binutils/NEWS

   1 -*- text -*-
   2
   3 * Add --dyn-syms to readelf to dump dynamic symbol table.
   4
   5 * A new tool - elfedit - has been added to directly manipulate ELF format
   6   binaries.
   7
   8 * Add to dlltool .def file feature of aliasing PE internal symbol name by
   9   '== <ID>' option.
  10
  11 * Add a new command line option -a / --addresses to addr2line to display the
  12   address before function name or source filename.
  13
  14 * Add a new command line option -p / --pretty-print to addr2line to have
  15   a more human readable output.
  16
  17 Changes in 2.20:
  18
  19 * Add support for delay importing to dlltool.  Use the --output-delaylib <file>
  20   switch to create a delay-import library.  The resulting app will load the dll
  21   as soon as the first function is called.  It will link to __delayLoadHelper2()
  22   from the static delayimp library, which will import LoadLibraryA and
  23   GetProcAddress from kernel32.
  24
  25 * Add a new command line option, --insn-width=WIDTH, to objdump to specify
  26   number of bytes to be displayed on a single line when disassembling
  27   instructions.
  28
  29 * Readelf can now display the relocated contents of a section as a sequence
  30   of bytes via the --relocated-dump=<name|number> command line option.
  31
  32 * The gprof program has been given a new command line option:
  33   --external-symbols-table=<filename> which reads in symbols from a specified
  34   file.
  35
  36 * The plugin target has been added to bfd. It can load the same shared objects
  37   used by gold and uses them to provide basic support for new file formats.
  38
  39 * The verilog memory hex dump file format is now supported as an output format
  40   for objcopy.
  41
  42 * Add --file-alignment, --heap, --image-base, --section-alignment,
  43   --stack and --subsystem command line options to objcopy, which will
  44   set PE optional header.
  45
  46 * Option --dwarf/-W of objdump is now as flexible as readelf --debug-dump/-w.
  47
  48 * --as-needed now links in a dynamic library if it satisfies undefined
  49   symbols in regular objects, or in other dynamic libraries.  In the
  50   latter case the library is not linked if it is found in a DT_NEEDED
  51   entry of one of the libraries already linked.
  52
  53 * Added --prefix=PREFIX and --prefix-strip=LEVEL switches to objdump to
  54   add absolute paths for -S.
  55
  56 * Add new option --use-nul-prefixed-import-tables to dlltool to allow fall-
  57   back to old import table generation with null element prefix.
  58
  59 * Added --identify-strict switch to cause --identify <implib> to
  60   report an error when the import library is associated with
  61   multiple DLLs.
  62
  63 * Added --identify <implib> option to dlltool, which determines the
  64   name of the DLL associated with the specified <implib>.
  65
  66 * Support for PowerPC booke64 instructions has been removed.  The assembler no
  67   longer accepts -mbooke32 or -mbooke64 and the disassembler no longer accepts
  68   -Mbooke32 or -Mbooke64.  Instead, -mbooke and -Mbooke should be used.
  69
  70 Changes in 2.19:
  71
  72 * Added -wL switch to dump decoded contents of .debug_line.
  73
  74 * Added support for "thin" archives which contain pathnames pointing to
  75   object files rather than the files themselves and which contain a
  76   flattened symbol index for all objects, and archives, which have been
  77   added to the archive.
  78
  79 * Added -F switch to objdump to include file offsets in the disassembly.
  80
  81 * Added -c switch to readelf to allow string dumps of archive symbol index.
  82
  83 * Support for SSE5 has been added to the i386 port.
  84
  85 * Added -p switch to readelf to allow string dumps of sections.
  86
  87 Changes in 2.18:
  88
  89 * Resolved 37 coding problems in bfd including static array overruns, null
  90   pointer dereferences and use of a malloc buffer after it has been freed, as
  91   revealed by static analysis donated by Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
  92
  93 * The binutils sources are now released under version 3 of the GNU General
  94   Public License.
  95
  96 * A new tool "windmc" has been added for some targets.  This is a message
  97   compiler which attempts to be compatible with the MS version.
  98
  99 * Add codepage support to the windres tool.  It now supports many new
 100   resource types (e.g. MANIFEST, TOOLBAR, etc).  The output generation
 101   for binary files is done now via bfd itself.  The endianess problems
 102   for different hosts are solved.  Dumps of .res files can now be
 103   re-compiled by windres without lossing resources or compilation errors.
 104   Some problems on dialog resource translations are corrected.
 105
 106 * Add --extract-symbol command line option to objcopy, which will
 107   strip everything out of an ordinary object file or executable except
 108   for its symbol table.  Files containing just symbols can be useful
 109   to some OSes.
 110
 111 Changes in 2.17:
 112
 113 * Add "-x NAME" to readelf in addition to "-x NUMBER".
 114
 115 * Add -i and -t switches to cxxfilt.  -i disables the display of implementation
 116   specific extra demangling information (if any) and -t disables the demangling
 117   of types.
 118
 119 * Add support for the "@<file>" syntax to the command lines of all tools, so
 120   that extra switches can be read from <file>.
 121
 122 * Add "-W/--dwarf" to objdump to display the contents of the DWARF
 123   debug sections.
 124
 125 * Add "-t/--section-details" to readelf to display section details.
 126   "-N/--full-section-name" is deprecated.
 127
 128 * powerpc-linux ld now supports a variant form of PLT and GOT for the security
 129   conscious.  This form will automatically be chosen when ld detects that all
 130   code in regular object files was generated by gcc -msecure-plt.  The old PLT
 131   and GOT may be forced by a new ld option, --bss-plt.
 132
 133 * Add "-i/--inlines" to addr2line to print enclosing scope information
 134   for inlined function chains, back to first non-inlined function.
 135
 136 * Add "-N/--full-section-name" to readelf to display full section name.
 137
 138 * Add "-M entry:<addr>" switch to objdump to specify a function entry address
 139   when disassembling VAX binaries.
 140
 141 * Add "--globalize-symbol <name>" and "--globalize-symbols <filename>" switches
 142   to objcopy to convert local symbols into global symbols.
 143
 144 * gprof now allows input files to have histogram records for
 145   several memory ranges, provided those ranges are disjoint.
 146
 147 Changes in 2.16:
 148
 149 * Add "-g/--section-groups" to readelf to display section groups.
 150
 151 * objcopy recognizes two new options --strip-unneeded-symbol and
 152   --strip-unneeded-symbols, namely for use together with the wildcard
 153   matching the original --strip-symbol/--strip-symbols provided, but
 154   retaining any symbols matching but needed by relocations.
 155
 156 * readelf can now display address ranges from .debug_range sections.  This
 157   happens automatically when a DW_AT_range attribute is encountered.  The
 158   command line switch --debug-dump=Ranges (or -wR) can also be used to display
 159   the contents of the .debug_range section.
 160
 161 * nm and objdump now have a switch "--special-syms" to enable the displaying of
 162   symbols which the target considers to be special.  By default these symbols
 163   are no longer displayed.  Currently the only special symbols are the Mapping
 164   symbols used by the ARM port to mark transitions between text and data and
 165   between ARM and THUMB code.
 166
 167 * dlltool has a switch "--ext-prefix-alias <prefix>" to generate additional
 168   import and export symbols with <preifx> prepended to them.
 169
 170 Changes in 2.15:
 171
 172 * objcopy for MIPS targets now accepts "-M no-aliases" as an option to the
 173   disassembler to print the "raw" mips instruction mnemonic instead of some
 174   pseudo instruction name.  I.E. print "daddu" or "or" instead of "move",
 175   "sll" instead of "nop", etc.
 176
 177 * objcopy and strip can now take wildcard patterns in symbol names specified on
 178   the command line provided that the --wildcard switch is used to enable them.
 179
 180 * readelf can now parse archives.
 181
 182 * objdump now accepts --debugging-tags to print the debug information in a
 183   format compatible with ctags tool.
 184
 185 * objcopy and strip now accept --only-keep-debug to create a file containing
 186   those sections that would be stripped out by --strip-debug.  The idea is that
 187   this can be used in conjunction with the --add-gnu-debuglink switch to create
 188   a two part program distribution - one a stripped executable and the other the
 189   debugging info.
 190
 191 * objcopy now accepts --add-gnu-debuglink=<file> to insert a .gnu_debuglink
 192   section into a (presumably stripped) executable.  This allows the debug
 193   information for the file to be held in a separate file.
 194
 195 * BFD marks the sections .comment and .note as 'n' in the BSD/POSIX
 196   single-character representation.  This can be checked by running nm
 197   with the -a switch.
 198
 199 Changes in 2.14:
 200
 201 * Added --info switch to objcopy and strip.
 202
 203 * Support for Vitesse IQ2000 added by Red Hat.
 204
 205 * Added 'S' encoding to strings to allow the display of 8-bit characters.
 206
 207 * Added --prefix-symbols=<text>, --prefix-sections=<text> and
 208   --prefix-alloc-sections=<text> to objcopy.
 209
 210 * readelf can handle the extensions to the DWARF2 spec used by the Unified
 211   Parallel C compiler.
 212
 213 * BFD no longer declares a "boolean" type, to avoid clashes with other
 214   headers that declare the same.  Users of BFD should replace boolean,
 215   false and true, with int, 0 and 1, or define their own boolean type.
 216
 217 * Support for IP2K added by Denis Chertykov.
 218
 219 Changes in 2.13:
 220
 221 * Support for the Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat. Models for FR400
 222   and FR500 included.
 223
 224 Changes in version 2.12:
 225
 226 * Support for Don Knuth's MMIX, by Hans-Peter Nilsson.
 227
 228 * size: Add --totals to display summary of sizes (Berkeley format only).
 229
 230 * readelf: Add --wide option to not break section header or segment listing
 231   lines to fit into 80 columns.
 232
 233 * strings: Add --encoding to display wide character strings.  By Markus Kuhn.
 234
 235 * objcopy: Add --rename-section to change section names.
 236
 237 * readelf: Support added for DWARF 2.1 extensions.  Support added for
 238   displaying the contents of .debug.macinfo sections.
 239
 240 * New command line switches added to objcopy to allow symbols to be kept as
 241   global symbols, and also to specify files containing lists of such symbols.
 242   by Honda Hiroki.
 243
 244 * Support for OpenRISC by Johan Rydberg.
 245
 246 * New command line switch to objcopy --alt-machine-code which creates a binary
 247   with an alternate machine code if one is defined in the architecture
 248   description.  Only supported for ELF targets.  By Alexandre Oliva.
 249
 250 * New command line switch to objcopy -B (or --binary-architecture) which sets
 251   the architecture of the output file to the given argument.  This option only
 252   makes sense, if the input target is binary.  Otherwise it is ignored.
 253   By Stefan Geuken.
 254
 255 * Support for PDP-11 by Lars Brinkhoff.
 256
 257 Changes in binutils 2.11:
 258
 259 * Add support for ARM v5t and v5te architectures and Intel's XScale ARM
 260   extenstions.
 261
 262 * Add --srec-len and --srec-forceS3 command line switch to objcopy.
 263   By Luciano Gemme.
 264
 265 * Support for the MIPS32, by Anders Norlander.
 266
 267 * Support for the i860, by Jason Eckhardt.
 268
 269 * Support for CRIS (Axis Communications ETRAX series).
 270
 271 Changes in binutils 2.10:
 272
 273 * Support for 64-bit ELF on HPPA.
 274
 275 * New command line switch to objdump --file-start-context which shows the
 276   entire file contents up to the source line first encountered for a given
 277   file.
 278
 279 * New command line switch to objdump -M (or --disassembler-options) which takes
 280   a parameter which can then be interpreted on a per-target basis by the
 281   disassembler.  Used by ARM targets to select register name sets, ISA, APCS or
 282   raw verions.
 283
 284 * objdump support for -mi386:intel which causes disassembly to be displayed
 285   with intel syntax.
 286
 287 * New program: readelf.  This displays the contents of ELF format files,
 288   regardless of target machine.
 289
 290 * objcopy now takes --change-section-lma, --change-section-vma, and
 291   --change-section-address options.  The old --adjust-section-vma option is
 292   equivalent to --change-section-address.  The other --adjust-* options are now
 293   renamed to --change-*, although --adjust-* continues to work.
 294
 295 * objcopy has a --redefine-sym option that lets you rename symbols.
 296
 297 * objcopy now takes a -j/--only-section option to copy only the specified
 298   sections.
 299
 300 * dlltool now supports the IMPORTS command.
 301
 302 * dlltool now takes --export-all-symbols, --no-export-all-symbols,
 303   --exclude-symbols, and --no-default-excludes options.
 304
 305 Changes in binutils 2.9:
 306
 307 * Added windres program, which can be used to manipulate resources in WIN32
 308   files as used on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
 309
 310 * The objcopy --gap-fill and --pad-to options operate on the LMA rather than
 311   the VMA of the sections.
 312
 313 * Added S modifier to ar to not build a symbol table.
 314
 315 Changes in binutils 2.8:
 316
 317 * The objdump disassembly format has been changed, and hopefully improved.  Use
 318   the new --prefix-addresses option to get the old format.  There are also new
 319   --disassemble-zeroes and --no-show-raw-insn options which affect disassembler
 320   output.
 321
 322 * Formats may now be specified as configuration triplets.  For example,
 323   objdump -b i386-pc-linux.  The triplets are not passed through config.sub,
 324   so they must be in canonical form.
 325
 326 * Added new addr2line program.  This uses the debugging information to convert
 327   an address into a file name and line number within a program.
 328
 329 * Added --change-leading-char argument to objcopy.
 330
 331 * Added --weaken argument to objcopy.
 332
 333 * objdump --dynamic-reloc now works on ELF executables and shared libraries.
 334
 335 * Added --adjust-vma option to objdump.
 336
 337 * Added -C/--demangle option to objdump.
 338
 339 * Added -p/--preserve-dates option to strip and objcopy.
 340
 341 Changes in binutils 2.7:
 342
 343 * Added --enable-shared and --enable-commonbfdlib options to configure.
 344
 345 * Added --debugging argument to objdump and objcopy.
 346
 347 * Added --defined-only argument to nm.
 348
 349 * Added --remove-leading-char argument to objcopy.
 350
 351 * The objdump --line-numbers option is now meaningful with --reloc.
 352
 353 * Added --line-numbers option to nm.
 354
 355 * Added --endian/-EB/-EL option to objdump.
 356
 357 * Added support for Alpha OpenVMS/AXP.
 358
 359 Changes in binutils 2.6:
 360
 361 * Added -N/--strip-symbol and -K/--keep-symbol arguments to strip and objcopy.
 362
 363 * Added several arguments to objcopy to provide some control over how the new
 364   file is laid out in memory.  Also added binary output format to BFD to permit
 365   generating plain binary files.
 366
 367 * Added --start-address and --stop-address options to objdump.
 368
 369 * ar and ranlib now work on AIX.  The tools are now built by default on AIX.
 370
 371 Changes in binutils 2.5:
 372
 373 * Changed objdump -dr to dump the relocs interspersed with the assembly
 374   listing, for a more useful listing of relocatable files.
 375
 376 * Changed objdump -d/--disassemble to only disassemble SEC_CODE sections.
 377   Added -D/--disassemble-all option to disassemble all sections.
 378
 379 * Added --size-sort option to nm.
 380
 381 * strip and objcopy should now be able to handle dynamically linked ELF
 382   executables.
 383
 384 Changes in binutils 2.4:
 385
 386 * Support for HP-PA (by Jeff Law), i386 Mach (by David Mackenzie), RS/6000 and
 387   PowerPC (except ar and ranlib; by Ian Taylor).
 388
 389 * Support for Irix 5.
 390
 391 * Programs `strip' and `objcopy' will not attempt to write dynamically linked
 392   ELF output files, since BFD currently can't create them properly.
 393
 394 Changes in binutils 2.3:
 395
 396 * A new --stabs argument has been added to objdump to dump stabs sections in
 397   ELF and COFF files.
 398
 399 * A new program, nlmconv, has been added.  It can convert object files into
 400   Novell NetWare Loadable Modules.
 401
 402 * The strings program has been added.
 403
 404 Changes in binutils 2.2:
 405
 406 * The 'copy' program has been renamed to 'objcopy', for consistency with
 407   'objdump', and because 'copy' might more plausibly be used as a synonym for
 408   'cp'.
 409
 410 * The new stand-alone program c++filt is a filter that converts encoded
 411   (mangled) C++ assembly-level identifiers to user-level names.  (Note: This
 412   may get moved to the gcc distribution.)
 413
 414 * nm -o on an archive now prefixes each line with the archive name, matching
 415   the output from BSD nm.
 416
 417 * ar (and ld) can now read (but not write) BSD4.4-style archives.
 418
 419 * New support for H8500, Z8000, and the Hitach SH.
 420
 421 * Dis-assembler interface changed to allow sharing with gdb.
 422
 423 * There is new Elf code, but it is not yet ready for general use.
 424
 425 * There is the beginnings of a test suite.
 426
 427 Changes in binutils 2.1:
 428
 429 * There is now support for writing ECOFF files, so ld and the other utilities
 430   should work on Risc/Ultrix and Irix.  Please let us know how well this works.
 431
 432 * ar now automatically creates a symbol table (a __.SYMDEF member, in the BSD
 433   version), if there are any object files in the archive.  So running ranlib is
 434   now redundant (unless the non-standard q command is used).  This is required
 435   for Posix.2 conformance.
 436
 437 * The archive-reading code now reads both BSD-style and SYSV-style archives
 438   independently of the selected target format.  This is to encourage people to
 439   switch to SYSV-format, which has a number of advantages.
 440
 441 * The strip and copy programs now have options to remove debug-symbols only
 442   and/or local symbols only.  They now also support long options.
 443
 444 \f
 445 Local variables:
 446 fill-column: 79
 447 End: