debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
4502is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
4503send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
4504reqired (if any).
4505
4506 * New Readline
4507
4508GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
4509is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
4510required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
4511
4512 * Bugs fixed
4513
4514The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
4515Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
4516See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
4517
4518 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
4519
4520GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
4521supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
4522symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
4523
4524Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
4525mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
4526debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
4527mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
4528version 2.
4529
4530Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
4531really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
4532line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
4533variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
4534situation somewhat.
4535
4536When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
4537However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
4538methods.
4539
4540We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
4541DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
4542encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
4543
4544
4545*** Changes in GDB-4.2:
4546
4547 * Improved configuration
4548
4549Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
4550Porting BFD is simpler.
4551
4552 * Stepping improved
4553
4554The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
4555of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
4556in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
4557function that has debugging information is called within the line.
4558
4559 * Bug fixing
4560
4561Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
4562
4563 * New host supported (not target)
4564
4565Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
4566
4567
4568*** Changes in GDB-4.1:
4569
4570 * Multiple source language support
4571
4572GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
4573It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
4574and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
4575language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
4576You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
4577`set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
4578
4579 * GDB and Modula-2
4580
4581GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
4582currently under development at the State University of New York at
4583Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
4584continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
4585
4586Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
4587debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
4588symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
4589
4590There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
4591in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
4592
4593 * set write on/off
4594
4595GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
4596a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
4597the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
4598by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
4599effect immediately.
4600
4601 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
4602
4603When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
4604shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
4605The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
4606examining core files.
4607
4608 * set listsize
4609
4610You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
4611The default is 10.
4612
4613 * New machines supported (host and target)
4614
4615SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4616Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
4617Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
4618
4619 * New hosts supported (not targets)
4620
4621IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
4622
4623 * New targets supported (not hosts)
4624
4625AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
4626AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
4627Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
4628
4629 * New remote interfaces
4630
4631AMD 29000 Adapt
4632AMD 29000 Minimon
4633
4634
4635*** Changes in GDB-4.0:
4636
4637 * New Facilities
4638
4639Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
4640
4641Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
4642target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
4643is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
4644remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
4645remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
4646also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
4647using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
4648stub on the target system.
4649
4650New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
4651
4652GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
4653library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
4654object file types such as a.out and coff.
4655
4656There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
4657refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
4658
4659
4660 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
4661
4662All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
4663by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
4664
4665For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
4666``Show prompt'' produces the response:
4667Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
4668
4669What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
4670print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
4671will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
4672all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
4673
4674confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
4675 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
4676 it is already running. Default is ON.
4677
4678editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
4679 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
4680 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
4681 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
4682 Default is ON.
4683
4684history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
4685 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
4686 or the value of the environment variable
4687 GDBHISTFILE.
4688
4689history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
4690 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
4691 HISTSIZE.
4692
4693history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
4694 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
4695 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
4696
4697history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
4698 history expansion will be performed on
4699 command line input. The default is OFF.
4700
4701radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
4702 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
4703 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
4704
4705height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
4706 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
4707 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
4708 variable TERM.
4709
4710width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
4711 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
4712 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
4713 variable TERM.
4714
4715Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
4716``set width'' instead.
4717
4718print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
4719 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
4720 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
4721 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
4722
4723print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
4724 is OFF.
4725
4726print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
4727 "raw" form if off.
4728
4729print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
4730 like instructions.
4731
4732print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
4733
4734
4735 * Support for Epoch Environment.
4736
4737The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
4738new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
4739are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
4740window.
4741
4742
4743 * Support for Shared Libraries
4744
4745GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
4746Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
4747before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
4748happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
4749At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
4750from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
4751shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
4752It can be abbreviated ``share''.
4753
4754sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
4755 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
4756 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
4757
4758info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
4759
4760
4761 * Watchpoints
4762
4763A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
4764expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
4765tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
4766quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
4767problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
4768more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
4769
4770watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
4771
4772info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
4773
4774delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4775disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4776enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4777
4778
4779 * C++ multiple inheritance
4780
4781When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
4782for C++ programs.
4783
4784 * C++ exception handling
4785
4786Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
4787ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
4788the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
4789handler's context).
4790
4791catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
4792 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
4793 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
4794
4795info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
4796 current stack frame.
4797
4798
4799 * Minor command changes
4800
4801The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
4802command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
4803is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
4804
4805The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
4806at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
4807frames without printing.
4808
4809 * New directory command
4810
4811'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
4812The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
4813about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
4814with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
4815find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
4816
4817 * Configuring GDB for compilation
4818
4819For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
4820for more details.
4821
4822GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
4823two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
4824Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
4825where the program that you are debugging will run.
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