Make "info threads" use the gdb::option framework
[deliverable/binutils-gdb.git] / gdb / NEWS
1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
3
4 *** Changes since GDB 8.3
5
6 * 'thread-exited' event is now available in the annotations interface.
7
8 * New built-in convenience variables $_gdb_major and $_gdb_minor
9 provide the GDB version. They are handy for conditionally using
10 features available only in or since specific GDB versions, in
11 scripts that should work error-free with many different versions,
12 such as in system-wide init files.
13
14 * GDB now supports Thread Local Storage (TLS) variables on several
15 FreeBSD architectures (amd64, i386, powerpc, riscv). Other
16 architectures require kernel changes. TLS is not yet supported for
17 amd64 and i386 process core dumps.
18
19 * Support for Pointer Authentication on AArch64 Linux.
20
21 * Two new convenience functions $_cimag and $_creal that extract the
22 imaginary and real parts respectively from complex numbers.
23
24 * New built-in convenience variables $_shell_exitcode and $_shell_exitsignal
25 provide the exitcode or exit status of the shell commands launched by
26 GDB commands such as "shell", "pipe" and "make".
27
28 * Python API
29
30 ** The gdb.Value type has a new method 'format_string' which returns a
31 string representing the value. The formatting is controlled by the
32 optional keyword arguments: 'raw', 'pretty_arrays', 'pretty_structs',
33 'array_indexes', 'symbols', 'unions', 'deref_refs', 'actual_objects',
34 'static_members', 'max_elements', 'repeat_threshold', and 'format'.
35
36 ** gdb.Type has a new property 'objfile' which returns the objfile the
37 type was defined in.
38
39 * New commands
40
41 | [COMMAND] | SHELL_COMMAND
42 | -d DELIM COMMAND DELIM SHELL_COMMAND
43 pipe [COMMAND] | SHELL_COMMAND
44 pipe -d DELIM COMMAND DELIM SHELL_COMMAND
45 Executes COMMAND and sends its output to SHELL_COMMAND.
46 With no COMMAND, repeat the last executed command
47 and send its output to SHELL_COMMAND.
48
49 set may-call-functions [on|off]
50 show may-call-functions
51 This controls whether GDB will attempt to call functions in
52 the program, such as with expressions in the print command. It
53 defaults to on. Calling functions in the program being debugged
54 can have undesired side effects. It is now possible to forbid
55 such function calls. If function calls are forbidden, GDB will throw
56 an error when a command (such as print expression) calls a function
57 in the program.
58
59 set print finish [on|off]
60 show print finish
61 This controls whether the `finish' command will display the value
62 that is returned by the current function. When `off', the value is
63 still entered into the value history, but it is not printed. The
64 default is `on'.
65
66 set print max-depth
67 show print max-depth
68 Allows deeply nested structures to be simplified when printing by
69 replacing deeply nested parts (beyond the max-depth) with ellipses.
70 The default max-depth is 20, but this can be set to unlimited to get
71 the old behavior back.
72
73 set logging debugredirect [on|off]
74 By default, GDB debug output will go to both the terminal and the logfile.
75 Set if you want debug output to go only to the log file.
76
77 set style title foreground COLOR
78 set style title background COLOR
79 set style title intensity VALUE
80 Control the styling of titles.
81
82 set style highlight foreground COLOR
83 set style highlight background COLOR
84 set style highlight intensity VALUE
85 Control the styling of highlightings.
86
87 maint test-settings KIND
88 A set of commands used by the testsuite for exercising the settings
89 infrastructure.
90
91 * Changed commands
92
93 help
94 The "help" command uses the title style to enhance the
95 readibility of its output by styling the classes and
96 command names.
97
98 apropos [-v] REGEXP
99 Similarly to "help", the "apropos" command also uses the
100 title style for the command names. "apropos" accepts now
101 a flag "-v" (verbose) to show the full documentation
102 of matching commands and to use the highlight style to mark
103 the documentation parts matching REGEXP.
104
105 show style
106 The "show style" and its subcommands are now styling
107 a style name in their output using its own style, to help
108 the user visualize the different styles.
109
110 set print raw-frame-arguments
111 show print raw-frame-arguments
112
113 These commands replace the similarly-named "set/show print raw
114 frame-arguments" commands (now with a dash instead of a space). The
115 old commands are now deprecated and may be removed in a future
116 release.
117
118 maint test-options require-delimiter
119 maint test-options unknown-is-error
120 maint test-options unknown-is-operand
121 maint show test-options-completion-result
122 Commands used by the testsuite to validate the command options
123 framework.
124
125 * New command options, command completion
126
127 GDB now has a standard infrastructure to support dash-style command
128 options ('-OPT'). One benefit is that commands that use it can
129 easily support completion of command line arguments. Try "CMD
130 -[TAB]" or "help CMD" to find options supported by a command. Over
131 time, we intend to migrate most commands to this infrastructure. A
132 number of commands got support for new command options in this
133 release:
134
135 ** The "print" and "compile print" commands now support a number of
136 options that allow overriding relevant global print settings as
137 set by "set print" subcommands:
138
139 -address [on|off]
140 -array [on|off]
141 -array-indexes [on|off]
142 -elements NUMBER|unlimited
143 -null-stop [on|off]
144 -object [on|off]
145 -pretty [on|off]
146 -repeats NUMBER|unlimited
147 -static-members [on|off]
148 -symbol [on|off]
149 -union [on|off]
150 -vtbl [on|off]
151
152 Note that because the "print"/"compile print" commands accept
153 arbitrary expressions which may look like options (including
154 abbreviations), if you specify any command option, then you must
155 use a double dash ("--") to mark the end of argument processing.
156
157 ** The "backtrace" command now supports a number of options that
158 allow overriding relevant global print settings as set by "set
159 backtrace" and "set print" subcommands:
160
161 -entry-values no|only|preferred|if-needed|both|compact|default
162 -frame-arguments all|scalars|none
163 -raw-frame-arguments [on|off]
164 -past-main [on|off]
165 -past-entry [on|off]
166
167 In addition, the full/no-filters/hide qualifiers are now also
168 exposed as command options too:
169
170 -full
171 -no-filters
172 -hide
173
174 ** The "frame apply", "tfaas" and "faas" commands similarly now
175 support the following options:
176
177 -past-main [on|off]
178 -past-entry [on|off]
179
180 All options above can also be abbreviated. The argument of boolean
181 (on/off) options can be 0/1 too, and also the argument is assumed
182 "on" if omitted. This allows writing compact command invocations,
183 like for example:
184
185 (gdb) p -r -p -o 0 -- *myptr
186
187 The above is equivalent to:
188
189 (gdb) print -raw -pretty -object off -- *myptr
190
191 * Completion improvements
192
193 ** GDB can now complete the options of the "thread apply all" and
194 "taas" commands, and their "-ascending" option can now be
195 abbreviated.
196
197 ** GDB can now complete the options of the "info threads" command.
198
199 ** GDB can now complete the options of the "compile file" and
200 "compile code" commands. The "compile file" command now
201 completes on filenames.
202
203 ** GDB can now complete the backtrace command's
204 "full/no-filters/hide" qualifiers.
205
206 * In settings, you can now abbreviate "unlimited".
207
208 E.g., "set print elements u" is now equivalent to "set print
209 elements unlimited".
210
211 * New MI commands
212
213 -complete
214 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
215 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by MI
216 frontends in cases when separate CLI and MI channels cannot be used.
217
218 -catch-throw, -catch-rethrow, and -catch-catch
219 These can be used to catch C++ exceptions in a similar fashion to
220 the CLI commands 'catch throw', 'catch rethrow', and 'catch catch'.
221
222 * Testsuite
223
224 The testsuite now creates the files gdb.cmd (containing the arguments
225 used to launch GDB) and gdb.in (containing all the commands sent to
226 GDB) in the output directory for each test script. Multiple invocations
227 are appended with .1, .2, .3 etc.
228
229 *** Changes in GDB 8.3
230
231 * GDB and GDBserver now support access to additional registers on
232 PowerPC GNU/Linux targets: PPR, DSCR, TAR, EBB/PMU registers, and
233 HTM registers.
234
235 * GDB now has experimental support for the compilation and injection of
236 C++ source code into the inferior. This beta release does not include
237 support for several language features, such as templates, constructors,
238 and operators.
239
240 This feature requires GCC 7.1 or higher built with libcp1.so
241 (the C++ plug-in).
242
243 * GDB and GDBserver now support IPv6 connections. IPv6 addresses
244 can be passed using the '[ADDRESS]:PORT' notation, or the regular
245 'ADDRESS:PORT' method.
246
247 * DWARF index cache: GDB can now automatically save indices of DWARF
248 symbols on disk to speed up further loading of the same binaries.
249
250 * Ada task switching is now supported on aarch64-elf targets when
251 debugging a program using the Ravenscar Profile. For more information,
252 see the "Tasking Support when using the Ravenscar Profile" section
253 in the GDB user manual.
254
255 * GDB in batch mode now exits with status 1 if the last command to be
256 executed failed.
257
258 * The RISC-V target now supports target descriptions.
259
260 * System call catchpoints now support system call aliases on FreeBSD.
261 When the ABI of a system call changes in FreeBSD, this is
262 implemented by leaving a compatibility system call using the old ABI
263 at the existing number and allocating a new system call number for
264 the new ABI. For example, FreeBSD 12 altered the layout of 'struct
265 kevent' used by the 'kevent' system call. As a result, FreeBSD 12
266 kernels ship with both 'kevent' and 'freebsd11_kevent' system calls.
267 The 'freebsd11_kevent' system call is assigned an alias of 'kevent'
268 so that a system call catchpoint for the 'kevent' system call will
269 catch invocations of both the 'kevent' and 'freebsd11_kevent'
270 binaries. This ensures that 'kevent' system calls are caught for
271 binaries using either the old or new ABIs.
272
273 * Terminal styling is now available for the CLI and the TUI. GNU
274 Source Highlight can additionally be used to provide styling of
275 source code snippets. See the "set style" commands, below, for more
276 information.
277
278 * Removed support for old demangling styles arm, edg, gnu, hp and
279 lucid.
280
281 * New commands
282
283 set debug compile-cplus-types
284 show debug compile-cplus-types
285 Control the display of debug output about type conversion in the
286 C++ compile feature. Commands have no effect while compiliong
287 for other languages.
288
289 set debug skip
290 show debug skip
291 Control whether debug output about files/functions skipping is
292 displayed.
293
294 frame apply [all | COUNT | -COUNT | level LEVEL...] [FLAG]... COMMAND
295 Apply a command to some frames.
296 FLAG arguments allow to control what output to produce and how to handle
297 errors raised when applying COMMAND to a frame.
298
299 taas COMMAND
300 Apply a command to all threads (ignoring errors and empty output).
301 Shortcut for 'thread apply all -s COMMAND'.
302
303 faas COMMAND
304 Apply a command to all frames (ignoring errors and empty output).
305 Shortcut for 'frame apply all -s COMMAND'.
306
307 tfaas COMMAND
308 Apply a command to all frames of all threads (ignoring errors and empty
309 output).
310 Shortcut for 'thread apply all -s frame apply all -s COMMAND'.
311
312 maint set dwarf unwinders (on|off)
313 maint show dwarf unwinders
314 Control whether DWARF unwinders can be used.
315
316 info proc files
317 Display a list of open files for a process.
318
319 * Changed commands
320
321 Changes to the "frame", "select-frame", and "info frame" CLI commands.
322 These commands all now take a frame specification which
323 is either a frame level, or one of the keywords 'level', 'address',
324 'function', or 'view' followed by a parameter. Selecting a frame by
325 address, or viewing a frame outside the current backtrace now
326 requires the use of a keyword. Selecting a frame by level is
327 unchanged. The MI comment "-stack-select-frame" is unchanged.
328
329 target remote FILENAME
330 target extended-remote FILENAME
331 If FILENAME is a Unix domain socket, GDB will attempt to connect
332 to this socket instead of opening FILENAME as a character device.
333
334 info args [-q] [-t TYPEREGEXP] [NAMEREGEXP]
335 info functions [-q] [-t TYPEREGEXP] [NAMEREGEXP]
336 info locals [-q] [-t TYPEREGEXP] [NAMEREGEXP]
337 info variables [-q] [-t TYPEREGEXP] [NAMEREGEXP]
338 These commands can now print only the searched entities
339 matching the provided regexp(s), giving a condition
340 on the entity names or entity types. The flag -q disables
341 printing headers or informations messages.
342
343 info functions
344 info types
345 info variables
346 rbreak
347 These commands now determine the syntax for the shown entities
348 according to the language chosen by `set language'. In particular,
349 `set language auto' means to automatically choose the language of
350 the shown entities.
351
352 thread apply [all | COUNT | -COUNT] [FLAG]... COMMAND
353 The 'thread apply' command accepts new FLAG arguments.
354 FLAG arguments allow to control what output to produce and how to handle
355 errors raised when applying COMMAND to a thread.
356
357 set tui tab-width NCHARS
358 show tui tab-width NCHARS
359 "set tui tab-width" replaces the "tabset" command, which has been deprecated.
360
361 set style enabled [on|off]
362 show style enabled
363 Enable or disable terminal styling. Styling is enabled by default
364 on most hosts, but disabled by default when in batch mode.
365
366 set style sources [on|off]
367 show style sources
368 Enable or disable source code styling. Source code styling is
369 enabled by default, but only takes effect if styling in general is
370 enabled, and if GDB was linked with GNU Source Highlight.
371
372 set style filename foreground COLOR
373 set style filename background COLOR
374 set style filename intensity VALUE
375 Control the styling of file names.
376
377 set style function foreground COLOR
378 set style function background COLOR
379 set style function intensity VALUE
380 Control the styling of function names.
381
382 set style variable foreground COLOR
383 set style variable background COLOR
384 set style variable intensity VALUE
385 Control the styling of variable names.
386
387 set style address foreground COLOR
388 set style address background COLOR
389 set style address intensity VALUE
390 Control the styling of addresses.
391
392 * MI changes
393
394 ** The default version of the MI interpreter is now 3 (-i=mi3).
395
396 ** The '-data-disassemble' MI command now accepts an '-a' option to
397 disassemble the whole function surrounding the given program
398 counter value or function name. Support for this feature can be
399 verified by using the "-list-features" command, which should
400 contain "data-disassemble-a-option".
401
402 ** Command responses and notifications that include a frame now include
403 the frame's architecture in a new "arch" attribute.
404
405 ** The output of information about multi-location breakpoints (which is
406 syntactically incorrect in MI 2) has changed in MI 3. This affects
407 the following commands and events:
408
409 - -break-insert
410 - -break-info
411 - =breakpoint-created
412 - =breakpoint-modified
413
414 The -fix-multi-location-breakpoint-output command can be used to enable
415 this behavior with previous MI versions.
416
417 * New native configurations
418
419 GNU/Linux/RISC-V riscv*-*-linux*
420 FreeBSD/riscv riscv*-*-freebsd*
421
422 * New targets
423
424 GNU/Linux/RISC-V riscv*-*-linux*
425 CSKY ELF csky*-*-elf
426 CSKY GNU/LINUX csky*-*-linux
427 FreeBSD/riscv riscv*-*-freebsd*
428 NXP S12Z s12z-*-elf
429 GNU/Linux/OpenRISC or1k*-*-linux*
430
431 * Removed targets
432
433 GDB no longer supports native debugging on versions of MS-Windows
434 before Windows XP.
435
436 * Python API
437
438 ** GDB no longer supports Python versions less than 2.6.
439
440 ** The gdb.Inferior type has a new 'progspace' property, which is the program
441 space associated to that inferior.
442
443 ** The gdb.Progspace type has a new 'objfiles' method, which returns the list
444 of objfiles associated to that program space.
445
446 ** gdb.SYMBOL_LOC_COMMON_BLOCK, gdb.SYMBOL_MODULE_DOMAIN, and
447 gdb.SYMBOL_COMMON_BLOCK_DOMAIN were added to reflect changes to
448 the gdb core.
449
450 ** gdb.SYMBOL_VARIABLES_DOMAIN, gdb.SYMBOL_FUNCTIONS_DOMAIN, and
451 gdb.SYMBOL_TYPES_DOMAIN are now deprecated. These were never
452 correct and did not work properly.
453
454 ** The gdb.Value type has a new constructor, which is used to construct a
455 gdb.Value from a Python buffer object and a gdb.Type.
456
457 * Configure changes
458
459 --enable-ubsan
460
461 Enable or disable the undefined behavior sanitizer. This is
462 disabled by default, but passing --enable-ubsan=yes or
463 --enable-ubsan=auto to configure will enable it. Enabling this can
464 cause a performance penalty. The undefined behavior sanitizer was
465 first introduced in GCC 4.9.
466
467 *** Changes in GDB 8.2
468
469 * The 'set disassembler-options' command now supports specifying options
470 for the MIPS target.
471
472 * The 'symbol-file' command now accepts an '-o' option to add a relative
473 offset to all sections.
474
475 * Similarly, the 'add-symbol-file' command also accepts an '-o' option to add
476 a relative offset to all sections, but it allows to override the load
477 address of individual sections using '-s'.
478
479 * The 'add-symbol-file' command no longer requires the second argument
480 (address of the text section).
481
482 * The endianness used with the 'set endian auto' mode in the absence of
483 an executable selected for debugging is now the last endianness chosen
484 either by one of the 'set endian big' and 'set endian little' commands
485 or by inferring from the last executable used, rather than the startup
486 default.
487
488 * The pager now allows a "c" response, meaning to disable the pager
489 for the rest of the current command.
490
491 * The commands 'info variables/functions/types' now show the source line
492 numbers of symbol definitions when available.
493
494 * 'info proc' now works on running processes on FreeBSD systems and core
495 files created on FreeBSD systems.
496
497 * C expressions can now use _Alignof, and C++ expressions can now use
498 alignof.
499
500 * Support for SVE on AArch64 Linux. Note that GDB does not detect changes to
501 the vector length while the process is running.
502
503 * New commands
504
505 set debug fbsd-nat
506 show debug fbsd-nat
507 Control display of debugging info regarding the FreeBSD native target.
508
509 set|show varsize-limit
510 This new setting allows the user to control the maximum size of Ada
511 objects being printed when those objects have a variable type,
512 instead of that maximum size being hardcoded to 65536 bytes.
513
514 set|show record btrace cpu
515 Controls the processor to be used for enabling errata workarounds for
516 branch trace decode.
517
518 maint check libthread-db
519 Run integrity checks on the current inferior's thread debugging
520 library
521
522 maint set check-libthread-db (on|off)
523 maint show check-libthread-db
524 Control whether to run integrity checks on inferior specific thread
525 debugging libraries as they are loaded. The default is not to
526 perform such checks.
527
528 * Python API
529
530 ** Type alignment is now exposed via the "align" attribute of a gdb.Type.
531
532 ** The commands attached to a breakpoint can be set by assigning to
533 the breakpoint's "commands" field.
534
535 ** gdb.execute can now execute multi-line gdb commands.
536
537 ** The new functions gdb.convenience_variable and
538 gdb.set_convenience_variable can be used to get and set the value
539 of convenience variables.
540
541 ** A gdb.Parameter will no longer print the "set" help text on an
542 ordinary "set"; instead by default a "set" will be silent unless
543 the get_set_string method returns a non-empty string.
544
545 * New targets
546
547 RiscV ELF riscv*-*-elf
548
549 * Removed targets and native configurations
550
551 m88k running OpenBSD m88*-*-openbsd*
552 SH-5/SH64 ELF sh64-*-elf*, SH-5/SH64 support in sh*
553 SH-5/SH64 running GNU/Linux SH-5/SH64 support in sh*-*-linux*
554 SH-5/SH64 running OpenBSD SH-5/SH64 support in sh*-*-openbsd*
555
556 * Aarch64/Linux hardware watchpoints improvements
557
558 Hardware watchpoints on unaligned addresses are now properly
559 supported when running Linux kernel 4.10 or higher: read and access
560 watchpoints are no longer spuriously missed, and all watchpoints
561 lengths between 1 and 8 bytes are supported. On older kernels,
562 watchpoints set on unaligned addresses are no longer missed, with
563 the tradeoff that there is a possibility of false hits being
564 reported.
565
566 * Configure changes
567
568 --enable-codesign=CERT
569 This can be used to invoke "codesign -s CERT" after building gdb.
570 This option is useful on macOS, where code signing is required for
571 gdb to work properly.
572
573 --disable-gdbcli has been removed
574 This is now silently accepted, but does nothing.
575
576 *** Changes in GDB 8.1
577
578 * GDB now supports dynamically creating arbitrary register groups specified
579 in XML target descriptions. This allows for finer grain grouping of
580 registers on systems with a large amount of registers.
581
582 * The 'ptype' command now accepts a '/o' flag, which prints the
583 offsets and sizes of fields in a struct, like the pahole(1) tool.
584
585 * New "--readnever" command line option instructs GDB to not read each
586 symbol file's symbolic debug information. This makes startup faster
587 but at the expense of not being able to perform symbolic debugging.
588 This option is intended for use cases where symbolic debugging will
589 not be used, e.g., when you only need to dump the debuggee's core.
590
591 * GDB now uses the GNU MPFR library, if available, to emulate target
592 floating-point arithmetic during expression evaluation when the target
593 uses different floating-point formats than the host. At least version
594 3.1 of GNU MPFR is required.
595
596 * GDB now supports access to the guarded-storage-control registers and the
597 software-based guarded-storage broadcast control registers on IBM z14.
598
599 * On Unix systems, GDB now supports transmitting environment variables
600 that are to be set or unset to GDBserver. These variables will
601 affect the environment to be passed to the remote inferior.
602
603 To inform GDB of environment variables that are to be transmitted to
604 GDBserver, use the "set environment" command. Only user set
605 environment variables are sent to GDBserver.
606
607 To inform GDB of environment variables that are to be unset before
608 the remote inferior is started by the GDBserver, use the "unset
609 environment" command.
610
611 * Completion improvements
612
613 ** GDB can now complete function parameters in linespecs and
614 explicit locations without quoting. When setting breakpoints,
615 quoting around functions names to help with TAB-completion is
616 generally no longer necessary. For example, this now completes
617 correctly:
618
619 (gdb) b function(in[TAB]
620 (gdb) b function(int)
621
622 Related, GDB is no longer confused with completing functions in
623 C++ anonymous namespaces:
624
625 (gdb) b (anon[TAB]
626 (gdb) b (anonymous namespace)::[TAB][TAB]
627 (anonymous namespace)::a_function()
628 (anonymous namespace)::b_function()
629
630 ** GDB now has much improved linespec and explicit locations TAB
631 completion support, that better understands what you're
632 completing and offers better suggestions. For example, GDB no
633 longer offers data symbols as possible completions when you're
634 setting a breakpoint.
635
636 ** GDB now TAB-completes label symbol names.
637
638 ** The "complete" command now mimics TAB completion accurately.
639
640 * New command line options (gcore)
641
642 -a
643 Dump all memory mappings.
644
645 * Breakpoints on C++ functions are now set on all scopes by default
646
647 By default, breakpoints on functions/methods are now interpreted as
648 specifying all functions with the given name ignoring missing
649 leading scopes (namespaces and classes).
650
651 For example, assuming a C++ program with symbols named:
652
653 A::B::func()
654 B::func()
655
656 both commands "break func()" and "break B::func()" set a breakpoint
657 on both symbols.
658
659 You can use the new flag "-qualified" to override this. This makes
660 GDB interpret the specified function name as a complete
661 fully-qualified name instead. For example, using the same C++
662 program, the "break -q B::func" command sets a breakpoint on
663 "B::func", only. A parameter has been added to the Python
664 gdb.Breakpoint constructor to achieve the same result when creating
665 a breakpoint from Python.
666
667 * Breakpoints on functions marked with C++ ABI tags
668
669 GDB can now set breakpoints on functions marked with C++ ABI tags
670 (e.g., [abi:cxx11]). See here for a description of ABI tags:
671 https://developers.redhat.com/blog/2015/02/05/gcc5-and-the-c11-abi/
672
673 Functions with a C++11 abi tag are demangled/displayed like this:
674
675 function[abi:cxx11](int)
676 ^^^^^^^^^^^
677
678 You can now set a breakpoint on such functions simply as if they had
679 no tag, like:
680
681 (gdb) b function(int)
682
683 Or if you need to disambiguate between tags, like:
684
685 (gdb) b function[abi:other_tag](int)
686
687 Tab completion was adjusted accordingly as well.
688
689 * Python Scripting
690
691 ** New events gdb.new_inferior, gdb.inferior_deleted, and
692 gdb.new_thread are emitted. See the manual for further
693 description of these.
694
695 ** A new function, "gdb.rbreak" has been added to the Python API.
696 This function allows the setting of a large number of breakpoints
697 via a regex pattern in Python. See the manual for further details.
698
699 ** Python breakpoints can now accept explicit locations. See the
700 manual for a further description of this feature.
701
702
703 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
704
705 ** GDBserver is now able to start inferior processes with a
706 specified initial working directory.
707
708 The user can set the desired working directory to be used from
709 GDB using the new "set cwd" command.
710
711 ** New "--selftest" command line option runs some GDBserver self
712 tests. These self tests are disabled in releases.
713
714 ** On Unix systems, GDBserver now does globbing expansion and variable
715 substitution in inferior command line arguments.
716
717 This is done by starting inferiors using a shell, like GDB does.
718 See "set startup-with-shell" in the user manual for how to disable
719 this from GDB when using "target extended-remote". When using
720 "target remote", you can disable the startup with shell by using the
721 new "--no-startup-with-shell" GDBserver command line option.
722
723 ** On Unix systems, GDBserver now supports receiving environment
724 variables that are to be set or unset from GDB. These variables
725 will affect the environment to be passed to the inferior.
726
727 * When catching an Ada exception raised with a message, GDB now prints
728 the message in the catchpoint hit notification. In GDB/MI mode, that
729 information is provided as an extra field named "exception-message"
730 in the *stopped notification.
731
732 * Trait objects can now be inspected When debugging Rust code. This
733 requires compiler support which will appear in Rust 1.24.
734
735 * New remote packets
736
737 QEnvironmentHexEncoded
738 Inform GDBserver of an environment variable that is to be passed to
739 the inferior when starting it.
740
741 QEnvironmentUnset
742 Inform GDBserver of an environment variable that is to be unset
743 before starting the remote inferior.
744
745 QEnvironmentReset
746 Inform GDBserver that the environment should be reset (i.e.,
747 user-set environment variables should be unset).
748
749 QStartupWithShell
750 Indicates whether the inferior must be started with a shell or not.
751
752 QSetWorkingDir
753 Tell GDBserver that the inferior to be started should use a specific
754 working directory.
755
756 * The "maintenance print c-tdesc" command now takes an optional
757 argument which is the file name of XML target description.
758
759 * The "maintenance selftest" command now takes an optional argument to
760 filter the tests to be run.
761
762 * The "enable", and "disable" commands now accept a range of
763 breakpoint locations, e.g. "enable 1.3-5".
764
765 * New commands
766
767 set|show cwd
768 Set and show the current working directory for the inferior.
769
770 set|show compile-gcc
771 Set and show compilation command used for compiling and injecting code
772 with the 'compile' commands.
773
774 set debug separate-debug-file
775 show debug separate-debug-file
776 Control the display of debug output about separate debug file search.
777
778 set dump-excluded-mappings
779 show dump-excluded-mappings
780 Control whether mappings marked with the VM_DONTDUMP flag should be
781 dumped when generating a core file.
782
783 maint info selftests
784 List the registered selftests.
785
786 starti
787 Start the debugged program stopping at the first instruction.
788
789 set|show debug or1k
790 Control display of debugging messages related to OpenRISC targets.
791
792 set|show print type nested-type-limit
793 Set and show the limit of nesting level for nested types that the
794 type printer will show.
795
796 * TUI Single-Key mode now supports two new shortcut keys: `i' for stepi and
797 `o' for nexti.
798
799 * Safer/improved support for debugging with no debug info
800
801 GDB no longer assumes functions with no debug information return
802 'int'.
803
804 This means that GDB now refuses to call such functions unless you
805 tell it the function's type, by either casting the call to the
806 declared return type, or by casting the function to a function
807 pointer of the right type, and calling that:
808
809 (gdb) p getenv ("PATH")
810 'getenv' has unknown return type; cast the call to its declared return type
811 (gdb) p (char *) getenv ("PATH")
812 $1 = 0x7fffffffe "/usr/local/bin:/"...
813 (gdb) p ((char * (*) (const char *)) getenv) ("PATH")
814 $2 = 0x7fffffffe "/usr/local/bin:/"...
815
816 Similarly, GDB no longer assumes that global variables with no debug
817 info have type 'int', and refuses to print the variable's value
818 unless you tell it the variable's type:
819
820 (gdb) p var
821 'var' has unknown type; cast it to its declared type
822 (gdb) p (float) var
823 $3 = 3.14
824
825 * New native configurations
826
827 FreeBSD/aarch64 aarch64*-*-freebsd*
828 FreeBSD/arm arm*-*-freebsd*
829
830 * New targets
831
832 FreeBSD/aarch64 aarch64*-*-freebsd*
833 FreeBSD/arm arm*-*-freebsd*
834 OpenRISC ELF or1k*-*-elf
835
836 * Removed targets and native configurations
837
838 Solaris 2.0-9 i?86-*-solaris2.[0-9], sparc*-*-solaris2.[0-9]
839
840 *** Changes in GDB 8.0
841
842 * GDB now supports access to the PKU register on GNU/Linux. The register is
843 added by the Memory Protection Keys for Userspace feature which will be
844 available in future Intel CPUs.
845
846 * GDB now supports C++11 rvalue references.
847
848 * Python Scripting
849
850 ** New functions to start, stop and access a running btrace recording.
851 ** Rvalue references are now supported in gdb.Type.
852
853 * GDB now supports recording and replaying rdrand and rdseed Intel 64
854 instructions.
855
856 * Building GDB and GDBserver now requires a C++11 compiler.
857
858 For example, GCC 4.8 or later.
859
860 It is no longer possible to build GDB or GDBserver with a C
861 compiler. The --disable-build-with-cxx configure option has been
862 removed.
863
864 * Building GDB and GDBserver now requires GNU make >= 3.81.
865
866 It is no longer supported to build GDB or GDBserver with another
867 implementation of the make program or an earlier version of GNU make.
868
869 * Native debugging on MS-Windows supports command-line redirection
870
871 Command-line arguments used for starting programs on MS-Windows can
872 now include redirection symbols supported by native Windows shells,
873 such as '<', '>', '>>', '2>&1', etc. This affects GDB commands such
874 as "run", "start", and "set args", as well as the corresponding MI
875 features.
876
877 * Support for thread names on MS-Windows.
878
879 GDB now catches and handles the special exception that programs
880 running on MS-Windows use to assign names to threads in the
881 debugger.
882
883 * Support for Java programs compiled with gcj has been removed.
884
885 * User commands now accept an unlimited number of arguments.
886 Previously, only up to 10 was accepted.
887
888 * The "eval" command now expands user-defined command arguments.
889
890 This makes it easier to process a variable number of arguments:
891
892 define mycommand
893 set $i = 0
894 while $i < $argc
895 eval "print $arg%d", $i
896 set $i = $i + 1
897 end
898 end
899
900 * Target descriptions can now describe registers for sparc32 and sparc64.
901
902 * GDB now supports DWARF version 5 (debug information format).
903 Its .debug_names index is not yet supported.
904
905 * New native configurations
906
907 FreeBSD/mips mips*-*-freebsd
908
909 * New targets
910
911 Synopsys ARC arc*-*-elf32
912 FreeBSD/mips mips*-*-freebsd
913
914 * Removed targets and native configurations
915
916 Alpha running FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
917 Alpha running GNU/kFreeBSD alpha*-*-kfreebsd*-gnu
918
919 * New commands
920
921 flash-erase
922 Erases all the flash memory regions reported by the target.
923
924 maint print arc arc-instruction address
925 Print internal disassembler information about instruction at a given address.
926
927 * New options
928
929 set disassembler-options
930 show disassembler-options
931 Controls the passing of target specific information to the disassembler.
932 If it is necessary to specify more than one disassembler option then
933 multiple options can be placed together into a comma separated list.
934 The default value is the empty string. Currently, the only supported
935 targets are ARM, PowerPC and S/390.
936
937 * New MI commands
938
939 -target-flash-erase
940 Erases all the flash memory regions reported by the target. This is
941 equivalent to the CLI command flash-erase.
942
943 -file-list-shared-libraries
944 List the shared libraries in the program. This is
945 equivalent to the CLI command "info shared".
946
947 -catch-handlers
948 Catchpoints stopping the program when Ada exceptions are
949 handled. This is equivalent to the CLI command "catch handlers".
950
951 *** Changes in GDB 7.12
952
953 * GDB and GDBserver now build with a C++ compiler by default.
954
955 The --enable-build-with-cxx configure option is now enabled by
956 default. One must now explicitly configure with
957 --disable-build-with-cxx in order to build with a C compiler. This
958 option will be removed in a future release.
959
960 * GDBserver now supports recording btrace without maintaining an active
961 GDB connection.
962
963 * GDB now supports a negative repeat count in the 'x' command to examine
964 memory backward from the given address. For example:
965
966 (gdb) bt
967 #0 Func1 (n=42, p=0x40061c "hogehoge") at main.cpp:4
968 #1 0x400580 in main (argc=1, argv=0x7fffffffe5c8) at main.cpp:8
969 (gdb) x/-5i 0x0000000000400580
970 0x40056a <main(int, char**)+8>: mov %edi,-0x4(%rbp)
971 0x40056d <main(int, char**)+11>: mov %rsi,-0x10(%rbp)
972 0x400571 <main(int, char**)+15>: mov $0x40061c,%esi
973 0x400576 <main(int, char**)+20>: mov $0x2a,%edi
974 0x40057b <main(int, char**)+25>:
975 callq 0x400536 <Func1(int, char const*)>
976
977 * Fortran: Support structures with fields of dynamic types and
978 arrays of dynamic types.
979
980 * The symbol dumping maintenance commands have new syntax.
981 maint print symbols [-pc address] [--] [filename]
982 maint print symbols [-objfile objfile] [-source source] [--] [filename]
983 maint print psymbols [-objfile objfile] [-pc address] [--] [filename]
984 maint print psymbols [-objfile objfile] [-source source] [--] [filename]
985 maint print msymbols [-objfile objfile] [--] [filename]
986
987 * GDB now supports multibit bitfields and enums in target register
988 descriptions.
989
990 * New Python-based convenience function $_as_string(val), which returns
991 the textual representation of a value. This function is especially
992 useful to obtain the text label of an enum value.
993
994 * Intel MPX bound violation handling.
995
996 Segmentation faults caused by a Intel MPX boundary violation
997 now display the kind of violation (upper or lower), the memory
998 address accessed and the memory bounds, along with the usual
999 signal received and code location.
1000
1001 For example:
1002
1003 Program received signal SIGSEGV, Segmentation fault
1004 Upper bound violation while accessing address 0x7fffffffc3b3
1005 Bounds: [lower = 0x7fffffffc390, upper = 0x7fffffffc3a3]
1006 0x0000000000400d7c in upper () at i386-mpx-sigsegv.c:68
1007
1008 * Rust language support.
1009 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the Rust programming
1010 language. See https://www.rust-lang.org/ for more information about
1011 Rust.
1012
1013 * Support for running interpreters on specified input/output devices
1014
1015 GDB now supports a new mechanism that allows frontends to provide
1016 fully featured GDB console views, as a better alternative to
1017 building such views on top of the "-interpreter-exec console"
1018 command. See the new "new-ui" command below. With that command,
1019 frontends can now start GDB in the traditional command-line mode
1020 running in an embedded terminal emulator widget, and create a
1021 separate MI interpreter running on a specified i/o device. In this
1022 way, GDB handles line editing, history, tab completion, etc. in the
1023 console all by itself, and the GUI uses the separate MI interpreter
1024 for its own control and synchronization, invisible to the command
1025 line.
1026
1027 * The "catch syscall" command catches groups of related syscalls.
1028
1029 The "catch syscall" command now supports catching a group of related
1030 syscalls using the 'group:' or 'g:' prefix.
1031
1032 * New commands
1033
1034 skip -file file
1035 skip -gfile file-glob-pattern
1036 skip -function function
1037 skip -rfunction regular-expression
1038 A generalized form of the skip command, with new support for
1039 glob-style file names and regular expressions for function names.
1040 Additionally, a file spec and a function spec may now be combined.
1041
1042 maint info line-table REGEXP
1043 Display the contents of GDB's internal line table data struture.
1044
1045 maint selftest
1046 Run any GDB unit tests that were compiled in.
1047
1048 new-ui INTERP TTY
1049 Start a new user interface instance running INTERP as interpreter,
1050 using the TTY file for input/output.
1051
1052 * Python Scripting
1053
1054 ** gdb.Breakpoint objects have a new attribute "pending", which
1055 indicates whether the breakpoint is pending.
1056 ** Three new breakpoint-related events have been added:
1057 gdb.breakpoint_created, gdb.breakpoint_modified, and
1058 gdb.breakpoint_deleted.
1059
1060 signal-event EVENTID
1061 Signal ("set") the given MS-Windows event object. This is used in
1062 conjunction with the Windows JIT debugging (AeDebug) support, where
1063 the OS suspends a crashing process until a debugger can attach to
1064 it. Resuming the crashing process, in order to debug it, is done by
1065 signalling an event.
1066
1067 * Support for tracepoints and fast tracepoints on s390-linux and s390x-linux
1068 was added in GDBserver, including JIT compiling fast tracepoint's
1069 conditional expression bytecode into native code.
1070
1071 * Support for various remote target protocols and ROM monitors has
1072 been removed:
1073
1074 target m32rsdi Remote M32R debugging over SDI
1075 target mips MIPS remote debugging protocol
1076 target pmon PMON ROM monitor
1077 target ddb NEC's DDB variant of PMON for Vr4300
1078 target rockhopper NEC RockHopper variant of PMON
1079 target lsi LSI variant of PMO
1080
1081 * Support for tracepoints and fast tracepoints on powerpc-linux,
1082 powerpc64-linux, and powerpc64le-linux was added in GDBserver,
1083 including JIT compiling fast tracepoint's conditional expression
1084 bytecode into native code.
1085
1086 * MI async record =record-started now includes the method and format used for
1087 recording. For example:
1088
1089 =record-started,thread-group="i1",method="btrace",format="bts"
1090
1091 * MI async record =thread-selected now includes the frame field. For example:
1092
1093 =thread-selected,id="3",frame={level="0",addr="0x00000000004007c0"}
1094
1095 * New targets
1096
1097 Andes NDS32 nds32*-*-elf
1098
1099 *** Changes in GDB 7.11
1100
1101 * GDB now supports debugging kernel-based threads on FreeBSD.
1102
1103 * Per-inferior thread numbers
1104
1105 Thread numbers are now per inferior instead of global. If you're
1106 debugging multiple inferiors, GDB displays thread IDs using a
1107 qualified INF_NUM.THR_NUM form. For example:
1108
1109 (gdb) info threads
1110 Id Target Id Frame
1111 1.1 Thread 0x7ffff7fc2740 (LWP 8155) (running)
1112 1.2 Thread 0x7ffff7fc1700 (LWP 8168) (running)
1113 * 2.1 Thread 0x7ffff7fc2740 (LWP 8157) (running)
1114 2.2 Thread 0x7ffff7fc1700 (LWP 8190) (running)
1115
1116 As consequence, thread numbers as visible in the $_thread
1117 convenience variable and in Python's InferiorThread.num attribute
1118 are no longer unique between inferiors.
1119
1120 GDB now maintains a second thread ID per thread, referred to as the
1121 global thread ID, which is the new equivalent of thread numbers in
1122 previous releases. See also $_gthread below.
1123
1124 For backwards compatibility, MI's thread IDs always refer to global
1125 IDs.
1126
1127 * Commands that accept thread IDs now accept the qualified
1128 INF_NUM.THR_NUM form as well. For example:
1129
1130 (gdb) thread 2.1
1131 [Switching to thread 2.1 (Thread 0x7ffff7fc2740 (LWP 8157))] (running)
1132 (gdb)
1133
1134 * In commands that accept a list of thread IDs, you can now refer to
1135 all threads of an inferior using a star wildcard. GDB accepts
1136 "INF_NUM.*", to refer to all threads of inferior INF_NUM, and "*" to
1137 refer to all threads of the current inferior. For example, "info
1138 threads 2.*".
1139
1140 * You can use "info threads -gid" to display the global thread ID of
1141 all threads.
1142
1143 * The new convenience variable $_gthread holds the global number of
1144 the current thread.
1145
1146 * The new convenience variable $_inferior holds the number of the
1147 current inferior.
1148
1149 * GDB now displays the ID and name of the thread that hit a breakpoint
1150 or received a signal, if your program is multi-threaded. For
1151 example:
1152
1153 Thread 3 "bar" hit Breakpoint 1 at 0x40087a: file program.c, line 20.
1154 Thread 1 "main" received signal SIGINT, Interrupt.
1155
1156 * Record btrace now supports non-stop mode.
1157
1158 * Support for tracepoints on aarch64-linux was added in GDBserver.
1159
1160 * The 'record instruction-history' command now indicates speculative execution
1161 when using the Intel Processor Trace recording format.
1162
1163 * GDB now allows users to specify explicit locations, bypassing
1164 the linespec parser. This feature is also available to GDB/MI
1165 clients.
1166
1167 * Multi-architecture debugging is supported on AArch64 GNU/Linux.
1168 GDB now is able to debug both AArch64 applications and ARM applications
1169 at the same time.
1170
1171 * Support for fast tracepoints on aarch64-linux was added in GDBserver,
1172 including JIT compiling fast tracepoint's conditional expression bytecode
1173 into native code.
1174
1175 * GDB now supports displaced stepping on AArch64 GNU/Linux.
1176
1177 * "info threads", "info inferiors", "info display", "info checkpoints"
1178 and "maint info program-spaces" now list the corresponding items in
1179 ascending ID order, for consistency with all other "info" commands.
1180
1181 * In Ada, the overloads selection menu has been enhanced to display the
1182 parameter types and the return types for the matching overloaded subprograms.
1183
1184 * New commands
1185
1186 maint set target-non-stop (on|off|auto)
1187 maint show target-non-stop
1188 Control whether GDB targets always operate in non-stop mode even if
1189 "set non-stop" is "off". The default is "auto", meaning non-stop
1190 mode is enabled if supported by the target.
1191
1192 maint set bfd-sharing
1193 maint show bfd-sharing
1194 Control the reuse of bfd objects.
1195
1196 set debug bfd-cache
1197 show debug bfd-cache
1198 Control display of debugging info regarding bfd caching.
1199
1200 set debug fbsd-lwp
1201 show debug fbsd-lwp
1202 Control display of debugging info regarding FreeBSD threads.
1203
1204 set remote multiprocess-extensions-packet
1205 show remote multiprocess-extensions-packet
1206 Set/show the use of the remote protocol multiprocess extensions.
1207
1208 set remote thread-events
1209 show remote thread-events
1210 Set/show the use of thread create/exit events.
1211
1212 set ada print-signatures on|off
1213 show ada print-signatures"
1214 Control whether parameter types and return types are displayed in overloads
1215 selection menus. It is activaled (@code{on}) by default.
1216
1217 set max-value-size
1218 show max-value-size
1219 Controls the maximum size of memory, in bytes, that GDB will
1220 allocate for value contents. Prevents incorrect programs from
1221 causing GDB to allocate overly large buffers. Default is 64k.
1222
1223 * The "disassemble" command accepts a new modifier: /s.
1224 It prints mixed source+disassembly like /m with two differences:
1225 - disassembled instructions are now printed in program order, and
1226 - and source for all relevant files is now printed.
1227 The "/m" option is now considered deprecated: its "source-centric"
1228 output hasn't proved useful in practice.
1229
1230 * The "record instruction-history" command accepts a new modifier: /s.
1231 It behaves exactly like /m and prints mixed source+disassembly.
1232
1233 * The "set scheduler-locking" command supports a new mode "replay".
1234 It behaves like "off" in record mode and like "on" in replay mode.
1235
1236 * Support for various ROM monitors has been removed:
1237
1238 target dbug dBUG ROM monitor for Motorola ColdFire
1239 target picobug Motorola picobug monitor
1240 target dink32 DINK32 ROM monitor for PowerPC
1241 target m32r Renesas M32R/D ROM monitor
1242 target mon2000 mon2000 ROM monitor
1243 target ppcbug PPCBUG ROM monitor for PowerPC
1244
1245 * Support for reading/writing memory and extracting values on architectures
1246 whose memory is addressable in units of any integral multiple of 8 bits.
1247
1248 catch handlers
1249 Allows to break when an Ada exception is handled.
1250
1251 * New remote packets
1252
1253 exec stop reason
1254 Indicates that an exec system call was executed.
1255
1256 exec-events feature in qSupported
1257 The qSupported packet allows GDB to request support for exec
1258 events using the new 'gdbfeature' exec-event, and the qSupported
1259 response can contain the corresponding 'stubfeature'. Set and
1260 show commands can be used to display whether these features are enabled.
1261
1262 vCtrlC
1263 Equivalent to interrupting with the ^C character, but works in
1264 non-stop mode.
1265
1266 thread created stop reason (T05 create:...)
1267 Indicates that the thread was just created and is stopped at entry.
1268
1269 thread exit stop reply (w exitcode;tid)
1270 Indicates that the thread has terminated.
1271
1272 QThreadEvents
1273 Enables/disables thread create and exit event reporting. For
1274 example, this is used in non-stop mode when GDB stops a set of
1275 threads and synchronously waits for the their corresponding stop
1276 replies. Without exit events, if one of the threads exits, GDB
1277 would hang forever not knowing that it should no longer expect a
1278 stop for that same thread.
1279
1280 N stop reply
1281 Indicates that there are no resumed threads left in the target (all
1282 threads are stopped). The remote stub reports support for this stop
1283 reply to GDB's qSupported query.
1284
1285 QCatchSyscalls
1286 Enables/disables catching syscalls from the inferior process.
1287 The remote stub reports support for this packet to GDB's qSupported query.
1288
1289 syscall_entry stop reason
1290 Indicates that a syscall was just called.
1291
1292 syscall_return stop reason
1293 Indicates that a syscall just returned.
1294
1295 * Extended-remote exec events
1296
1297 ** GDB now has support for exec events on extended-remote Linux targets.
1298 For such targets with Linux kernels 2.5.46 and later, this enables
1299 follow-exec-mode and exec catchpoints.
1300
1301 set remote exec-event-feature-packet
1302 show remote exec-event-feature-packet
1303 Set/show the use of the remote exec event feature.
1304
1305 * Thread names in remote protocol
1306
1307 The reply to qXfer:threads:read may now include a name attribute for each
1308 thread.
1309
1310 * Target remote mode fork and exec events
1311
1312 ** GDB now has support for fork and exec events on target remote mode
1313 Linux targets. For such targets with Linux kernels 2.5.46 and later,
1314 this enables follow-fork-mode, detach-on-fork, follow-exec-mode, and
1315 fork and exec catchpoints.
1316
1317 * Remote syscall events
1318
1319 ** GDB now has support for catch syscall on remote Linux targets,
1320 currently enabled on x86/x86_64 architectures.
1321
1322 set remote catch-syscall-packet
1323 show remote catch-syscall-packet
1324 Set/show the use of the remote catch syscall feature.
1325
1326 * MI changes
1327
1328 ** The -var-set-format command now accepts the zero-hexadecimal
1329 format. It outputs data in hexadecimal format with zero-padding on the
1330 left.
1331
1332 * Python Scripting
1333
1334 ** gdb.InferiorThread objects have a new attribute "global_num",
1335 which refers to the thread's global thread ID. The existing
1336 "num" attribute now refers to the thread's per-inferior number.
1337 See "Per-inferior thread numbers" above.
1338 ** gdb.InferiorThread objects have a new attribute "inferior", which
1339 is the Inferior object the thread belongs to.
1340
1341 *** Changes in GDB 7.10
1342
1343 * Support for process record-replay and reverse debugging on aarch64*-linux*
1344 targets has been added. GDB now supports recording of A64 instruction set
1345 including advance SIMD instructions.
1346
1347 * Support for Sun's version of the "stabs" debug file format has been removed.
1348
1349 * GDB now honors the content of the file /proc/PID/coredump_filter
1350 (PID is the process ID) on GNU/Linux systems. This file can be used
1351 to specify the types of memory mappings that will be included in a
1352 corefile. For more information, please refer to the manual page of
1353 "core(5)". GDB also has a new command: "set use-coredump-filter
1354 on|off". It allows to set whether GDB will read the content of the
1355 /proc/PID/coredump_filter file when generating a corefile.
1356
1357 * The "info os" command on GNU/Linux can now display information on
1358 cpu information :
1359 "info os cpus" Listing of all cpus/cores on the system
1360
1361 * GDB has two new commands: "set serial parity odd|even|none" and
1362 "show serial parity". These allows to set or show parity for the
1363 remote serial I/O.
1364
1365 * The "info source" command now displays the producer string if it was
1366 present in the debug info. This typically includes the compiler version
1367 and may include things like its command line arguments.
1368
1369 * The "info dll", an alias of the "info sharedlibrary" command,
1370 is now available on all platforms.
1371
1372 * Directory names supplied to the "set sysroot" commands may be
1373 prefixed with "target:" to tell GDB to access shared libraries from
1374 the target system, be it local or remote. This replaces the prefix
1375 "remote:". The default sysroot has been changed from "" to
1376 "target:". "remote:" is automatically converted to "target:" for
1377 backward compatibility.
1378
1379 * The system root specified by "set sysroot" will be prepended to the
1380 filename of the main executable (if reported to GDB as absolute by
1381 the operating system) when starting processes remotely, and when
1382 attaching to already-running local or remote processes.
1383
1384 * GDB now supports automatic location and retrieval of executable
1385 files from remote targets. Remote debugging can now be initiated
1386 using only a "target remote" or "target extended-remote" command
1387 (no "set sysroot" or "file" commands are required). See "New remote
1388 packets" below.
1389
1390 * The "dump" command now supports verilog hex format.
1391
1392 * GDB now supports the vector ABI on S/390 GNU/Linux targets.
1393
1394 * On GNU/Linux, GDB and gdbserver are now able to access executable
1395 and shared library files without a "set sysroot" command when
1396 attaching to processes running in different mount namespaces from
1397 the debugger. This makes it possible to attach to processes in
1398 containers as simply as "gdb -p PID" or "gdbserver --attach PID".
1399 See "New remote packets" below.
1400
1401 * The "tui reg" command now provides completion for all of the
1402 available register groups, including target specific groups.
1403
1404 * The HISTSIZE environment variable is no longer read when determining
1405 the size of GDB's command history. GDB now instead reads the dedicated
1406 GDBHISTSIZE environment variable. Setting GDBHISTSIZE to "-1" or to "" now
1407 disables truncation of command history. Non-numeric values of GDBHISTSIZE
1408 are ignored.
1409
1410 * Guile Scripting
1411
1412 ** Memory ports can now be unbuffered.
1413
1414 * Python Scripting
1415
1416 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "username",
1417 which is the name of the objfile as specified by the user,
1418 without, for example, resolving symlinks.
1419 ** You can now write frame unwinders in Python.
1420 ** gdb.Type objects have a new method "optimized_out",
1421 returning optimized out gdb.Value instance of this type.
1422 ** gdb.Value objects have new methods "reference_value" and
1423 "const_value" which return a reference to the value and a
1424 "const" version of the value respectively.
1425
1426 * New commands
1427
1428 maint print symbol-cache
1429 Print the contents of the symbol cache.
1430
1431 maint print symbol-cache-statistics
1432 Print statistics of symbol cache usage.
1433
1434 maint flush-symbol-cache
1435 Flush the contents of the symbol cache.
1436
1437 record btrace bts
1438 record bts
1439 Start branch trace recording using Branch Trace Store (BTS) format.
1440
1441 compile print
1442 Evaluate expression by using the compiler and print result.
1443
1444 tui enable
1445 tui disable
1446 Explicit commands for enabling and disabling tui mode.
1447
1448 show mpx bound
1449 set mpx bound on i386 and amd64
1450 Support for bound table investigation on Intel MPX enabled applications.
1451
1452 record btrace pt
1453 record pt
1454 Start branch trace recording using Intel Processor Trace format.
1455
1456 maint info btrace
1457 Print information about branch tracing internals.
1458
1459 maint btrace packet-history
1460 Print the raw branch tracing data.
1461
1462 maint btrace clear-packet-history
1463 Discard the stored raw branch tracing data.
1464
1465 maint btrace clear
1466 Discard all branch tracing data. It will be fetched and processed
1467 anew by the next "record" command.
1468
1469 * New options
1470
1471 set debug dwarf-die
1472 Renamed from "set debug dwarf2-die".
1473 show debug dwarf-die
1474 Renamed from "show debug dwarf2-die".
1475
1476 set debug dwarf-read
1477 Renamed from "set debug dwarf2-read".
1478 show debug dwarf-read
1479 Renamed from "show debug dwarf2-read".
1480
1481 maint set dwarf always-disassemble
1482 Renamed from "maint set dwarf2 always-disassemble".
1483 maint show dwarf always-disassemble
1484 Renamed from "maint show dwarf2 always-disassemble".
1485
1486 maint set dwarf max-cache-age
1487 Renamed from "maint set dwarf2 max-cache-age".
1488 maint show dwarf max-cache-age
1489 Renamed from "maint show dwarf2 max-cache-age".
1490
1491 set debug dwarf-line
1492 show debug dwarf-line
1493 Control display of debugging info regarding DWARF line processing.
1494
1495 set max-completions
1496 show max-completions
1497 Set the maximum number of candidates to be considered during
1498 completion. The default value is 200. This limit allows GDB
1499 to avoid generating large completion lists, the computation of
1500 which can cause the debugger to become temporarily unresponsive.
1501
1502 set history remove-duplicates
1503 show history remove-duplicates
1504 Control the removal of duplicate history entries.
1505
1506 maint set symbol-cache-size
1507 maint show symbol-cache-size
1508 Control the size of the symbol cache.
1509
1510 set|show record btrace bts buffer-size
1511 Set and show the size of the ring buffer used for branch tracing in
1512 BTS format.
1513 The obtained size may differ from the requested size. Use "info
1514 record" to see the obtained buffer size.
1515
1516 set debug linux-namespaces
1517 show debug linux-namespaces
1518 Control display of debugging info regarding Linux namespaces.
1519
1520 set|show record btrace pt buffer-size
1521 Set and show the size of the ring buffer used for branch tracing in
1522 Intel Processor Trace format.
1523 The obtained size may differ from the requested size. Use "info
1524 record" to see the obtained buffer size.
1525
1526 maint set|show btrace pt skip-pad
1527 Set and show whether PAD packets are skipped when computing the
1528 packet history.
1529
1530 * The command 'thread apply all' can now support new option '-ascending'
1531 to call its specified command for all threads in ascending order.
1532
1533 * Python/Guile scripting
1534
1535 ** GDB now supports auto-loading of Python/Guile scripts contained in the
1536 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts'.
1537
1538 * New remote packets
1539
1540 qXfer:btrace-conf:read
1541 Return the branch trace configuration for the current thread.
1542
1543 Qbtrace-conf:bts:size
1544 Set the requested ring buffer size for branch tracing in BTS format.
1545
1546 Qbtrace:pt
1547 Enable Intel Procesor Trace-based branch tracing for the current
1548 process. The remote stub reports support for this packet to GDB's
1549 qSupported query.
1550
1551 Qbtrace-conf:pt:size
1552 Set the requested ring buffer size for branch tracing in Intel Processor
1553 Trace format.
1554
1555 swbreak stop reason
1556 Indicates a memory breakpoint instruction was executed, irrespective
1557 of whether it was GDB that planted the breakpoint or the breakpoint
1558 is hardcoded in the program. This is required for correct non-stop
1559 mode operation.
1560
1561 hwbreak stop reason
1562 Indicates the target stopped for a hardware breakpoint. This is
1563 required for correct non-stop mode operation.
1564
1565 vFile:fstat:
1566 Return information about files on the remote system.
1567
1568 qXfer:exec-file:read
1569 Return the full absolute name of the file that was executed to
1570 create a process running on the remote system.
1571
1572 vFile:setfs:
1573 Select the filesystem on which vFile: operations with filename
1574 arguments will operate. This is required for GDB to be able to
1575 access files on remote targets where the remote stub does not
1576 share a common filesystem with the inferior(s).
1577
1578 fork stop reason
1579 Indicates that a fork system call was executed.
1580
1581 vfork stop reason
1582 Indicates that a vfork system call was executed.
1583
1584 vforkdone stop reason
1585 Indicates that a vfork child of the specified process has executed
1586 an exec or exit, allowing the vfork parent to resume execution.
1587
1588 fork-events and vfork-events features in qSupported
1589 The qSupported packet allows GDB to request support for fork and
1590 vfork events using new 'gdbfeatures' fork-events and vfork-events,
1591 and the qSupported response can contain the corresponding
1592 'stubfeatures'. Set and show commands can be used to display
1593 whether these features are enabled.
1594
1595 * Extended-remote fork events
1596
1597 ** GDB now has support for fork events on extended-remote Linux
1598 targets. For targets with Linux kernels 2.5.60 and later, this
1599 enables follow-fork-mode and detach-on-fork for both fork and
1600 vfork, as well as fork and vfork catchpoints.
1601
1602 * The info record command now shows the recording format and the
1603 branch tracing configuration for the current thread when using
1604 the btrace record target.
1605 For the BTS format, it shows the ring buffer size.
1606
1607 * GDB now has support for DTrace USDT (Userland Static Defined
1608 Tracing) probes. The supported targets are x86_64-*-linux-gnu.
1609
1610 * GDB now supports access to vector registers on S/390 GNU/Linux
1611 targets.
1612
1613 * Removed command line options
1614
1615 -xdb HP-UX XDB compatibility mode.
1616
1617 * Removed targets and native configurations
1618
1619 HP/PA running HP-UX hppa*-*-hpux*
1620 Itanium running HP-UX ia64-*-hpux*
1621
1622 * New configure options
1623
1624 --with-intel-pt
1625 This configure option allows the user to build GDB with support for
1626 Intel Processor Trace (default: auto). This requires libipt.
1627
1628 --with-libipt-prefix=PATH
1629 Specify the path to the version of libipt that GDB should use.
1630 $PATH/include should contain the intel-pt.h header and
1631 $PATH/lib should contain the libipt.so library.
1632
1633 *** Changes in GDB 7.9.1
1634
1635 * Python Scripting
1636
1637 ** Xmethods can now specify a result type.
1638
1639 *** Changes in GDB 7.9
1640
1641 * GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on x86 GNU Hurd.
1642
1643 * Python Scripting
1644
1645 ** You can now access frame registers from Python scripts.
1646 ** New attribute 'producer' for gdb.Symtab objects.
1647 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "progspace",
1648 which is the gdb.Progspace object of the containing program space.
1649 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "owner".
1650 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "build_id",
1651 which is the build ID generated when the file was built.
1652 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new method "add_separate_debug_file".
1653 ** A new event "gdb.clear_objfiles" has been added, triggered when
1654 selecting a new file to debug.
1655 ** You can now add attributes to gdb.Objfile and gdb.Progspace objects.
1656 ** New function gdb.lookup_objfile.
1657
1658 New events which are triggered when GDB modifies the state of the
1659 inferior.
1660
1661 ** gdb.events.inferior_call_pre: Function call is about to be made.
1662 ** gdb.events.inferior_call_post: Function call has just been made.
1663 ** gdb.events.memory_changed: A memory location has been altered.
1664 ** gdb.events.register_changed: A register has been altered.
1665
1666 * New Python-based convenience functions:
1667
1668 ** $_caller_is(name [, number_of_frames])
1669 ** $_caller_matches(regexp [, number_of_frames])
1670 ** $_any_caller_is(name [, number_of_frames])
1671 ** $_any_caller_matches(regexp [, number_of_frames])
1672
1673 * GDB now supports the compilation and injection of source code into
1674 the inferior. GDB will use GCC 5.0 or higher built with libcc1.so
1675 to compile the source code to object code, and if successful, inject
1676 and execute that code within the current context of the inferior.
1677 Currently the C language is supported. The commands used to
1678 interface with this new feature are:
1679
1680 compile code [-raw|-r] [--] [source code]
1681 compile file [-raw|-r] filename
1682
1683 * New commands
1684
1685 demangle [-l language] [--] name
1686 Demangle "name" in the specified language, or the current language
1687 if elided. This command is renamed from the "maint demangle" command.
1688 The latter is kept as a no-op to avoid "maint demangle" being interpreted
1689 as "maint demangler-warning".
1690
1691 queue-signal signal-name-or-number
1692 Queue a signal to be delivered to the thread when it is resumed.
1693
1694 add-auto-load-scripts-directory directory
1695 Add entries to the list of directories from which to load auto-loaded
1696 scripts.
1697
1698 maint print user-registers
1699 List all currently available "user" registers.
1700
1701 compile code [-r|-raw] [--] [source code]
1702 Compile, inject, and execute in the inferior the executable object
1703 code produced by compiling the provided source code.
1704
1705 compile file [-r|-raw] filename
1706 Compile and inject into the inferior the executable object code
1707 produced by compiling the source code stored in the filename
1708 provided.
1709
1710 * On resume, GDB now always passes the signal the program had stopped
1711 for to the thread the signal was sent to, even if the user changed
1712 threads before resuming. Previously GDB would often (but not
1713 always) deliver the signal to the thread that happens to be current
1714 at resume time.
1715
1716 * Conversely, the "signal" command now consistently delivers the
1717 requested signal to the current thread. GDB now asks for
1718 confirmation if the program had stopped for a signal and the user
1719 switched threads meanwhile.
1720
1721 * "breakpoint always-inserted" modes "off" and "auto" merged.
1722
1723 Now, when 'breakpoint always-inserted mode' is set to "off", GDB
1724 won't remove breakpoints from the target until all threads stop,
1725 even in non-stop mode. The "auto" mode has been removed, and "off"
1726 is now the default mode.
1727
1728 * New options
1729
1730 set debug symbol-lookup
1731 show debug symbol-lookup
1732 Control display of debugging info regarding symbol lookup.
1733
1734 * MI changes
1735
1736 ** The -list-thread-groups command outputs an exit-code field for
1737 inferiors that have exited.
1738
1739 * New targets
1740
1741 MIPS SDE mips*-sde*-elf*
1742
1743 * Removed targets
1744
1745 Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
1746
1747 Alpha running OSF/1 (or Tru64) alpha*-*-osf*
1748 SGI Irix-5.x mips-*-irix5*
1749 SGI Irix-6.x mips-*-irix6*
1750 VAX running (4.2 - 4.3 Reno) BSD vax-*-bsd*
1751 VAX running Ultrix vax-*-ultrix*
1752
1753 * The "dll-symbols" command, and its two aliases ("add-shared-symbol-files"
1754 and "assf"), have been removed. Use the "sharedlibrary" command, or
1755 its alias "share", instead.
1756
1757 *** Changes in GDB 7.8
1758
1759 * New command line options
1760
1761 -D data-directory
1762 This is an alias for the --data-directory option.
1763
1764 * GDB supports printing and modifying of variable length automatic arrays
1765 as specified in ISO C99.
1766
1767 * The ARM simulator now supports instruction level tracing
1768 with or without disassembly.
1769
1770 * Guile scripting
1771
1772 GDB now has support for scripting using Guile. Whether this is
1773 available is determined at configure time.
1774 Guile version 2.0 or greater is required.
1775 Guile version 2.0.9 is well tested, earlier 2.0 versions are not.
1776
1777 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
1778
1779 guile [code]
1780 gu [code]
1781 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Guile interpreter.
1782
1783 guile-repl
1784 gr
1785 Start a Guile interactive prompt (or "repl" for "read-eval-print loop").
1786
1787 info auto-load guile-scripts [regexp]
1788 Print the list of automatically loaded Guile scripts.
1789
1790 * The source command is now capable of sourcing Guile scripts.
1791 This feature is dependent on the debugger being built with Guile support.
1792
1793 * New options
1794
1795 set print symbol-loading (off|brief|full)
1796 show print symbol-loading
1797 Control whether to print informational messages when loading symbol
1798 information for a file. The default is "full", but when debugging
1799 programs with large numbers of shared libraries the amount of output
1800 becomes less useful.
1801
1802 set guile print-stack (none|message|full)
1803 show guile print-stack
1804 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Guile script.
1805
1806 set auto-load guile-scripts (on|off)
1807 show auto-load guile-scripts
1808 Control auto-loading of Guile script files.
1809
1810 maint ada set ignore-descriptive-types (on|off)
1811 maint ada show ignore-descriptive-types
1812 Control whether the debugger should ignore descriptive types in Ada
1813 programs. The default is not to ignore the descriptive types. See
1814 the user manual for more details on descriptive types and the intended
1815 usage of this option.
1816
1817 set auto-connect-native-target
1818
1819 Control whether GDB is allowed to automatically connect to the
1820 native target for the run, attach, etc. commands when not connected
1821 to any target yet. See also "target native" below.
1822
1823 set record btrace replay-memory-access (read-only|read-write)
1824 show record btrace replay-memory-access
1825 Control what memory accesses are allowed during replay.
1826
1827 maint set target-async (on|off)
1828 maint show target-async
1829 This controls whether GDB targets operate in synchronous or
1830 asynchronous mode. Normally the default is asynchronous, if it is
1831 available; but this can be changed to more easily debug problems
1832 occurring only in synchronous mode.
1833
1834 set mi-async (on|off)
1835 show mi-async
1836 Control whether MI asynchronous mode is preferred. This supersedes
1837 "set target-async" of previous GDB versions.
1838
1839 * "set target-async" is deprecated as a CLI option and is now an alias
1840 for "set mi-async" (only puts MI into async mode).
1841
1842 * Background execution commands (e.g., "c&", "s&", etc.) are now
1843 possible ``out of the box'' if the target supports them. Previously
1844 the user would need to explicitly enable the possibility with the
1845 "set target-async on" command.
1846
1847 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
1848
1849 ** New option --debug-format=option1[,option2,...] allows one to add
1850 additional text to each output. At present only timestamps
1851 are supported: --debug-format=timestamps.
1852 Timestamps can also be turned on with the
1853 "monitor set debug-format timestamps" command from GDB.
1854
1855 * The 'record instruction-history' command now starts counting instructions
1856 at one. This also affects the instruction ranges reported by the
1857 'record function-call-history' command when given the /i modifier.
1858
1859 * The command 'record function-call-history' supports a new modifier '/c' to
1860 indent the function names based on their call stack depth.
1861 The fields for the '/i' and '/l' modifier have been reordered.
1862 The source line range is now prefixed with 'at'.
1863 The instruction range is now prefixed with 'inst'.
1864 Both ranges are now printed as '<from>, <to>' to allow copy&paste to the
1865 "record instruction-history" and "list" commands.
1866
1867 * The ranges given as arguments to the 'record function-call-history' and
1868 'record instruction-history' commands are now inclusive.
1869
1870 * The btrace record target now supports the 'record goto' command.
1871 For locations inside the execution trace, the back trace is computed
1872 based on the information stored in the execution trace.
1873
1874 * The btrace record target supports limited reverse execution and replay.
1875 The target does not record data and therefore does not allow reading
1876 memory or registers.
1877
1878 * The "catch syscall" command now works on s390*-linux* targets.
1879
1880 * The "compare-sections" command is no longer specific to target
1881 remote. It now works with all targets.
1882
1883 * All native targets are now consistently called "native".
1884 Consequently, the "target child", "target GNU", "target djgpp",
1885 "target procfs" (Solaris/Irix/OSF/AIX) and "target darwin-child"
1886 commands have been replaced with "target native". The QNX/NTO port
1887 leaves the "procfs" target in place and adds a "native" target for
1888 consistency with other ports. The impact on users should be minimal
1889 as these commands previously either throwed an error, or were
1890 no-ops. The target's name is visible in the output of the following
1891 commands: "help target", "info target", "info files", "maint print
1892 target-stack".
1893
1894 * The "target native" command now connects to the native target. This
1895 can be used to launch native programs even when "set
1896 auto-connect-native-target" is set to off.
1897
1898 * GDB now supports access to Intel MPX registers on GNU/Linux.
1899
1900 * Support for Intel AVX-512 registers on GNU/Linux.
1901 Support displaying and modifying Intel AVX-512 registers
1902 $zmm0 - $zmm31 and $k0 - $k7 on GNU/Linux.
1903
1904 * New remote packets
1905
1906 qXfer:btrace:read's annex
1907 The qXfer:btrace:read packet supports a new annex 'delta' to read
1908 branch trace incrementally.
1909
1910 * Python Scripting
1911
1912 ** Valid Python operations on gdb.Value objects representing
1913 structs/classes invoke the corresponding overloaded operators if
1914 available.
1915 ** New `Xmethods' feature in the Python API. Xmethods are
1916 additional methods or replacements for existing methods of a C++
1917 class. This feature is useful for those cases where a method
1918 defined in C++ source code could be inlined or optimized out by
1919 the compiler, making it unavailable to GDB.
1920
1921 * New targets
1922 PowerPC64 GNU/Linux little-endian powerpc64le-*-linux*
1923
1924 * The "dll-symbols" command, and its two aliases ("add-shared-symbol-files"
1925 and "assf"), have been deprecated. Use the "sharedlibrary" command, or
1926 its alias "share", instead.
1927
1928 * The commands "set remotebaud" and "show remotebaud" are no longer
1929 supported. Use "set serial baud" and "show serial baud" (respectively)
1930 instead.
1931
1932 * MI changes
1933
1934 ** A new option "-gdb-set mi-async" replaces "-gdb-set
1935 target-async". The latter is left as a deprecated alias of the
1936 former for backward compatibility. If the target supports it,
1937 CLI background execution commands are now always possible by
1938 default, independently of whether the frontend stated a
1939 preference for asynchronous execution with "-gdb-set mi-async".
1940 Previously "-gdb-set target-async off" affected both MI execution
1941 commands and CLI execution commands.
1942
1943 *** Changes in GDB 7.7
1944
1945 * Improved support for process record-replay and reverse debugging on
1946 arm*-linux* targets. Support for thumb32 and syscall instruction
1947 recording has been added.
1948
1949 * GDB now supports SystemTap SDT probes on AArch64 GNU/Linux.
1950
1951 * GDB now supports Fission DWP file format version 2.
1952 http://gcc.gnu.org/wiki/DebugFission
1953
1954 * New convenience function "$_isvoid", to check whether an expression
1955 is void. A void expression is an expression where the type of the
1956 result is "void". For example, some convenience variables may be
1957 "void" when evaluated (e.g., "$_exitcode" before the execution of
1958 the program being debugged; or an undefined convenience variable).
1959 Another example, when calling a function whose return type is
1960 "void".
1961
1962 * The "maintenance print objfiles" command now takes an optional regexp.
1963
1964 * The "catch syscall" command now works on arm*-linux* targets.
1965
1966 * GDB now consistently shows "<not saved>" when printing values of
1967 registers the debug info indicates have not been saved in the frame
1968 and there's nowhere to retrieve them from
1969 (callee-saved/call-clobbered registers):
1970
1971 (gdb) p $rax
1972 $1 = <not saved>
1973
1974 (gdb) info registers rax
1975 rax <not saved>
1976
1977 Before, the former would print "<optimized out>", and the latter
1978 "*value not available*".
1979
1980 * New script contrib/gdb-add-index.sh for adding .gdb_index sections
1981 to binaries.
1982
1983 * Python scripting
1984
1985 ** Frame filters and frame decorators have been added.
1986 ** Temporary breakpoints are now supported.
1987 ** Line tables representation has been added.
1988 ** New attribute 'parent_type' for gdb.Field objects.
1989 ** gdb.Field objects can be used as subscripts on gdb.Value objects.
1990 ** New attribute 'name' for gdb.Type objects.
1991
1992 * New targets
1993
1994 Nios II ELF nios2*-*-elf
1995 Nios II GNU/Linux nios2*-*-linux
1996 Texas Instruments MSP430 msp430*-*-elf
1997
1998 * Removed native configurations
1999
2000 Support for these a.out NetBSD and OpenBSD obsolete configurations has
2001 been removed. ELF variants of these configurations are kept supported.
2002
2003 arm*-*-netbsd* but arm*-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
2004 i[34567]86-*-netbsd* but i[34567]86-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
2005 i[34567]86-*-openbsd[0-2].* but i[34567]86-*-openbsd* is kept supported.
2006 i[34567]86-*-openbsd3.[0-3]
2007 m68*-*-netbsd* but m68*-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
2008 sparc-*-netbsd* but sparc-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
2009 vax-*-netbsd* but vax-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
2010
2011 * New commands:
2012 catch rethrow
2013 Like "catch throw", but catches a re-thrown exception.
2014 maint check-psymtabs
2015 Renamed from old "maint check-symtabs".
2016 maint check-symtabs
2017 Perform consistency checks on symtabs.
2018 maint expand-symtabs
2019 Expand symtabs matching an optional regexp.
2020
2021 show configuration
2022 Display the details of GDB configure-time options.
2023
2024 maint set|show per-command
2025 maint set|show per-command space
2026 maint set|show per-command time
2027 maint set|show per-command symtab
2028 Enable display of per-command gdb resource usage.
2029
2030 remove-symbol-file FILENAME
2031 remove-symbol-file -a ADDRESS
2032 Remove a symbol file added via add-symbol-file. The file to remove
2033 can be identified by its filename or by an address that lies within
2034 the boundaries of this symbol file in memory.
2035
2036 info exceptions
2037 info exceptions REGEXP
2038 Display the list of Ada exceptions defined in the program being
2039 debugged. If provided, only the exceptions whose names match REGEXP
2040 are listed.
2041
2042 * New options
2043
2044 set debug symfile off|on
2045 show debug symfile
2046 Control display of debugging info regarding reading symbol files and
2047 symbol tables within those files
2048
2049 set print raw frame-arguments
2050 show print raw frame-arguments
2051 Set/show whether to print frame arguments in raw mode,
2052 disregarding any defined pretty-printers.
2053
2054 set remote trace-status-packet
2055 show remote trace-status-packet
2056 Set/show the use of remote protocol qTStatus packet.
2057
2058 set debug nios2
2059 show debug nios2
2060 Control display of debugging messages related to Nios II targets.
2061
2062 set range-stepping
2063 show range-stepping
2064 Control whether target-assisted range stepping is enabled.
2065
2066 set startup-with-shell
2067 show startup-with-shell
2068 Specifies whether Unix child processes are started via a shell or
2069 directly.
2070
2071 set code-cache
2072 show code-cache
2073 Use the target memory cache for accesses to the code segment. This
2074 improves performance of remote debugging (particularly disassembly).
2075
2076 * You can now use a literal value 'unlimited' for options that
2077 interpret 0 or -1 as meaning "unlimited". E.g., "set
2078 trace-buffer-size unlimited" is now an alias for "set
2079 trace-buffer-size -1" and "set height unlimited" is now an alias for
2080 "set height 0".
2081
2082 * The "set debug symtab-create" debugging option of GDB has been changed to
2083 accept a verbosity level. 0 means "off", 1 provides basic debugging
2084 output, and values of 2 or greater provides more verbose output.
2085
2086 * New command-line options
2087 --configuration
2088 Display the details of GDB configure-time options.
2089
2090 * The command 'tsave' can now support new option '-ctf' to save trace
2091 buffer in Common Trace Format.
2092
2093 * Newly installed $prefix/bin/gcore acts as a shell interface for the
2094 GDB command gcore.
2095
2096 * GDB now implements the the C++ 'typeid' operator.
2097
2098 * The new convenience variable $_exception holds the exception being
2099 thrown or caught at an exception-related catchpoint.
2100
2101 * The exception-related catchpoints, like "catch throw", now accept a
2102 regular expression which can be used to filter exceptions by type.
2103
2104 * The new convenience variable $_exitsignal is automatically set to
2105 the terminating signal number when the program being debugged dies
2106 due to an uncaught signal.
2107
2108 * MI changes
2109
2110 ** All MI commands now accept an optional "--language" option.
2111 Support for this feature can be verified by using the "-list-features"
2112 command, which should contain "language-option".
2113
2114 ** The new command -info-gdb-mi-command allows the user to determine
2115 whether a GDB/MI command is supported or not.
2116
2117 ** The "^error" result record returned when trying to execute an undefined
2118 GDB/MI command now provides a variable named "code" whose content is the
2119 "undefined-command" error code. Support for this feature can be verified
2120 by using the "-list-features" command, which should contain
2121 "undefined-command-error-code".
2122
2123 ** The -trace-save MI command can optionally save trace buffer in Common
2124 Trace Format now.
2125
2126 ** The new command -dprintf-insert sets a dynamic printf breakpoint.
2127
2128 ** The command -data-list-register-values now accepts an optional
2129 "--skip-unavailable" option. When used, only the available registers
2130 are displayed.
2131
2132 ** The new command -trace-frame-collected dumps collected variables,
2133 computed expressions, tvars, memory and registers in a traceframe.
2134
2135 ** The commands -stack-list-locals, -stack-list-arguments and
2136 -stack-list-variables now accept an option "--skip-unavailable".
2137 When used, only the available locals or arguments are displayed.
2138
2139 ** The -exec-run command now accepts an optional "--start" option.
2140 When used, the command follows the same semantics as the "start"
2141 command, stopping the program's execution at the start of its
2142 main subprogram. Support for this feature can be verified using
2143 the "-list-features" command, which should contain
2144 "exec-run-start-option".
2145
2146 ** The new commands -catch-assert and -catch-exceptions insert
2147 catchpoints stopping the program when Ada exceptions are raised.
2148
2149 ** The new command -info-ada-exceptions provides the equivalent of
2150 the new "info exceptions" command.
2151
2152 * New system-wide configuration scripts
2153 A GDB installation now provides scripts suitable for use as system-wide
2154 configuration scripts for the following systems:
2155 ** ElinOS
2156 ** Wind River Linux
2157
2158 * GDB now supports target-assigned range stepping with remote targets.
2159 This improves the performance of stepping source lines by reducing
2160 the number of control packets from/to GDB. See "New remote packets"
2161 below.
2162
2163 * GDB now understands the element 'tvar' in the XML traceframe info.
2164 It has the id of the collected trace state variables.
2165
2166 * On S/390 targets that provide the transactional-execution feature,
2167 the program interruption transaction diagnostic block (TDB) is now
2168 represented as a number of additional "registers" in GDB.
2169
2170 * New remote packets
2171
2172 vCont;r
2173
2174 The vCont packet supports a new 'r' action, that tells the remote
2175 stub to step through an address range itself, without GDB
2176 involvemement at each single-step.
2177
2178 qXfer:libraries-svr4:read's annex
2179 The previously unused annex of the qXfer:libraries-svr4:read packet
2180 is now used to support passing an argument list. The remote stub
2181 reports support for this argument list to GDB's qSupported query.
2182 The defined arguments are "start" and "prev", used to reduce work
2183 necessary for library list updating, resulting in significant
2184 speedup.
2185
2186 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
2187
2188 ** GDBserver now supports target-assisted range stepping. Currently
2189 enabled on x86/x86_64 GNU/Linux targets.
2190
2191 ** GDBserver now adds element 'tvar' in the XML in the reply to
2192 'qXfer:traceframe-info:read'. It has the id of the collected
2193 trace state variables.
2194
2195 ** GDBserver now supports hardware watchpoints on the MIPS GNU/Linux
2196 target.
2197
2198 * New 'z' formatter for printing and examining memory, this displays the
2199 value as hexadecimal zero padded on the left to the size of the type.
2200
2201 * GDB can now use Windows x64 unwinding data.
2202
2203 * The "set remotebaud" command has been replaced by "set serial baud".
2204 Similarly, "show remotebaud" has been replaced by "show serial baud".
2205 The "set remotebaud" and "show remotebaud" commands are still available
2206 to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
2207
2208 *** Changes in GDB 7.6
2209
2210 * Target record has been renamed to record-full.
2211 Record/replay is now enabled with the "record full" command.
2212 This also affects settings that are associated with full record/replay
2213 that have been moved from "set/show record" to "set/show record full":
2214
2215 set|show record full insn-number-max
2216 set|show record full stop-at-limit
2217 set|show record full memory-query
2218
2219 * A new record target "record-btrace" has been added. The new target
2220 uses hardware support to record the control-flow of a process. It
2221 does not support replaying the execution, but it implements the
2222 below new commands for investigating the recorded execution log.
2223 This new recording method can be enabled using:
2224
2225 record btrace
2226
2227 The "record-btrace" target is only available on Intel Atom processors
2228 and requires a Linux kernel 2.6.32 or later.
2229
2230 * Two new commands have been added for record/replay to give information
2231 about the recorded execution without having to replay the execution.
2232 The commands are only supported by "record btrace".
2233
2234 record instruction-history prints the execution history at
2235 instruction granularity
2236
2237 record function-call-history prints the execution history at
2238 function granularity
2239
2240 * New native configurations
2241
2242 ARM AArch64 GNU/Linux aarch64*-*-linux-gnu
2243 FreeBSD/powerpc powerpc*-*-freebsd
2244 x86_64/Cygwin x86_64-*-cygwin*
2245 Tilera TILE-Gx GNU/Linux tilegx*-*-linux-gnu
2246
2247 * New targets
2248
2249 ARM AArch64 aarch64*-*-elf
2250 ARM AArch64 GNU/Linux aarch64*-*-linux
2251 Lynx 178 PowerPC powerpc-*-lynx*178
2252 x86_64/Cygwin x86_64-*-cygwin*
2253 Tilera TILE-Gx GNU/Linux tilegx*-*-linux
2254
2255 * If the configured location of system.gdbinit file (as given by the
2256 --with-system-gdbinit option at configure time) is in the
2257 data-directory (as specified by --with-gdb-datadir at configure
2258 time) or in one of its subdirectories, then GDB will look for the
2259 system-wide init file in the directory specified by the
2260 --data-directory command-line option.
2261
2262 * New command line options:
2263
2264 -nh Disables auto-loading of ~/.gdbinit, but still executes all the
2265 other initialization files, unlike -nx which disables all of them.
2266
2267 * Removed command line options
2268
2269 -epoch This was used by the gdb mode in Epoch, an ancient fork of
2270 Emacs.
2271
2272 * The 'ptype' and 'whatis' commands now accept an argument to control
2273 type formatting.
2274
2275 * 'info proc' now works on some core files.
2276
2277 * Python scripting
2278
2279 ** Vectors can be created with gdb.Type.vector.
2280
2281 ** Python's atexit.register now works in GDB.
2282
2283 ** Types can be pretty-printed via a Python API.
2284
2285 ** Python 3 is now supported (in addition to Python 2.4 or later)
2286
2287 ** New class gdb.Architecture exposes GDB's internal representation
2288 of architecture in the Python API.
2289
2290 ** New method Frame.architecture returns the gdb.Architecture object
2291 corresponding to the frame's architecture.
2292
2293 * New Python-based convenience functions:
2294
2295 ** $_memeq(buf1, buf2, length)
2296 ** $_streq(str1, str2)
2297 ** $_strlen(str)
2298 ** $_regex(str, regex)
2299
2300 * The 'cd' command now defaults to using '~' (the home directory) if not
2301 given an argument.
2302
2303 * The C++ ABI now defaults to the GNU v3 ABI. This has been the
2304 default for GCC since November 2000.
2305
2306 * The command 'forward-search' can now be abbreviated as 'fo'.
2307
2308 * The command 'info tracepoints' can now display 'installed on target'
2309 or 'not installed on target' for each non-pending location of tracepoint.
2310
2311 * New configure options
2312
2313 --enable-libmcheck/--disable-libmcheck
2314 By default, development versions are built with -lmcheck on hosts
2315 that support it, in order to help track memory corruption issues.
2316 Release versions, on the other hand, are built without -lmcheck
2317 by default. The --enable-libmcheck/--disable-libmcheck configure
2318 options allow the user to override that default.
2319 --with-babeltrace/--with-babeltrace-include/--with-babeltrace-lib
2320 This configure option allows the user to build GDB with
2321 libbabeltrace using which GDB can read Common Trace Format data.
2322
2323 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
2324
2325 catch signal
2326 Catch signals. This is similar to "handle", but allows commands and
2327 conditions to be attached.
2328
2329 maint info bfds
2330 List the BFDs known to GDB.
2331
2332 python-interactive [command]
2333 pi [command]
2334 Start a Python interactive prompt, or evaluate the optional command
2335 and print the result of expressions.
2336
2337 py [command]
2338 "py" is a new alias for "python".
2339
2340 enable type-printer [name]...
2341 disable type-printer [name]...
2342 Enable or disable type printers.
2343
2344 * Removed commands
2345
2346 ** For the Renesas Super-H architecture, the "regs" command has been removed
2347 (has been deprecated in GDB 7.5), and "info all-registers" should be used
2348 instead.
2349
2350 * New options
2351
2352 set print type methods (on|off)
2353 show print type methods
2354 Control whether method declarations are displayed by "ptype".
2355 The default is to show them.
2356
2357 set print type typedefs (on|off)
2358 show print type typedefs
2359 Control whether typedef definitions are displayed by "ptype".
2360 The default is to show them.
2361
2362 set filename-display basename|relative|absolute
2363 show filename-display
2364 Control the way in which filenames is displayed.
2365 The default is "relative", which preserves previous behavior.
2366
2367 set trace-buffer-size
2368 show trace-buffer-size
2369 Request target to change the size of trace buffer.
2370
2371 set remote trace-buffer-size-packet auto|on|off
2372 show remote trace-buffer-size-packet
2373 Control the use of the remote protocol `QTBuffer:size' packet.
2374
2375 set debug aarch64
2376 show debug aarch64
2377 Control display of debugging messages related to ARM AArch64.
2378 The default is off.
2379
2380 set debug coff-pe-read
2381 show debug coff-pe-read
2382 Control display of debugging messages related to reading of COFF/PE
2383 exported symbols.
2384
2385 set debug mach-o
2386 show debug mach-o
2387 Control display of debugging messages related to Mach-O symbols
2388 processing.
2389
2390 set debug notification
2391 show debug notification
2392 Control display of debugging info for async remote notification.
2393
2394 * MI changes
2395
2396 ** Command parameter changes are now notified using new async record
2397 "=cmd-param-changed".
2398 ** Trace frame changes caused by command "tfind" are now notified using
2399 new async record "=traceframe-changed".
2400 ** The creation, deletion and modification of trace state variables
2401 are now notified using new async records "=tsv-created",
2402 "=tsv-deleted" and "=tsv-modified".
2403 ** The start and stop of process record are now notified using new
2404 async record "=record-started" and "=record-stopped".
2405 ** Memory changes are now notified using new async record
2406 "=memory-changed".
2407 ** The data-disassemble command response will include a "fullname" field
2408 containing the absolute file name when source has been requested.
2409 ** New optional parameter COUNT added to the "-data-write-memory-bytes"
2410 command, to allow pattern filling of memory areas.
2411 ** New commands "-catch-load"/"-catch-unload" added for intercepting
2412 library load/unload events.
2413 ** The response to breakpoint commands and breakpoint async records
2414 includes an "installed" field containing a boolean state about each
2415 non-pending tracepoint location is whether installed on target or not.
2416 ** Output of the "-trace-status" command includes a "trace-file" field
2417 containing the name of the trace file being examined. This field is
2418 optional, and only present when examining a trace file.
2419 ** The "fullname" field is now always present along with the "file" field,
2420 even if the file cannot be found by GDB.
2421
2422 * GDB now supports the "mini debuginfo" section, .gnu_debugdata.
2423 You must have the LZMA library available when configuring GDB for this
2424 feature to be enabled. For more information, see:
2425 http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Features/MiniDebugInfo
2426
2427 * New remote packets
2428
2429 QTBuffer:size
2430 Set the size of trace buffer. The remote stub reports support for this
2431 packet to gdb's qSupported query.
2432
2433 Qbtrace:bts
2434 Enable Branch Trace Store (BTS)-based branch tracing for the current
2435 thread. The remote stub reports support for this packet to gdb's
2436 qSupported query.
2437
2438 Qbtrace:off
2439 Disable branch tracing for the current thread. The remote stub reports
2440 support for this packet to gdb's qSupported query.
2441
2442 qXfer:btrace:read
2443 Read the traced branches for the current thread. The remote stub
2444 reports support for this packet to gdb's qSupported query.
2445
2446 *** Changes in GDB 7.5
2447
2448 * GDB now supports x32 ABI. Visit <http://sites.google.com/site/x32abi/>
2449 for more x32 ABI info.
2450
2451 * GDB now supports access to MIPS DSP registers on Linux targets.
2452
2453 * GDB now supports debugging microMIPS binaries.
2454
2455 * The "info os" command on GNU/Linux can now display information on
2456 several new classes of objects managed by the operating system:
2457 "info os procgroups" lists process groups
2458 "info os files" lists file descriptors
2459 "info os sockets" lists internet-domain sockets
2460 "info os shm" lists shared-memory regions
2461 "info os semaphores" lists semaphores
2462 "info os msg" lists message queues
2463 "info os modules" lists loaded kernel modules
2464
2465 * GDB now has support for SDT (Static Defined Tracing) probes. Currently,
2466 the only implemented backend is for SystemTap probes (<sys/sdt.h>). You
2467 can set a breakpoint using the new "-probe, "-pstap" or "-probe-stap"
2468 options and inspect the probe arguments using the new $_probe_arg family
2469 of convenience variables. You can obtain more information about SystemTap
2470 in <http://sourceware.org/systemtap/>.
2471
2472 * GDB now supports reversible debugging on ARM, it allows you to
2473 debug basic ARM and THUMB instructions, and provides
2474 record/replay support.
2475
2476 * The option "symbol-reloading" has been deleted as it is no longer used.
2477
2478 * Python scripting
2479
2480 ** GDB commands implemented in Python can now be put in command class
2481 "gdb.COMMAND_USER".
2482
2483 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" is now deleted.
2484
2485 ** A new class, gdb.printing.FlagEnumerationPrinter, can be used to
2486 apply "flag enum"-style pretty-printing to any enum.
2487
2488 ** gdb.lookup_symbol can now work when there is no current frame.
2489
2490 ** gdb.Symbol now has a 'line' attribute, holding the line number in
2491 the source at which the symbol was defined.
2492
2493 ** gdb.Symbol now has the new attribute 'needs_frame' and the new
2494 method 'value'. The former indicates whether the symbol needs a
2495 frame in order to compute its value, and the latter computes the
2496 symbol's value.
2497
2498 ** A new method 'referenced_value' on gdb.Value objects which can
2499 dereference pointer as well as C++ reference values.
2500
2501 ** New methods 'global_block' and 'static_block' on gdb.Symtab objects
2502 which return the global and static blocks (as gdb.Block objects),
2503 of the underlying symbol table, respectively.
2504
2505 ** New function gdb.find_pc_line which returns the gdb.Symtab_and_line
2506 object associated with a PC value.
2507
2508 ** gdb.Symtab_and_line has new attribute 'last' which holds the end
2509 of the address range occupied by code for the current source line.
2510
2511 * Go language support.
2512 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the Go programming
2513 language.
2514
2515 * GDBserver now supports stdio connections.
2516 E.g. (gdb) target remote | ssh myhost gdbserver - hello
2517
2518 * The binary "gdbtui" can no longer be built or installed.
2519 Use "gdb -tui" instead.
2520
2521 * GDB will now print "flag" enums specially. A flag enum is one where
2522 all the enumerator values have no bits in common when pairwise
2523 "and"ed. When printing a value whose type is a flag enum, GDB will
2524 show all the constants, e.g., for enum E { ONE = 1, TWO = 2}:
2525 (gdb) print (enum E) 3
2526 $1 = (ONE | TWO)
2527
2528 * The filename part of a linespec will now match trailing components
2529 of a source file name. For example, "break gcc/expr.c:1000" will
2530 now set a breakpoint in build/gcc/expr.c, but not
2531 build/libcpp/expr.c.
2532
2533 * The "info proc" and "generate-core-file" commands will now also
2534 work on remote targets connected to GDBserver on Linux.
2535
2536 * The command "info catch" has been removed. It has been disabled
2537 since December 2007.
2538
2539 * The "catch exception" and "catch assert" commands now accept
2540 a condition at the end of the command, much like the "break"
2541 command does. For instance:
2542
2543 (gdb) catch exception Constraint_Error if Barrier = True
2544
2545 Previously, it was possible to add a condition to such catchpoints,
2546 but it had to be done as a second step, after the catchpoint had been
2547 created, using the "condition" command.
2548
2549 * The "info static-tracepoint-marker" command will now also work on
2550 native Linux targets with in-process agent.
2551
2552 * GDB can now set breakpoints on inlined functions.
2553
2554 * The .gdb_index section has been updated to include symbols for
2555 inlined functions. GDB will ignore older .gdb_index sections by
2556 default, which could cause symbol files to be loaded more slowly
2557 until their .gdb_index sections can be recreated. The new command
2558 "set use-deprecated-index-sections on" will cause GDB to use any older
2559 .gdb_index sections it finds. This will restore performance, but the
2560 ability to set breakpoints on inlined functions will be lost in symbol
2561 files with older .gdb_index sections.
2562
2563 The .gdb_index section has also been updated to record more information
2564 about each symbol. This speeds up the "info variables", "info functions"
2565 and "info types" commands when used with programs having the .gdb_index
2566 section, as well as speeding up debugging with shared libraries using
2567 the .gdb_index section.
2568
2569 * Ada support for GDB/MI Variable Objects has been added.
2570
2571 * GDB can now support 'breakpoint always-inserted mode' in 'record'
2572 target.
2573
2574 * MI changes
2575
2576 ** New command -info-os is the MI equivalent of "info os".
2577
2578 ** Output logs ("set logging" and related) now include MI output.
2579
2580 * New commands
2581
2582 ** "set use-deprecated-index-sections on|off"
2583 "show use-deprecated-index-sections on|off"
2584 Controls the use of deprecated .gdb_index sections.
2585
2586 ** "catch load" and "catch unload" can be used to stop when a shared
2587 library is loaded or unloaded, respectively.
2588
2589 ** "enable count" can be used to auto-disable a breakpoint after
2590 several hits.
2591
2592 ** "info vtbl" can be used to show the virtual method tables for
2593 C++ and Java objects.
2594
2595 ** "explore" and its sub commands "explore value" and "explore type"
2596 can be used to recursively explore values and types of
2597 expressions. These commands are available only if GDB is
2598 configured with '--with-python'.
2599
2600 ** "info auto-load" shows status of all kinds of auto-loaded files,
2601 "info auto-load gdb-scripts" shows status of auto-loading GDB canned
2602 sequences of commands files, "info auto-load python-scripts"
2603 shows status of auto-loading Python script files,
2604 "info auto-load local-gdbinit" shows status of loading init file
2605 (.gdbinit) from current directory and "info auto-load libthread-db" shows
2606 status of inferior specific thread debugging shared library loading.
2607
2608 ** "info auto-load-scripts", "set auto-load-scripts on|off"
2609 and "show auto-load-scripts" commands have been deprecated, use their
2610 "info auto-load python-scripts", "set auto-load python-scripts on|off"
2611 and "show auto-load python-scripts" counterparts instead.
2612
2613 ** "dprintf location,format,args..." creates a dynamic printf, which
2614 is basically a breakpoint that does a printf and immediately
2615 resumes your program's execution, so it is like a printf that you
2616 can insert dynamically at runtime instead of at compiletime.
2617
2618 ** "set print symbol"
2619 "show print symbol"
2620 Controls whether GDB attempts to display the symbol, if any,
2621 corresponding to addresses it prints. This defaults to "on", but
2622 you can set it to "off" to restore GDB's previous behavior.
2623
2624 * Deprecated commands
2625
2626 ** For the Renesas Super-H architecture, the "regs" command has been
2627 deprecated, and "info all-registers" should be used instead.
2628
2629 * New targets
2630
2631 Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
2632 HP OpenVMS ia64 ia64-hp-openvms*
2633
2634 * GDBserver supports evaluation of breakpoint conditions. When
2635 support is advertised by GDBserver, GDB may be told to send the
2636 breakpoint conditions in bytecode form to GDBserver. GDBserver
2637 will only report the breakpoint trigger to GDB when its condition
2638 evaluates to true.
2639
2640 * New options
2641
2642 set mips compression
2643 show mips compression
2644 Select the compressed ISA encoding used in functions that have no symbol
2645 information available. The encoding can be set to either of:
2646 mips16
2647 micromips
2648 and is updated automatically from ELF file flags if available.
2649
2650 set breakpoint condition-evaluation
2651 show breakpoint condition-evaluation
2652 Control whether breakpoint conditions are evaluated by GDB ("host") or by
2653 GDBserver ("target"). Default option "auto" chooses the most efficient
2654 available mode.
2655 This option can improve debugger efficiency depending on the speed of the
2656 target.
2657
2658 set auto-load off
2659 Disable auto-loading globally.
2660
2661 show auto-load
2662 Show auto-loading setting of all kinds of auto-loaded files.
2663
2664 set auto-load gdb-scripts on|off
2665 show auto-load gdb-scripts
2666 Control auto-loading of GDB canned sequences of commands files.
2667
2668 set auto-load python-scripts on|off
2669 show auto-load python-scripts
2670 Control auto-loading of Python script files.
2671
2672 set auto-load local-gdbinit on|off
2673 show auto-load local-gdbinit
2674 Control loading of init file (.gdbinit) from current directory.
2675
2676 set auto-load libthread-db on|off
2677 show auto-load libthread-db
2678 Control auto-loading of inferior specific thread debugging shared library.
2679
2680 set auto-load scripts-directory <dir1>[:<dir2>...]
2681 show auto-load scripts-directory
2682 Set a list of directories from which to load auto-loaded scripts.
2683 Automatically loaded Python scripts and GDB scripts are located in one
2684 of the directories listed by this option.
2685 The delimiter (':' above) may differ according to the host platform.
2686
2687 set auto-load safe-path <dir1>[:<dir2>...]
2688 show auto-load safe-path
2689 Set a list of directories from which it is safe to auto-load files.
2690 The delimiter (':' above) may differ according to the host platform.
2691
2692 set debug auto-load on|off
2693 show debug auto-load
2694 Control display of debugging info for auto-loading the files above.
2695
2696 set dprintf-style gdb|call|agent
2697 show dprintf-style
2698 Control the way in which a dynamic printf is performed; "gdb"
2699 requests a GDB printf command, while "call" causes dprintf to call a
2700 function in the inferior. "agent" requests that the target agent
2701 (such as GDBserver) do the printing.
2702
2703 set dprintf-function <expr>
2704 show dprintf-function
2705 set dprintf-channel <expr>
2706 show dprintf-channel
2707 Set the function and optional first argument to the call when using
2708 the "call" style of dynamic printf.
2709
2710 set disconnected-dprintf on|off
2711 show disconnected-dprintf
2712 Control whether agent-style dynamic printfs continue to be in effect
2713 after GDB disconnects.
2714
2715 * New configure options
2716
2717 --with-auto-load-dir
2718 Configure default value for the 'set auto-load scripts-directory'
2719 setting above. It defaults to '$debugdir:$datadir/auto-load',
2720 $debugdir representing global debugging info directories (available
2721 via 'show debug-file-directory') and $datadir representing GDB's data
2722 directory (available via 'show data-directory').
2723
2724 --with-auto-load-safe-path
2725 Configure default value for the 'set auto-load safe-path' setting
2726 above. It defaults to the --with-auto-load-dir setting.
2727
2728 --without-auto-load-safe-path
2729 Set 'set auto-load safe-path' to '/', effectively disabling this
2730 security feature.
2731
2732 * New remote packets
2733
2734 z0/z1 conditional breakpoints extension
2735
2736 The z0/z1 breakpoint insertion packets have been extended to carry
2737 a list of conditional expressions over to the remote stub depending on the
2738 condition evaluation mode. The use of this extension can be controlled
2739 via the "set remote conditional-breakpoints-packet" command.
2740
2741 QProgramSignals:
2742
2743 Specify the signals which the remote stub may pass to the debugged
2744 program without GDB involvement.
2745
2746 * New command line options
2747
2748 --init-command=FILE, -ix Like --command, -x but execute it
2749 before loading inferior.
2750 --init-eval-command=COMMAND, -iex Like --eval-command=COMMAND, -ex but
2751 execute it before loading inferior.
2752
2753 *** Changes in GDB 7.4
2754
2755 * GDB now handles ambiguous linespecs more consistently; the existing
2756 FILE:LINE support has been expanded to other types of linespecs. A
2757 breakpoint will now be set on all matching locations in all
2758 inferiors, and locations will be added or removed according to
2759 inferior changes.
2760
2761 * GDB now allows you to skip uninteresting functions and files when
2762 stepping with the "skip function" and "skip file" commands.
2763
2764 * GDB has two new commands: "set remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit"
2765 and "show remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit". These allows to
2766 set or show the maximum length limit (in bytes) of a remote
2767 target hardware watchpoint.
2768
2769 This allows e.g. to use "unlimited" hardware watchpoints with the
2770 gdbserver integrated in Valgrind version >= 3.7.0. Such Valgrind
2771 watchpoints are slower than real hardware watchpoints but are
2772 significantly faster than gdb software watchpoints.
2773
2774 * Python scripting
2775
2776 ** The register_pretty_printer function in module gdb.printing now takes
2777 an optional `replace' argument. If True, the new printer replaces any
2778 existing one.
2779
2780 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" command has been
2781 deprecated and will be deleted in GDB 7.5.
2782 A new command: "set python print-stack none|full|message" has
2783 replaced it. Additionally, the default for "print-stack" is
2784 now "message", which just prints the error message without
2785 the stack trace.
2786
2787 ** A prompt substitution hook (prompt_hook) is now available to the
2788 Python API.
2789
2790 ** A new Python module, gdb.prompt has been added to the GDB Python
2791 modules library. This module provides functionality for
2792 escape sequences in prompts (used by set/show
2793 extended-prompt). These escape sequences are replaced by their
2794 corresponding value.
2795
2796 ** Python commands and convenience-functions located in
2797 'data-directory'/python/gdb/command and
2798 'data-directory'/python/gdb/function are now automatically loaded
2799 on GDB start-up.
2800
2801 ** Blocks now provide four new attributes. global_block and
2802 static_block will return the global and static blocks
2803 respectively. is_static and is_global are boolean attributes
2804 that indicate if the block is one of those two types.
2805
2806 ** Symbols now provide the "type" attribute, the type of the symbol.
2807
2808 ** The "gdb.breakpoint" function has been deprecated in favor of
2809 "gdb.breakpoints".
2810
2811 ** A new class "gdb.FinishBreakpoint" is provided to catch the return
2812 of a function. This class is based on the "finish" command
2813 available in the CLI.
2814
2815 ** Type objects for struct and union types now allow access to
2816 the fields using standard Python dictionary (mapping) methods.
2817 For example, "some_type['myfield']" now works, as does
2818 "some_type.items()".
2819
2820 ** A new event "gdb.new_objfile" has been added, triggered by loading a
2821 new object file.
2822
2823 ** A new function, "deep_items" has been added to the gdb.types
2824 module in the GDB Python modules library. This function returns
2825 an iterator over the fields of a struct or union type. Unlike
2826 the standard Python "iteritems" method, it will recursively traverse
2827 any anonymous fields.
2828
2829 * MI changes
2830
2831 ** "*stopped" events can report several new "reason"s, such as
2832 "solib-event".
2833
2834 ** Breakpoint changes are now notified using new async records, like
2835 "=breakpoint-modified".
2836
2837 ** New command -ada-task-info.
2838
2839 * libthread-db-search-path now supports two special values: $sdir and $pdir.
2840 $sdir specifies the default system locations of shared libraries.
2841 $pdir specifies the directory where the libpthread used by the application
2842 lives.
2843
2844 GDB no longer looks in $sdir and $pdir after it has searched the directories
2845 mentioned in libthread-db-search-path. If you want to search those
2846 directories, they must be specified in libthread-db-search-path.
2847 The default value of libthread-db-search-path on GNU/Linux and Solaris
2848 systems is now "$sdir:$pdir".
2849
2850 $pdir is not supported by gdbserver, it is currently ignored.
2851 $sdir is supported by gdbserver.
2852
2853 * New configure option --with-iconv-bin.
2854 When using the internationalization support like the one in the GNU C
2855 library, GDB will invoke the "iconv" program to get a list of supported
2856 character sets. If this program lives in a non-standard location, one can
2857 use this option to specify where to find it.
2858
2859 * When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
2860 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports masked hardware
2861 watchpoints, which specify a mask in addition to an address to watch.
2862 The mask specifies that some bits of an address (the bits which are
2863 reset in the mask) should be ignored when matching the address accessed
2864 by the inferior against the watchpoint address. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
2865 section in the user manual for more details.
2866
2867 * The new option --once causes GDBserver to stop listening for connections once
2868 the first connection is made. The listening port used by GDBserver will
2869 become available after that.
2870
2871 * New commands "info macros" and "alias" have been added.
2872
2873 * New function parameters suffix @entry specifies value of function parameter
2874 at the time the function got called. Entry values are available only since
2875 gcc version 4.7.
2876
2877 * New commands
2878
2879 !SHELL COMMAND
2880 "!" is now an alias of the "shell" command.
2881 Note that no space is needed between "!" and SHELL COMMAND.
2882
2883 * Changed commands
2884
2885 watch EXPRESSION mask MASK_VALUE
2886 The watch command now supports the mask argument which allows creation
2887 of masked watchpoints, if the current architecture supports this feature.
2888
2889 info auto-load-scripts [REGEXP]
2890 This command was formerly named "maintenance print section-scripts".
2891 It is now generally useful and is no longer a maintenance-only command.
2892
2893 info macro [-all] [--] MACRO
2894 The info macro command has new options `-all' and `--'. The first for
2895 printing all definitions of a macro. The second for explicitly specifying
2896 the end of arguments and the beginning of the macro name in case the macro
2897 name starts with a hyphen.
2898
2899 collect[/s] EXPRESSIONS
2900 The tracepoint collect command now takes an optional modifier "/s"
2901 that directs it to dereference pointer-to-character types and
2902 collect the bytes of memory up to a zero byte. The behavior is
2903 similar to what you see when you use the regular print command on a
2904 string. An optional integer following the "/s" sets a bound on the
2905 number of bytes that will be collected.
2906
2907 tstart [NOTES]
2908 The trace start command now interprets any supplied arguments as a
2909 note to be recorded with the trace run, with an effect similar to
2910 setting the variable trace-notes.
2911
2912 tstop [NOTES]
2913 The trace stop command now interprets any arguments as a note to be
2914 mentioned along with the tstatus report that the trace was stopped
2915 with a command. The effect is similar to setting the variable
2916 trace-stop-notes.
2917
2918 * Tracepoints can now be enabled and disabled at any time after a trace
2919 experiment has been started using the standard "enable" and "disable"
2920 commands. It is now possible to start a trace experiment with no enabled
2921 tracepoints; GDB will display a warning, but will allow the experiment to
2922 begin, assuming that tracepoints will be enabled as needed while the trace
2923 is running.
2924
2925 * Fast tracepoints on 32-bit x86-architectures can now be placed at
2926 locations with 4-byte instructions, when they were previously
2927 limited to locations with instructions of 5 bytes or longer.
2928
2929 * New options
2930
2931 set debug dwarf2-read
2932 show debug dwarf2-read
2933 Turns on or off display of debugging messages related to reading
2934 DWARF debug info. The default is off.
2935
2936 set debug symtab-create
2937 show debug symtab-create
2938 Turns on or off display of debugging messages related to symbol table
2939 creation. The default is off.
2940
2941 set extended-prompt
2942 show extended-prompt
2943 Set the GDB prompt, and allow escape sequences to be inserted to
2944 display miscellaneous information (see 'help set extended-prompt'
2945 for the list of sequences). This prompt (and any information
2946 accessed through the escape sequences) is updated every time the
2947 prompt is displayed.
2948
2949 set print entry-values (both|compact|default|if-needed|no|only|preferred)
2950 show print entry-values
2951 Set printing of frame argument values at function entry. In some cases
2952 GDB can determine the value of function argument which was passed by the
2953 function caller, even if the value was modified inside the called function.
2954
2955 set debug entry-values
2956 show debug entry-values
2957 Control display of debugging info for determining frame argument values at
2958 function entry and virtual tail call frames.
2959
2960 set basenames-may-differ
2961 show basenames-may-differ
2962 Set whether a source file may have multiple base names.
2963 (A "base name" is the name of a file with the directory part removed.
2964 Example: The base name of "/home/user/hello.c" is "hello.c".)
2965 If set, GDB will canonicalize file names (e.g., expand symlinks)
2966 before comparing them. Canonicalization is an expensive operation,
2967 but it allows the same file be known by more than one base name.
2968 If not set (the default), all source files are assumed to have just
2969 one base name, and gdb will do file name comparisons more efficiently.
2970
2971 set trace-user
2972 show trace-user
2973 set trace-notes
2974 show trace-notes
2975 Set a user name and notes for the current and any future trace runs.
2976 This is useful for long-running and/or disconnected traces, to
2977 inform others (or yourself) as to who is running the trace, supply
2978 contact information, or otherwise explain what is going on.
2979
2980 set trace-stop-notes
2981 show trace-stop-notes
2982 Set a note attached to the trace run, that is displayed when the
2983 trace has been stopped by a tstop command. This is useful for
2984 instance as an explanation, if you are stopping a trace run that was
2985 started by someone else.
2986
2987 * New remote packets
2988
2989 QTEnable
2990
2991 Dynamically enable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
2992
2993 QTDisable
2994
2995 Dynamically disable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
2996
2997 QTNotes
2998
2999 Set the user and notes of the trace run.
3000
3001 qTP
3002
3003 Query the current status of a tracepoint.
3004
3005 qTMinFTPILen
3006
3007 Query the minimum length of instruction at which a fast tracepoint may
3008 be placed.
3009
3010 * Dcache size (number of lines) and line-size are now runtime-configurable
3011 via "set dcache line" and "set dcache line-size" commands.
3012
3013 * New targets
3014
3015 Texas Instruments TMS320C6x tic6x-*-*
3016
3017 * New Simulators
3018
3019 Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
3020
3021 *** Changes in GDB 7.3.1
3022
3023 * The build failure for NetBSD and OpenBSD targets have now been fixed.
3024
3025 *** Changes in GDB 7.3
3026
3027 * GDB has a new command: "thread find [REGEXP]".
3028 It finds the thread id whose name, target id, or thread extra info
3029 matches the given regular expression.
3030
3031 * The "catch syscall" command now works on mips*-linux* targets.
3032
3033 * The -data-disassemble MI command now supports modes 2 and 3 for
3034 dumping the instruction opcodes.
3035
3036 * New command line options
3037
3038 -data-directory DIR Specify DIR as the "data-directory".
3039 This is mostly for testing purposes.
3040
3041 * The "maint set python auto-load on|off" command has been renamed to
3042 "set auto-load-scripts on|off".
3043
3044 * GDB has a new command: "set directories".
3045 It is like the "dir" command except that it replaces the
3046 source path list instead of augmenting it.
3047
3048 * GDB now understands thread names.
3049
3050 On GNU/Linux, "info threads" will display the thread name as set by
3051 prctl or pthread_setname_np.
3052
3053 There is also a new command, "thread name", which can be used to
3054 assign a name internally for GDB to display.
3055
3056 * OpenCL C
3057 Initial support for the OpenCL C language (http://www.khronos.org/opencl)
3058 has been integrated into GDB.
3059
3060 * Python scripting
3061
3062 ** The function gdb.Write now accepts an optional keyword 'stream'.
3063 This keyword, when provided, will direct the output to either
3064 stdout, stderr, or GDB's logging output.
3065
3066 ** Parameters can now be be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
3067 you may implement the get_set_doc and get_show_doc functions.
3068 This improves how Parameter set/show documentation is processed
3069 and allows for more dynamic content.
3070
3071 ** Symbols, Symbol Table, Symbol Table and Line, Object Files,
3072 Inferior, Inferior Thread, Blocks, and Block Iterator APIs now
3073 have an is_valid method.
3074
3075 ** Breakpoints can now be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
3076 you may implement a 'stop' function that is executed each time
3077 the inferior reaches that breakpoint.
3078
3079 ** New function gdb.lookup_global_symbol looks up a global symbol.
3080
3081 ** GDB values in Python are now callable if the value represents a
3082 function. For example, if 'some_value' represents a function that
3083 takes two integer parameters and returns a value, you can call
3084 that function like so:
3085
3086 result = some_value (10,20)
3087
3088 ** Module gdb.types has been added.
3089 It contains a collection of utilities for working with gdb.Types objects:
3090 get_basic_type, has_field, make_enum_dict.
3091
3092 ** Module gdb.printing has been added.
3093 It contains utilities for writing and registering pretty-printers.
3094 New classes: PrettyPrinter, SubPrettyPrinter,
3095 RegexpCollectionPrettyPrinter.
3096 New function: register_pretty_printer.
3097
3098 ** New commands "info pretty-printers", "enable pretty-printer" and
3099 "disable pretty-printer" have been added.
3100
3101 ** gdb.parameter("directories") is now available.
3102
3103 ** New function gdb.newest_frame returns the newest frame in the
3104 selected thread.
3105
3106 ** The gdb.InferiorThread class has a new "name" attribute. This
3107 holds the thread's name.
3108
3109 ** Python Support for Inferior events.
3110 Python scripts can add observers to be notified of events
3111 occurring in the process being debugged.
3112 The following events are currently supported:
3113 - gdb.events.cont Continue event.
3114 - gdb.events.exited Inferior exited event.
3115 - gdb.events.stop Signal received, and Breakpoint hit events.
3116
3117 * C++ Improvements:
3118
3119 ** GDB now puts template parameters in scope when debugging in an
3120 instantiation. For example, if you have:
3121
3122 template<int X> int func (void) { return X; }
3123
3124 then if you step into func<5>, "print X" will show "5". This
3125 feature requires proper debuginfo support from the compiler; it
3126 was added to GCC 4.5.
3127
3128 ** The motion commands "next", "finish", "until", and "advance" now
3129 work better when exceptions are thrown. In particular, GDB will
3130 no longer lose control of the inferior; instead, the GDB will
3131 stop the inferior at the point at which the exception is caught.
3132 This functionality requires a change in the exception handling
3133 code that was introduced in GCC 4.5.
3134
3135 * GDB now follows GCC's rules on accessing volatile objects when
3136 reading or writing target state during expression evaluation.
3137 One notable difference to prior behavior is that "print x = 0"
3138 no longer generates a read of x; the value of the assignment is
3139 now always taken directly from the value being assigned.
3140
3141 * GDB now has some support for using labels in the program's source in
3142 linespecs. For instance, you can use "advance label" to continue
3143 execution to a label.
3144
3145 * GDB now has support for reading and writing a new .gdb_index
3146 section. This section holds a fast index of DWARF debugging
3147 information and can be used to greatly speed up GDB startup and
3148 operation. See the documentation for `save gdb-index' for details.
3149
3150 * The "watch" command now accepts an optional "-location" argument.
3151 When used, this causes GDB to watch the memory referred to by the
3152 expression. Such a watchpoint is never deleted due to it going out
3153 of scope.
3154
3155 * GDB now supports thread debugging of core dumps on GNU/Linux.
3156
3157 GDB now activates thread debugging using the libthread_db library
3158 when debugging GNU/Linux core dumps, similarly to when debugging
3159 live processes. As a result, when debugging a core dump file, GDB
3160 is now able to display pthread_t ids of threads. For example, "info
3161 threads" shows the same output as when debugging the process when it
3162 was live. In earlier releases, you'd see something like this:
3163
3164 (gdb) info threads
3165 * 1 LWP 6780 main () at main.c:10
3166
3167 While now you see this:
3168
3169 (gdb) info threads
3170 * 1 Thread 0x7f0f5712a700 (LWP 6780) main () at main.c:10
3171
3172 It is also now possible to inspect TLS variables when debugging core
3173 dumps.
3174
3175 When debugging a core dump generated on a machine other than the one
3176 used to run GDB, you may need to point GDB at the correct
3177 libthread_db library with the "set libthread-db-search-path"
3178 command. See the user manual for more details on this command.
3179
3180 * When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
3181 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports ranged breakpoints,
3182 which stop execution of the inferior whenever it executes an instruction
3183 at any address within the specified range. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
3184 section in the user manual for more details.
3185
3186 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
3187
3188 ** GDBserver is now supported on PowerPC LynxOS (versions 4.x and 5.x),
3189 and i686 LynxOS (version 5.x).
3190
3191 ** GDBserver is now supported on Blackfin Linux.
3192
3193 * New native configurations
3194
3195 ia64 HP-UX ia64-*-hpux*
3196
3197 * New targets:
3198
3199 Analog Devices, Inc. Blackfin Processor bfin-*
3200
3201 * Ada task switching is now supported on sparc-elf targets when
3202 debugging a program using the Ravenscar Profile. For more information,
3203 see the "Tasking Support when using the Ravenscar Profile" section
3204 in the GDB user manual.
3205
3206 * Guile support was removed.
3207
3208 * New features in the GNU simulator
3209
3210 ** The --map-info flag lists all known core mappings.
3211
3212 ** CFI flashes may be simulated via the "cfi" device.
3213
3214 *** Changes in GDB 7.2
3215
3216 * Shared library support for remote targets by default
3217
3218 When GDB is configured for a generic, non-OS specific target, like
3219 for example, --target=arm-eabi or one of the many *-*-elf targets,
3220 GDB now queries remote stubs for loaded shared libraries using the
3221 `qXfer:libraries:read' packet. Previously, shared library support
3222 was always disabled for such configurations.
3223
3224 * C++ Improvements:
3225
3226 ** Argument Dependent Lookup (ADL)
3227
3228 In C++ ADL lookup directs function search to the namespaces of its
3229 arguments even if the namespace has not been imported.
3230 For example:
3231 namespace A
3232 {
3233 class B { };
3234 void foo (B) { }
3235 }
3236 ...
3237 A::B b
3238 foo(b)
3239 Here the compiler will search for `foo' in the namespace of 'b'
3240 and find A::foo. GDB now supports this. This construct is commonly
3241 used in the Standard Template Library for operators.
3242
3243 ** Improved User Defined Operator Support
3244
3245 In addition to member operators, GDB now supports lookup of operators
3246 defined in a namespace and imported with a `using' directive, operators
3247 defined in the global scope, operators imported implicitly from an
3248 anonymous namespace, and the ADL operators mentioned in the previous
3249 entry.
3250 GDB now also supports proper overload resolution for all the previously
3251 mentioned flavors of operators.
3252
3253 ** static const class members
3254
3255 Printing of static const class members that are initialized in the
3256 class definition has been fixed.
3257
3258 * Windows Thread Information Block access.
3259
3260 On Windows targets, GDB now supports displaying the Windows Thread
3261 Information Block (TIB) structure. This structure is visible either
3262 by using the new command `info w32 thread-information-block' or, by
3263 dereferencing the new convenience variable named `$_tlb', a
3264 thread-specific pointer to the TIB. This feature is also supported
3265 when remote debugging using GDBserver.
3266
3267 * Static tracepoints
3268
3269 Static tracepoints are calls in the user program into a tracing
3270 library. One such library is a port of the LTTng kernel tracer to
3271 userspace --- UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer, http://lttng.org/ust).
3272 When debugging with GDBserver, GDB now supports combining the GDB
3273 tracepoint machinery with such libraries. For example: the user can
3274 use GDB to probe a static tracepoint marker (a call from the user
3275 program into the tracing library) with the new "strace" command (see
3276 "New commands" below). This creates a "static tracepoint" in the
3277 breakpoint list, that can be manipulated with the same feature set
3278 as fast and regular tracepoints. E.g., collect registers, local and
3279 global variables, collect trace state variables, and define
3280 tracepoint conditions. In addition, the user can collect extra
3281 static tracepoint marker specific data, by collecting the new
3282 $_sdata internal variable. When analyzing the trace buffer, you can
3283 inspect $_sdata like any other variable available to GDB. For more
3284 information, see the "Tracepoints" chapter in GDB user manual. New
3285 remote packets have been defined to support static tracepoints, see
3286 the "New remote packets" section below.
3287
3288 * Better reconstruction of tracepoints after disconnected tracing
3289
3290 GDB will attempt to download the original source form of tracepoint
3291 definitions when starting a trace run, and then will upload these
3292 upon reconnection to the target, resulting in a more accurate
3293 reconstruction of the tracepoints that are in use on the target.
3294
3295 * Observer mode
3296
3297 You can now exercise direct control over the ways that GDB can
3298 affect your program. For instance, you can disallow the setting of
3299 breakpoints, so that the program can run continuously (assuming
3300 non-stop mode). In addition, the "observer" variable is available
3301 to switch all of the different controls; in observer mode, GDB
3302 cannot affect the target's behavior at all, which is useful for
3303 tasks like diagnosing live systems in the field.
3304
3305 * The new convenience variable $_thread holds the number of the
3306 current thread.
3307
3308 * New remote packets
3309
3310 qGetTIBAddr
3311
3312 Return the address of the Windows Thread Information Block of a given thread.
3313
3314 qRelocInsn
3315
3316 In response to several of the tracepoint packets, the target may now
3317 also respond with a number of intermediate `qRelocInsn' request
3318 packets before the final result packet, to have GDB handle
3319 relocating an instruction to execute at a different address. This
3320 is particularly useful for stubs that support fast tracepoints. GDB
3321 reports support for this feature in the qSupported packet.
3322
3323 qTfSTM, qTsSTM
3324
3325 List static tracepoint markers in the target program.
3326
3327 qTSTMat
3328
3329 List static tracepoint markers at a given address in the target
3330 program.
3331
3332 qXfer:statictrace:read
3333
3334 Read the static trace data collected (by a `collect $_sdata'
3335 tracepoint action). The remote stub reports support for this packet
3336 to gdb's qSupported query.
3337
3338 QAllow
3339
3340 Send the current settings of GDB's permission flags.
3341
3342 QTDPsrc
3343
3344 Send part of the source (textual) form of a tracepoint definition,
3345 which includes location, conditional, and action list.
3346
3347 * The source command now accepts a -s option to force searching for the
3348 script in the source search path even if the script name specifies
3349 a directory.
3350
3351 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
3352
3353 - GDBserver now support tracepoints (including fast tracepoints, and
3354 static tracepoints). The feature is currently supported by the
3355 i386-linux and amd64-linux builds. See the "Tracepoints support
3356 in gdbserver" section in the manual for more information.
3357
3358 GDBserver JIT compiles the tracepoint's conditional agent
3359 expression bytecode into native code whenever possible for low
3360 overhead dynamic tracepoints conditionals. For such tracepoints,
3361 an expression that examines program state is evaluated when the
3362 tracepoint is reached, in order to determine whether to capture
3363 trace data. If the condition is simple and false, processing the
3364 tracepoint finishes very quickly and no data is gathered.
3365
3366 GDBserver interfaces with the UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer) library
3367 for static tracepoints support.
3368
3369 - GDBserver now supports x86_64 Windows 64-bit debugging.
3370
3371 * GDB now sends xmlRegisters= in qSupported packet to indicate that
3372 it understands register description.
3373
3374 * The --batch flag now disables pagination and queries.
3375
3376 * X86 general purpose registers
3377
3378 GDB now supports reading/writing byte, word and double-word x86
3379 general purpose registers directly. This means you can use, say,
3380 $ah or $ax to refer, respectively, to the byte register AH and
3381 16-bit word register AX that are actually portions of the 32-bit
3382 register EAX or 64-bit register RAX.
3383
3384 * The `commands' command now accepts a range of breakpoints to modify.
3385 A plain `commands' following a command that creates multiple
3386 breakpoints affects all the breakpoints set by that command. This
3387 applies to breakpoints set by `rbreak', and also applies when a
3388 single `break' command creates multiple breakpoints (e.g.,
3389 breakpoints on overloaded c++ functions).
3390
3391 * The `rbreak' command now accepts a filename specification as part of
3392 its argument, limiting the functions selected by the regex to those
3393 in the specified file.
3394
3395 * Support for remote debugging Windows and SymbianOS shared libraries
3396 from Unix hosts has been improved. Non Windows GDB builds now can
3397 understand target reported file names that follow MS-DOS based file
3398 system semantics, such as file names that include drive letters and
3399 use the backslash character as directory separator. This makes it
3400 possible to transparently use the "set sysroot" and "set
3401 solib-search-path" on Unix hosts to point as host copies of the
3402 target's shared libraries. See the new command "set
3403 target-file-system-kind" described below, and the "Commands to
3404 specify files" section in the user manual for more information.
3405
3406 * New commands
3407
3408 eval template, expressions...
3409 Convert the values of one or more expressions under the control
3410 of the string template to a command line, and call it.
3411
3412 set target-file-system-kind unix|dos-based|auto
3413 show target-file-system-kind
3414 Set or show the assumed file system kind for target reported file
3415 names.
3416
3417 save breakpoints <filename>
3418 Save all current breakpoint definitions to a file suitable for use
3419 in a later debugging session. To read the saved breakpoint
3420 definitions, use the `source' command.
3421
3422 `save tracepoints' is a new alias for `save-tracepoints'. The latter
3423 is now deprecated.
3424
3425 info static-tracepoint-markers
3426 Display information about static tracepoint markers in the target.
3427
3428 strace FN | FILE:LINE | *ADDR | -m MARKER_ID
3429 Define a static tracepoint by probing a marker at the given
3430 function, line, address, or marker ID.
3431
3432 set observer on|off
3433 show observer
3434 Enable and disable observer mode.
3435
3436 set may-write-registers on|off
3437 set may-write-memory on|off
3438 set may-insert-breakpoints on|off
3439 set may-insert-tracepoints on|off
3440 set may-insert-fast-tracepoints on|off
3441 set may-interrupt on|off
3442 Set individual permissions for GDB effects on the target. Note that
3443 some of these settings can have undesirable or surprising
3444 consequences, particularly when changed in the middle of a session.
3445 For instance, disabling the writing of memory can prevent
3446 breakpoints from being inserted, cause single-stepping to fail, or
3447 even crash your program, if you disable after breakpoints have been
3448 inserted. However, GDB should not crash.
3449
3450 set record memory-query on|off
3451 show record memory-query
3452 Control whether to stop the inferior if memory changes caused
3453 by an instruction cannot be recorded.
3454
3455 * Changed commands
3456
3457 disassemble
3458 The disassemble command now supports "start,+length" form of two arguments.
3459
3460 * Python scripting
3461
3462 ** GDB now provides a new directory location, called the python directory,
3463 where Python scripts written for GDB can be installed. The location
3464 of that directory is <data-directory>/python, where <data-directory>
3465 is the GDB data directory. For more details, see section `Scripting
3466 GDB using Python' in the manual.
3467
3468 ** The GDB Python API now has access to breakpoints, symbols, symbol
3469 tables, program spaces, inferiors, threads and frame's code blocks.
3470 Additionally, GDB Parameters can now be created from the API, and
3471 manipulated via set/show in the CLI.
3472
3473 ** New functions gdb.target_charset, gdb.target_wide_charset,
3474 gdb.progspaces, gdb.current_progspace, and gdb.string_to_argv.
3475
3476 ** New exception gdb.GdbError.
3477
3478 ** Pretty-printers are now also looked up in the current program space.
3479
3480 ** Pretty-printers can now be individually enabled and disabled.
3481
3482 ** GDB now looks for names of Python scripts to auto-load in a
3483 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts', in addition to looking
3484 for a OBJFILE-gdb.py script when OBJFILE is read by the debugger.
3485
3486 * Tracepoint actions were unified with breakpoint commands. In particular,
3487 there are no longer differences in "info break" output for breakpoints and
3488 tracepoints and the "commands" command can be used for both tracepoints and
3489 regular breakpoints.
3490
3491 * New targets
3492
3493 ARM Symbian arm*-*-symbianelf*
3494
3495 * D language support.
3496 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the D programming
3497 language.
3498
3499 * GDB now supports the extended ptrace interface for PowerPC which is
3500 available since Linux kernel version 2.6.34. This automatically enables
3501 any hardware breakpoints and additional hardware watchpoints available in
3502 the processor. The old ptrace interface exposes just one hardware
3503 watchpoint and no hardware breakpoints.
3504
3505 * GDB is now able to use the Data Value Compare (DVC) register available on
3506 embedded PowerPC processors to implement in hardware simple watchpoint
3507 conditions of the form:
3508
3509 watch ADDRESS|VARIABLE if ADDRESS|VARIABLE == CONSTANT EXPRESSION
3510
3511 This works in native GDB running on Linux kernels with the extended ptrace
3512 interface mentioned above.
3513
3514 *** Changes in GDB 7.1
3515
3516 * C++ Improvements
3517
3518 ** Namespace Support
3519
3520 GDB now supports importing of namespaces in C++. This enables the
3521 user to inspect variables from imported namespaces. Support for
3522 namepace aliasing has also been added. So, if a namespace is
3523 aliased in the current scope (e.g. namepace C=A; ) the user can
3524 print variables using the alias (e.g. (gdb) print C::x).
3525
3526 ** Bug Fixes
3527
3528 All known bugs relating to the printing of virtual base class were
3529 fixed. It is now possible to call overloaded static methods using a
3530 qualified name.
3531
3532 ** Cast Operators
3533
3534 The C++ cast operators static_cast<>, dynamic_cast<>, const_cast<>,
3535 and reinterpret_cast<> are now handled by the C++ expression parser.
3536
3537 * New targets
3538
3539 Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze-*-*
3540 Renesas RX rx-*-elf
3541
3542 * New Simulators
3543
3544 Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze
3545 Renesas RX rx
3546
3547 * Multi-program debugging.
3548
3549 GDB now has support for multi-program (a.k.a. multi-executable or
3550 multi-exec) debugging. This allows for debugging multiple inferiors
3551 simultaneously each running a different program under the same GDB
3552 session. See "Debugging Multiple Inferiors and Programs" in the
3553 manual for more information. This implied some user visible changes
3554 in the multi-inferior support. For example, "info inferiors" now
3555 lists inferiors that are not running yet or that have exited
3556 already. See also "New commands" and "New options" below.
3557
3558 * New tracing features
3559
3560 GDB's tracepoint facility now includes several new features:
3561
3562 ** Trace state variables
3563
3564 GDB tracepoints now include support for trace state variables, which
3565 are variables managed by the target agent during a tracing
3566 experiment. They are useful for tracepoints that trigger each
3567 other, so for instance one tracepoint can count hits in a variable,
3568 and then a second tracepoint has a condition that is true when the
3569 count reaches a particular value. Trace state variables share the
3570 $-syntax of GDB convenience variables, and can appear in both
3571 tracepoint actions and condition expressions. Use the "tvariable"
3572 command to create, and "info tvariables" to view; see "Trace State
3573 Variables" in the manual for more detail.
3574
3575 ** Fast tracepoints
3576
3577 GDB now includes an option for defining fast tracepoints, which
3578 targets may implement more efficiently, such as by installing a jump
3579 into the target agent rather than a trap instruction. The resulting
3580 speedup can be by two orders of magnitude or more, although the
3581 tradeoff is that some program locations on some target architectures
3582 might not allow fast tracepoint installation, for instance if the
3583 instruction to be replaced is shorter than the jump. To request a
3584 fast tracepoint, use the "ftrace" command, with syntax identical to
3585 the regular trace command.
3586
3587 ** Disconnected tracing
3588
3589 It is now possible to detach GDB from the target while it is running
3590 a trace experiment, then reconnect later to see how the experiment
3591 is going. In addition, a new variable disconnected-tracing lets you
3592 tell the target agent whether to continue running a trace if the
3593 connection is lost unexpectedly.
3594
3595 ** Trace files
3596
3597 GDB now has the ability to save the trace buffer into a file, and
3598 then use that file as a target, similarly to you can do with
3599 corefiles. You can select trace frames, print data that was
3600 collected in them, and use tstatus to display the state of the
3601 tracing run at the moment that it was saved. To create a trace
3602 file, use "tsave <filename>", and to use it, do "target tfile
3603 <name>".
3604
3605 ** Circular trace buffer
3606
3607 You can ask the target agent to handle the trace buffer as a
3608 circular buffer, discarding the oldest trace frames to make room for
3609 newer ones, by setting circular-trace-buffer to on. This feature may
3610 not be available for all target agents.
3611
3612 * Changed commands
3613
3614 disassemble
3615 The disassemble command, when invoked with two arguments, now requires
3616 the arguments to be comma-separated.
3617
3618 info variables
3619 The info variables command now displays variable definitions. Files
3620 which only declare a variable are not shown.
3621
3622 source
3623 The source command is now capable of sourcing Python scripts.
3624 This feature is dependent on the debugger being build with Python
3625 support.
3626
3627 Related to this enhancement is also the introduction of a new command
3628 "set script-extension" (see below).
3629
3630 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
3631
3632 record save [<FILENAME>]
3633 Save a file (in core file format) containing the process record
3634 execution log for replay debugging at a later time.
3635
3636 record restore <FILENAME>
3637 Restore the process record execution log that was saved at an
3638 earlier time, for replay debugging.
3639
3640 add-inferior [-copies <N>] [-exec <FILENAME>]
3641 Add a new inferior.
3642
3643 clone-inferior [-copies <N>] [ID]
3644 Make a new inferior ready to execute the same program another
3645 inferior has loaded.
3646
3647 remove-inferior ID
3648 Remove an inferior.
3649
3650 maint info program-spaces
3651 List the program spaces loaded into GDB.
3652
3653 set remote interrupt-sequence [Ctrl-C | BREAK | BREAK-g]
3654 show remote interrupt-sequence
3655 Allow the user to select one of ^C, a BREAK signal or BREAK-g
3656 as the sequence to the remote target in order to interrupt the execution.
3657 Ctrl-C is a default. Some system prefers BREAK which is high level of
3658 serial line for some certain time. Linux kernel prefers BREAK-g, a.k.a
3659 Magic SysRq g. It is BREAK signal and character 'g'.
3660
3661 set remote interrupt-on-connect [on | off]
3662 show remote interrupt-on-connect
3663 When interrupt-on-connect is ON, gdb sends interrupt-sequence to
3664 remote target when gdb connects to it. This is needed when you debug
3665 Linux kernel.
3666
3667 set remotebreak [on | off]
3668 show remotebreak
3669 Deprecated. Use "set/show remote interrupt-sequence" instead.
3670
3671 tvariable $NAME [ = EXP ]
3672 Create or modify a trace state variable.
3673
3674 info tvariables
3675 List trace state variables and their values.
3676
3677 delete tvariable $NAME ...
3678 Delete one or more trace state variables.
3679
3680 teval EXPR, ...
3681 Evaluate the given expressions without collecting anything into the
3682 trace buffer. (Valid in tracepoint actions only.)
3683
3684 ftrace FN / FILE:LINE / *ADDR
3685 Define a fast tracepoint at the given function, line, or address.
3686
3687 * New expression syntax
3688
3689 GDB now parses the 0b prefix of binary numbers the same way as GCC does.
3690 GDB now parses 0b101010 identically with 42.
3691
3692 * New options
3693
3694 set follow-exec-mode new|same
3695 show follow-exec-mode
3696 Control whether GDB reuses the same inferior across an exec call or
3697 creates a new one. This is useful to be able to restart the old
3698 executable after the inferior having done an exec call.
3699
3700 set default-collect EXPR, ...
3701 show default-collect
3702 Define a list of expressions to be collected at each tracepoint.
3703 This is a useful way to ensure essential items are not overlooked,
3704 such as registers or a critical global variable.
3705
3706 set disconnected-tracing
3707 show disconnected-tracing
3708 If set to 1, the target is instructed to continue tracing if it
3709 loses its connection to GDB. If 0, the target is to stop tracing
3710 upon disconnection.
3711
3712 set circular-trace-buffer
3713 show circular-trace-buffer
3714 If set to on, the target is instructed to use a circular trace buffer
3715 and discard the oldest trace frames instead of stopping the trace due
3716 to a full trace buffer. If set to off, the trace stops when the buffer
3717 fills up. Some targets may not support this.
3718
3719 set script-extension off|soft|strict
3720 show script-extension
3721 If set to "off", the debugger does not perform any script language
3722 recognition, and all sourced files are assumed to be GDB scripts.
3723 If set to "soft" (the default), files are sourced according to
3724 filename extension, falling back to GDB scripts if the first
3725 evaluation failed.
3726 If set to "strict", files are sourced according to filename extension.
3727
3728 set ada trust-PAD-over-XVS on|off
3729 show ada trust-PAD-over-XVS
3730 If off, activate a workaround against a bug in the debugging information
3731 generated by the compiler for PAD types (see gcc/exp_dbug.ads in
3732 the GCC sources for more information about the GNAT encoding and
3733 PAD types in particular). It is always safe to set this option to
3734 off, but this introduces a slight performance penalty. The default
3735 is on.
3736
3737 * Python API Improvements
3738
3739 ** GDB provides the new class gdb.LazyString. This is useful in
3740 some pretty-printing cases. The new method gdb.Value.lazy_string
3741 provides a simple way to create objects of this type.
3742
3743 ** The fields returned by gdb.Type.fields now have an
3744 `is_base_class' attribute.
3745
3746 ** The new method gdb.Type.range returns the range of an array type.
3747
3748 ** The new method gdb.parse_and_eval can be used to parse and
3749 evaluate an expression.
3750
3751 * New remote packets
3752
3753 QTDV
3754 Define a trace state variable.
3755
3756 qTV
3757 Get the current value of a trace state variable.
3758
3759 QTDisconnected
3760 Set desired tracing behavior upon disconnection.
3761
3762 QTBuffer:circular
3763 Set the trace buffer to be linear or circular.
3764
3765 qTfP, qTsP
3766 Get data about the tracepoints currently in use.
3767
3768 * Bug fixes
3769
3770 Process record now works correctly with hardware watchpoints.
3771
3772 Multiple bug fixes have been made to the mips-irix port, making it
3773 much more reliable. In particular:
3774 - Debugging threaded applications is now possible again. Previously,
3775 GDB would hang while starting the program, or while waiting for
3776 the program to stop at a breakpoint.
3777 - Attaching to a running process no longer hangs.
3778 - An error occurring while loading a core file has been fixed.
3779 - Changing the value of the PC register now works again. This fixes
3780 problems observed when using the "jump" command, or when calling
3781 a function from GDB, or even when assigning a new value to $pc.
3782 - With the "finish" and "return" commands, the return value for functions
3783 returning a small array is now correctly printed.
3784 - It is now possible to break on shared library code which gets executed
3785 during a shared library init phase (code executed while executing
3786 their .init section). Previously, the breakpoint would have no effect.
3787 - GDB is now able to backtrace through the signal handler for
3788 non-threaded programs.
3789
3790 PIE (Position Independent Executable) programs debugging is now supported.
3791 This includes debugging execution of PIC (Position Independent Code) shared
3792 libraries although for that, it should be possible to run such libraries as an
3793 executable program.
3794
3795 *** Changes in GDB 7.0
3796
3797 * GDB now has an interface for JIT compilation. Applications that
3798 dynamically generate code can create symbol files in memory and register
3799 them with GDB. For users, the feature should work transparently, and
3800 for JIT developers, the interface is documented in the GDB manual in the
3801 "JIT Compilation Interface" chapter.
3802
3803 * Tracepoints may now be conditional. The syntax is as for
3804 breakpoints; either an "if" clause appended to the "trace" command,
3805 or the "condition" command is available. GDB sends the condition to
3806 the target for evaluation using the same bytecode format as is used
3807 for tracepoint actions.
3808
3809 * The disassemble command now supports: an optional /r modifier, print the
3810 raw instructions in hex as well as in symbolic form, and an optional /m
3811 modifier to print mixed source+assembly.
3812
3813 * Process record and replay
3814
3815 In a architecture environment that supports ``process record and
3816 replay'', ``process record and replay'' target can record a log of
3817 the process execution, and replay it with both forward and reverse
3818 execute commands.
3819
3820 * Reverse debugging: GDB now has new commands reverse-continue, reverse-
3821 step, reverse-next, reverse-finish, reverse-stepi, reverse-nexti, and
3822 set execution-direction {forward|reverse}, for targets that support
3823 reverse execution.
3824
3825 * GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on MIPS/Linux systems. This
3826 feature is available with a native GDB running on kernel version
3827 2.6.28 or later.
3828
3829 * GDB now has support for multi-byte and wide character sets on the
3830 target. Strings whose character type is wchar_t, char16_t, or
3831 char32_t are now correctly printed. GDB supports wide- and unicode-
3832 literals in C, that is, L'x', L"string", u'x', u"string", U'x', and
3833 U"string" syntax. And, GDB allows the "%ls" and "%lc" formats in
3834 `printf'. This feature requires iconv to work properly; if your
3835 system does not have a working iconv, GDB can use GNU libiconv. See
3836 the installation instructions for more information.
3837
3838 * GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
3839 remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
3840 with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
3841 the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
3842
3843 * "info sharedlibrary" now takes an optional regex of libraries to show,
3844 and it now reports if a shared library has no debugging information.
3845
3846 * Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
3847 now complete on file names.
3848
3849 * When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
3850 completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
3851 For instance, consider:
3852
3853 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
3854 # struct example variable;
3855 (gdb) p variable.
3856
3857 If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
3858 completions will be "f1" and "f2".
3859
3860 * Inlined functions are now supported. They show up in backtraces, and
3861 the "step", "next", and "finish" commands handle them automatically.
3862
3863 * GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
3864 operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
3865 macros.
3866
3867 * GDB now supports inspecting extra signal information, exported by
3868 the new $_siginfo convenience variable. The feature is currently
3869 implemented on linux ARM, i386 and amd64.
3870
3871 * GDB can now display the VFP floating point registers and NEON vector
3872 registers on ARM targets. Both ARM GNU/Linux native GDB and gdbserver
3873 can provide these registers (requires Linux 2.6.30 or later). Remote
3874 and simulator targets may also provide them.
3875
3876 * New remote packets
3877
3878 qSearch:memory:
3879 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
3880
3881 QStartNoAckMode
3882 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
3883 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
3884 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
3885
3886 vKill
3887 Kill the process with the specified process ID. Use this in preference
3888 to `k' when multiprocess protocol extensions are supported.
3889
3890 qXfer:osdata:read
3891 Obtains additional operating system information
3892
3893 qXfer:siginfo:read
3894 qXfer:siginfo:write
3895 Read or write additional signal information.
3896
3897 * Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
3898
3899 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
3900 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
3901 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
3902
3903 * GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
3904 DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
3905
3906 * The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
3907 and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
3908 `set/show sh calling-convention'.
3909
3910 * GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
3911 with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
3912
3913 * 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
3914
3915 * Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
3916
3917 * Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
3918 which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
3919
3920 * The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
3921 list of section offsets.
3922
3923 * On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
3924 conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
3925 have also been fixed.
3926
3927 * GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
3928 From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
3929 are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
3930
3931 * GDB now parses C++ symbol and type names more flexibly. For
3932 example, given:
3933
3934 template<typename T> class C { };
3935 C<char const *> c;
3936
3937 GDB will now correctly handle all of:
3938
3939 ptype C<char const *>
3940 ptype C<char const*>
3941 ptype C<const char *>
3942 ptype C<const char*>
3943
3944 * New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
3945
3946 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
3947 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
3948
3949 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
3950 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
3951 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
3952
3953 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
3954 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
3955
3956 - Support for the sparc64-linux-gnu target is now included in
3957 gdbserver.
3958
3959 - The amd64-linux build of gdbserver now supports debugging both
3960 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
3961
3962 - The i386-linux, amd64-linux, and i386-win32 builds of gdbserver
3963 now support hardware watchpoints, and will use them automatically
3964 as appropriate.
3965
3966 * Python scripting
3967
3968 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
3969 available is determined at configure time.
3970
3971 New GDB commands can now be written in Python.
3972
3973 * Ada tasking support
3974
3975 Ada tasks can now be inspected in GDB. The following commands have
3976 been introduced:
3977
3978 info tasks
3979 Print the list of Ada tasks.
3980 info task N
3981 Print detailed information about task number N.
3982 task
3983 Print the task number of the current task.
3984 task N
3985 Switch the context of debugging to task number N.
3986
3987 * Support for user-defined prefixed commands. The "define" command can
3988 add new commands to existing prefixes, e.g. "target".
3989
3990 * Multi-inferior, multi-process debugging.
3991
3992 GDB now has generalized support for multi-inferior debugging. See
3993 "Debugging Multiple Inferiors" in the manual for more information.
3994 Although availability still depends on target support, the command
3995 set is more uniform now. The GNU/Linux specific multi-forks support
3996 has been migrated to this new framework. This implied some user
3997 visible changes; see "New commands" and also "Removed commands"
3998 below.
3999
4000 * Target descriptions can now describe the target OS ABI. See the
4001 "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for more
4002 information.
4003
4004 * Target descriptions can now describe "compatible" architectures
4005 to indicate that the target can execute applications for a different
4006 architecture in addition to those for the main target architecture.
4007 See the "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for
4008 more information.
4009
4010 * Multi-architecture debugging.
4011
4012 GDB now includes general supports for debugging applications on
4013 hybrid systems that use more than one single processor architecture
4014 at the same time. Each such hybrid architecture still requires
4015 specific support to be added. The only hybrid architecture supported
4016 in this version of GDB is the Cell Broadband Engine.
4017
4018 * GDB now supports integrated debugging of Cell/B.E. applications that
4019 use both the PPU and SPU architectures. To enable support for hybrid
4020 Cell/B.E. debugging, you need to configure GDB to support both the
4021 powerpc-linux or powerpc64-linux and the spu-elf targets, using the
4022 --enable-targets configure option.
4023
4024 * Non-stop mode debugging.
4025
4026 For some targets, GDB now supports an optional mode of operation in
4027 which you can examine stopped threads while other threads continue
4028 to execute freely. This is referred to as non-stop mode, with the
4029 old mode referred to as all-stop mode. See the "Non-Stop Mode"
4030 section in the user manual for more information.
4031
4032 To be able to support remote non-stop debugging, a remote stub needs
4033 to implement the non-stop mode remote protocol extensions, as
4034 described in the "Remote Non-Stop" section of the user manual. The
4035 GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been adjusted to support these
4036 extensions on linux targets.
4037
4038 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
4039
4040 catch syscall [NAME(S) | NUMBER(S)]
4041 Catch system calls. Arguments, which should be names of system
4042 calls or their numbers, mean catch only those syscalls. Without
4043 arguments, every syscall will be caught. When the inferior issues
4044 any of the specified syscalls, GDB will stop and announce the system
4045 call, both when it is called and when its call returns. This
4046 feature is currently available with a native GDB running on the
4047 Linux Kernel, under the following architectures: x86, x86_64,
4048 PowerPC and PowerPC64.
4049
4050 find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
4051 val1 [, val2, ...]
4052 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
4053
4054 maint set python print-stack
4055 maint show python print-stack
4056 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
4057
4058 python [CODE]
4059 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
4060
4061 macro define
4062 macro list
4063 macro undef
4064 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
4065 interactively.
4066
4067 info os processes
4068 Show operating system information about processes.
4069
4070 info inferiors
4071 List the inferiors currently under GDB's control.
4072
4073 inferior NUM
4074 Switch focus to inferior number NUM.
4075
4076 detach inferior NUM
4077 Detach from inferior number NUM.
4078
4079 kill inferior NUM
4080 Kill inferior number NUM.
4081
4082 * New options
4083
4084 set spu stop-on-load
4085 show spu stop-on-load
4086 Control whether to stop for new SPE threads during Cell/B.E. debugging.
4087
4088 set spu auto-flush-cache
4089 show spu auto-flush-cache
4090 Control whether to automatically flush the software-managed cache
4091 during Cell/B.E. debugging.
4092
4093 set sh calling-convention
4094 show sh calling-convention
4095 Control the calling convention used when calling SH target functions.
4096
4097 set debug timestamp
4098 show debug timestamp
4099 Control display of timestamps with GDB debugging output.
4100
4101 set disassemble-next-line
4102 show disassemble-next-line
4103 Control display of disassembled source lines or instructions when
4104 the debuggee stops.
4105
4106 set remote noack-packet
4107 show remote noack-packet
4108 Set/show the use of remote protocol QStartNoAckMode packet. See above
4109 under "New remote packets."
4110
4111 set remote query-attached-packet
4112 show remote query-attached-packet
4113 Control use of remote protocol `qAttached' (query-attached) packet.
4114
4115 set remote read-siginfo-object
4116 show remote read-siginfo-object
4117 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:read' (read-siginfo-object)
4118 packet.
4119
4120 set remote write-siginfo-object
4121 show remote write-siginfo-object
4122 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:write' (write-siginfo-object)
4123 packet.
4124
4125 set remote reverse-continue
4126 show remote reverse-continue
4127 Control use of remote protocol 'bc' (reverse-continue) packet.
4128
4129 set remote reverse-step
4130 show remote reverse-step
4131 Control use of remote protocol 'bs' (reverse-step) packet.
4132
4133 set displaced-stepping
4134 show displaced-stepping
4135 Control displaced stepping mode. Displaced stepping is a way to
4136 single-step over breakpoints without removing them from the debuggee.
4137 Also known as "out-of-line single-stepping".
4138
4139 set debug displaced
4140 show debug displaced
4141 Control display of debugging info for displaced stepping.
4142
4143 maint set internal-error
4144 maint show internal-error
4145 Control what GDB does when an internal error is detected.
4146
4147 maint set internal-warning
4148 maint show internal-warning
4149 Control what GDB does when an internal warning is detected.
4150
4151 set exec-wrapper
4152 show exec-wrapper
4153 unset exec-wrapper
4154 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
4155
4156 set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
4157 show multiple-symbols
4158 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
4159 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
4160 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
4161
4162 set breakpoint always-inserted
4163 show breakpoint always-inserted
4164 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
4165 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
4166 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
4167
4168 set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
4169 show arm fallback-mode
4170 set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
4171 show arm force-mode
4172 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
4173 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
4174 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
4175 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
4176
4177 set disable-randomization
4178 show disable-randomization
4179 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
4180 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
4181 multiple debugging sessions.
4182
4183 set non-stop
4184 show non-stop
4185 Control whether other threads are stopped or not when some thread hits
4186 a breakpoint.
4187
4188 set target-async
4189 show target-async
4190 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
4191 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
4192 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
4193 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
4194
4195 set target-wide-charset
4196 show target-wide-charset
4197 The target-wide-charset is the name of the character set that GDB
4198 uses when printing characters whose type is wchar_t.
4199
4200 set tcp auto-retry (on|off)
4201 show tcp auto-retry
4202 set tcp connect-timeout
4203 show tcp connect-timeout
4204 These commands allow GDB to retry failed TCP connections to a remote stub
4205 with a specified timeout period; this is useful if the stub is launched
4206 in parallel with GDB but may not be ready to accept connections immediately.
4207
4208 set libthread-db-search-path
4209 show libthread-db-search-path
4210 Control list of directories which GDB will search for appropriate
4211 libthread_db.
4212
4213 set schedule-multiple (on|off)
4214 show schedule-multiple
4215 Allow GDB to resume all threads of all processes or only threads of
4216 the current process.
4217
4218 set stack-cache
4219 show stack-cache
4220 Use more aggressive caching for accesses to the stack. This improves
4221 performance of remote debugging (particularly backtraces) without
4222 affecting correctness.
4223
4224 set interactive-mode (on|off|auto)
4225 show interactive-mode
4226 Control whether GDB runs in interactive mode (on) or not (off).
4227 When in interactive mode, GDB waits for the user to answer all
4228 queries. Otherwise, GDB does not wait and assumes the default
4229 answer. When set to auto (the default), GDB determines which
4230 mode to use based on the stdin settings.
4231
4232 * Removed commands
4233
4234 info forks
4235 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `info
4236 inferiors' command. To list checkpoints, you can still use the
4237 `info checkpoints' command, which was an alias for the `info forks'
4238 command.
4239
4240 fork NUM
4241 Replaced by the new `inferior' command. To switch between
4242 checkpoints, you can still use the `restart' command, which was an
4243 alias for the `fork' command.
4244
4245 process PID
4246 This is removed, since some targets don't have a notion of
4247 processes. To switch between processes, you can still use the
4248 `inferior' command using GDB's own inferior number.
4249
4250 delete fork NUM
4251 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `kill
4252 inferior' command. To delete a checkpoint, you can still use the
4253 `delete checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `delete
4254 fork' command.
4255
4256 detach fork NUM
4257 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `detach
4258 inferior' command. To detach a checkpoint, you can still use the
4259 `detach checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `detach
4260 fork' command.
4261
4262 * New native configurations
4263
4264 x86/x86_64 Darwin i[34567]86-*-darwin*
4265
4266 x86_64 MinGW x86_64-*-mingw*
4267
4268 * New targets
4269
4270 Lattice Mico32 lm32-*
4271 x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
4272 x86_64 DICOS x86_64-*-dicos*
4273 S+core 3 score-*-*
4274
4275 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports x86 Windows CE
4276 (mingw32ce) debugging.
4277
4278 * Removed commands
4279
4280 catch load
4281 catch unload
4282 These commands were actually not implemented on any target.
4283
4284 *** Changes in GDB 6.8
4285
4286 * New native configurations
4287
4288 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
4289 Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
4290
4291 * New targets
4292
4293 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
4294 Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
4295
4296 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
4297
4298 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
4299 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
4300 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
4301 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
4302
4303 * GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
4304 (mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
4305
4306 * Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
4307 is resolved.
4308
4309 * GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
4310 including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
4311 and in inlined functions.
4312
4313 * GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
4314 accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
4315 more than one contiguous range of addresses.
4316
4317 * Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
4318
4319 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
4320 registers on PowerPC targets.
4321
4322 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
4323 targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
4324
4325 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
4326 commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
4327
4328 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
4329 extended-remote mode.
4330
4331 * hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
4332 The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
4333 error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
4334 The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
4335
4336 * GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
4337 building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
4338 target architectures.
4339
4340 * GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
4341 Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
4342 now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
4343 stored in two consecutive float registers.
4344
4345 * The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
4346 breakpoints now.
4347
4348 * Improved support for debugging Ada
4349 Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
4350 include:
4351 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
4352 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
4353 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
4354 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
4355 of an assignment
4356 - Improved command completion in Ada
4357 - Several bug fixes
4358
4359 * GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
4360 process.
4361
4362 * New commands
4363
4364 set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
4365 show print frame-arguments
4366 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
4367 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
4368
4369 remote put
4370 remote get
4371 remote delete
4372 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
4373
4374 * New MI commands
4375
4376 -target-file-put
4377 -target-file-get
4378 -target-file-delete
4379 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
4380
4381 * New remote packets
4382
4383 vFile:open:
4384 vFile:close:
4385 vFile:pread:
4386 vFile:pwrite:
4387 vFile:unlink:
4388 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
4389
4390 vAttach
4391 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
4392 mode.
4393
4394 vRun
4395 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
4396
4397 *** Changes in GDB 6.7
4398
4399 * Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
4400 bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
4401 Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
4402
4403 * When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
4404 symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
4405 -Bsymbolic linker option.
4406
4407 * When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
4408 recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
4409 is not supported.
4410
4411 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
4412 frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
4413
4414 * GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
4415 32-bit or 64-bit register values.
4416
4417 * Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
4418
4419 * GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
4420 target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
4421 a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
4422
4423 * Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
4424 automatically displayed as character or string data.
4425
4426 * The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
4427 arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
4428 as strings.
4429
4430 * Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
4431 for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
4432 only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
4433
4434 * GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
4435 iWMMXt coprocessor.
4436
4437 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
4438 ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
4439 has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
4440
4441 * GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
4442
4443 * GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
4444
4445 * The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
4446 layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
4447 segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
4448
4449 * The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
4450 immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
4451
4452 * The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
4453 "library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
4454 packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
4455 where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
4456 Windows and SymbianOS).
4457
4458 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
4459 (DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
4460
4461 * GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
4462 according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
4463
4464 * New commands
4465
4466 set remoteflow
4467 show remoteflow
4468 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
4469 when debugging using remote targets.
4470
4471 set mem inaccessible-by-default
4472 show mem inaccessible-by-default
4473 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
4474 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
4475 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
4476 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
4477 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
4478
4479 set breakpoint auto-hw
4480 show breakpoint auto-hw
4481 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
4482 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
4483 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
4484 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
4485 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
4486 including "next" and "finish".
4487
4488 catch exception
4489 catch exception unhandled
4490 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
4491
4492 catch assert
4493 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
4494
4495 set sysroot
4496 show sysroot
4497 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
4498 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
4499 an alias to "set sysroot".
4500
4501 info spu
4502 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
4503 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
4504 architecture.
4505
4506 * New native configurations
4507
4508 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
4509
4510 set tdesc filename
4511 unset tdesc filename
4512 show tdesc filename
4513 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
4514 not query the target for its built-in description.
4515
4516 * New targets
4517
4518 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
4519 MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
4520 Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
4521
4522 * New remote packets
4523
4524 QPassSignals:
4525 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
4526 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
4527
4528 qXfer:features:read:
4529 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
4530 features.
4531
4532 qXfer:spu:read:
4533 qXfer:spu:write:
4534 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
4535 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
4536
4537 qXfer:libraries:read:
4538 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
4539 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
4540 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
4541 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
4542
4543 * Removed targets
4544
4545 Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
4546
4547 alpha*-*-osf1*
4548 alpha*-*-osf2*
4549 d10v-*-*
4550 hppa*-*-hiux*
4551 i[34567]86-ncr-*
4552 i[34567]86-*-dgux*
4553 i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
4554 i[34567]86-*-netware*
4555 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
4556 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
4557 i[34567]86-*-sco*
4558 i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
4559 i[34567]86-*-sysv4*
4560 i[34567]86-*-sysv5*
4561 i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
4562 i[34567]86-*-unixware*
4563 i[34567]86-*-sysv*
4564 i[34567]86-*-isc*
4565 m68*-cisco*-*
4566 m68*-tandem-*
4567 mips*-*-pe
4568 rs6000-*-lynxos*
4569 sh*-*-pe
4570
4571 * Other removed features
4572
4573 target abug
4574 target cpu32bug
4575 target est
4576 target rom68k
4577
4578 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
4579
4580 target hms
4581 target e7000
4582 target sh3
4583 target sh3e
4584
4585 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
4586 H8/300.
4587
4588 target ocd
4589
4590 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
4591 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
4592 interfaces.
4593
4594 DWARF 1 support
4595
4596 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
4597 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
4598
4599 Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
4600
4601 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
4602 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
4603 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
4604 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
4605
4606 MIPS ".pdr" sections
4607
4608 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
4609 in debugging information.
4610
4611 Scheme support
4612
4613 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
4614 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
4615
4616 set mips stack-arg-size
4617 set mips saved-gpreg-size
4618
4619 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
4620
4621 *** Changes in GDB 6.6
4622
4623 * New targets
4624
4625 Xtensa xtensa-elf
4626 Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
4627
4628 * GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
4629 (mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
4630 running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
4631
4632 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
4633 Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
4634 supported.
4635
4636 * The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
4637 broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
4638
4639 * The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
4640 stub provides the required support.
4641
4642 * Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
4643 longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
4644
4645 * New commands
4646
4647 set substitute-path
4648 unset substitute-path
4649 show substitute-path
4650 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
4651 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
4652 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
4653 between compilation and debugging.
4654
4655 set trace-commands
4656 show trace-commands
4657 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
4658 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
4659 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
4660
4661 * REMOVED features
4662
4663 The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
4664
4665 Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
4666 an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
4667
4668 The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
4669
4670 * New remote packets
4671
4672 qSupported:
4673 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
4674 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
4675 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
4676 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
4677 target.
4678
4679 qXfer:auxv:read:
4680 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
4681 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
4682
4683 qXfer:memory-map:read:
4684 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
4685 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
4686
4687 vFlashErase:
4688 vFlashWrite:
4689 vFlashDone:
4690 Erase and program a flash memory device.
4691
4692 * Removed remote packets
4693
4694 qPart:auxv:read:
4695 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
4696 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
4697
4698 *** Changes in GDB 6.5
4699
4700 * New targets
4701
4702 Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
4703
4704 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
4705
4706 * New commands
4707
4708 init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
4709 only if it doesn't already have a value.
4710
4711 The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
4712
4713 checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
4714
4715 restart <n> Return the program state to a
4716 previously saved state.
4717
4718 info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
4719
4720 delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
4721
4722 set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
4723 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
4724
4725 info forks List forks of the user program that
4726 are available to be debugged.
4727
4728 fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
4729 forks of the user program that are
4730 available to be debugged.
4731
4732 delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
4733 that are available to be debugged (and
4734 kill the forked process).
4735
4736 detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
4737 that are available to be debugged (and
4738 allow the process to continue).
4739
4740 * New architecture
4741
4742 Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
4743
4744 * Improved Windows host support
4745
4746 GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
4747 native console support, and remote communications using either
4748 network sockets or serial ports.
4749
4750 * Improved Modula-2 language support
4751
4752 GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
4753 basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
4754 pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
4755 printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
4756 written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
4757 GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
4758
4759 * REMOVED features
4760
4761 The ARM rdi-share module.
4762
4763 The Netware NLM debug server.
4764
4765 *** Changes in GDB 6.4
4766
4767 * New native configurations
4768
4769 OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
4770 OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
4771
4772 * New targets
4773
4774 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
4775
4776 * New command line options
4777
4778 --batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
4779 --return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
4780 the child (debugged) program exited with.
4781 --eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
4782 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
4783 specified multiple times and in conjunction
4784 with the --command (-x) option.
4785
4786 * Deprecated commands removed
4787
4788 The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
4789 removed:
4790
4791 Command Replacement
4792 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
4793 othernames set arm disassembler
4794 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
4795 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
4796 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
4797 regs info registers
4798
4799 * New BSD user-level threads support
4800
4801 It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
4802 library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
4803 configurations are:
4804
4805 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
4806 FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
4807 OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
4808
4809 Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
4810 are not yet supported.
4811
4812 * New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
4813 (Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
4814
4815 * REMOVED configurations and files
4816
4817 VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
4818 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
4819 National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
4820
4821 * New "set print array-indexes" command
4822
4823 After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
4824 when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
4825 behavior.
4826
4827 * VAX floating point support
4828
4829 GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
4830
4831 * User-defined command support
4832
4833 In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
4834 to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
4835 section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
4836
4837 *** Changes in GDB 6.3:
4838
4839 * New command line option
4840
4841 GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
4842 debugging.
4843
4844 * GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
4845
4846 GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
4847 information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
4848 by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
4849 proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
4850 to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
4851
4852 * Internationalization
4853
4854 When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
4855 internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
4856 continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
4857
4858 * Ada
4859
4860 Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
4861 implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
4862 into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
4863
4864 * New native configurations
4865
4866 GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
4867
4868 * Remote 'p' packet
4869
4870 GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
4871 packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
4872
4873 * END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
4874
4875 GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
4876 The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
4877 features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
4878 i386 application).
4879
4880 GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
4881 compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
4882 continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
4883 configurations:
4884
4885 hppa-*-hpux
4886 ia64-*-aix
4887 mips-*-irix*
4888 *-*-lynx
4889 mips-*-linux-gnu
4890 sds protocol
4891 xdr protocol
4892 powerpc bdm protocol
4893
4894 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
4895 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
4896
4897 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
4898
4899 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
4900 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
4901 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
4902 permanently REMOVED.
4903
4904 h8300-*-*
4905 mcore-*-*
4906 mn10300-*-*
4907 ns32k-*-*
4908 sh64-*-*
4909 v850-*-*
4910
4911 *** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
4912
4913 * MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
4914
4915 When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
4916 heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
4917 been fixed.
4918
4919 * MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
4920
4921 When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
4922 fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
4923 IRIX long double values).
4924
4925 * VAX and "next"
4926
4927 A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
4928 command. This problem has been fixed.
4929
4930 *** Changes in GDB 6.2:
4931
4932 * Fix for ``many threads''
4933
4934 On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
4935 rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
4936 error message:
4937
4938 ptrace: No such process.
4939 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
4940
4941 This problem has been fixed.
4942
4943 * "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
4944
4945 Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
4946 GDB to dump core).
4947
4948 * New ``start'' command.
4949
4950 This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
4951
4952 * New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
4953
4954 Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
4955 live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
4956 platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
4957
4958 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
4959 FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
4960 NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
4961 NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
4962 NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
4963 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
4964 OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
4965 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
4966 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
4967
4968 * Signal trampoline code overhauled
4969
4970 Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
4971 These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
4972 of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
4973 call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
4974 signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
4975
4976 Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
4977 features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
4978 include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
4979
4980 * Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
4981
4982 * New native configurations
4983
4984 GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
4985 OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
4986 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
4987 OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
4988 OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
4989 NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
4990 OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
4991
4992 * END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
4993
4994 GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
4995 The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
4996 including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
4997 migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
4998 compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
4999 work, was also included.
5000
5001 GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
5002 module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
5003
5004 h8300-*-*
5005 mcore-*-*
5006 mn10300-*-*
5007 ns32k-*-*
5008 sh64-*-*
5009 v850-*-*
5010 xstormy16-*-*
5011
5012 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
5013 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
5014
5015 * REMOVED configurations and files
5016
5017 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
5018 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
5019 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
5020 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
5021 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
5022 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
5023 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
5024 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
5025 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
5026 sonymips mips-sony-*
5027 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
5028
5029 *** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
5030
5031 * TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
5032
5033 The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
5034 GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
5035 command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
5036 program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
5037 with GDB".
5038
5039 * Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
5040
5041 Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
5042 libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
5043 cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
5044 GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
5045 shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
5046 the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
5047 are created.
5048
5049 Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
5050
5051 * Fixed ISO-C build problems
5052
5053 The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
5054 non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
5055 compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
5056
5057 * Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
5058
5059 Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
5060 wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
5061
5062 * Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
5063
5064 The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
5065 permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
5066 systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
5067
5068 * Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
5069
5070 Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
5071 has been updated to use constant array sizes.
5072
5073 * Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
5074
5075 GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
5076 its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
5077 panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
5078
5079 * Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
5080
5081 When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
5082 by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
5083 not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
5084
5085 *** Changes in GDB 6.1:
5086
5087 * Removed --with-mmalloc
5088
5089 Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
5090 conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
5091
5092 * Changes in AMD64 configurations
5093
5094 The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
5095 the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
5096 and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
5097 you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
5098
5099 * Revised SPARC target
5100
5101 The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
5102 FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
5103 support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
5104 from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
5105 (Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
5106
5107 * New C++ demangler
5108
5109 GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
5110 names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
5111 with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
5112 programs.
5113
5114 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
5115
5116 GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
5117 arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
5118 encountered these.
5119
5120 * C++ nested types and namespaces
5121
5122 GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
5123 improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
5124 is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
5125 Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
5126 namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
5127 "Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
5128 frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
5129 if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
5130 GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
5131
5132 * New native configurations
5133
5134 NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
5135 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
5136 OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
5137 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
5138 OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
5139
5140 * New debugging protocols
5141
5142 M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
5143
5144 * "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
5145
5146 The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
5147 and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
5148 tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
5149
5150 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
5151
5152 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5153 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5154 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5155 permanently REMOVED.
5156
5157 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
5158 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
5159 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
5160 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
5161 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
5162 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
5163 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
5164 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
5165 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
5166 sonymips mips-sony-*
5167 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
5168
5169 * REMOVED configurations and files
5170
5171 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
5172 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
5173 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
5174 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
5175 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
5176 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
5177 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
5178 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
5179 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
5180 386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
5181 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
5182 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
5183 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
5184 SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
5185 SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
5186 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
5187 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
5188
5189 *** Changes in GDB 6.0:
5190
5191 * Objective-C
5192
5193 Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
5194 integrated into GDB.
5195
5196 * New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
5197
5198 DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
5199 information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
5200 By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
5201 backtraces.
5202
5203 The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
5204 have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
5205 DWARF 2 CFI support.
5206
5207 * Hosted file I/O.
5208
5209 GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
5210 file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
5211 remote protocol documentation for details.
5212
5213 * All targets using the new architecture framework.
5214
5215 All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
5216 architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
5217 to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
5218 ppc32 on ppc64).
5219
5220 * GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
5221
5222 GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
5223 per-thread variables.
5224
5225 * GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
5226
5227 GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
5228 GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
5229
5230 * Separate debug info.
5231
5232 GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
5233 automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
5234 of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
5235 system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
5236 and optional debug files.
5237
5238 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
5239
5240 DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
5241 describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
5242 debugger.
5243
5244 GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
5245 for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
5246
5247 * Java
5248
5249 A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
5250 Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
5251 considered "useable".
5252
5253 * GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
5254
5255 The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
5256 commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
5257 kernel.
5258
5259 * GDB supports logging output to a file
5260
5261 There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
5262 used to capture GDB's output to a file.
5263
5264 * The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
5265
5266 The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
5267 disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
5268 command.
5269
5270 * d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
5271
5272 The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
5273 registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
5274
5275 * Profiling support
5276
5277 A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
5278 be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
5279 session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
5280 "--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
5281 data, for more informative profiling results.
5282
5283 * Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
5284
5285 The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
5286 option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
5287 "mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
5288
5289 Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
5290 removed.
5291
5292 Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
5293 Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
5294 Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
5295 in a subsequent -var-update.
5296
5297 * New native configurations.
5298
5299 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
5300
5301 * Multi-arched targets.
5302
5303 HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
5304 Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
5305
5306 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
5307
5308 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5309 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5310 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5311 permanently REMOVED.
5312
5313 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
5314 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
5315 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
5316 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
5317 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
5318 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
5319 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
5320 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
5321 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
5322 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
5323 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
5324 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
5325
5326 * REMOVED configurations and files
5327
5328 V850EA ISA
5329 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
5330 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
5331 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
5332 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
5333 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
5334 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
5335 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
5336 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
5337 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
5338 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
5339 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
5340 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
5341 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5342
5343 * MIPS $fp behavior changed
5344
5345 The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
5346 the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
5347 context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
5348 address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
5349 The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
5350
5351 *** Changes in GDB 5.3:
5352
5353 * GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
5354
5355 When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
5356 `/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
5357 in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
5358 library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
5359 shared libs like mad''.
5360
5361 * ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
5362
5363 Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
5364 the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
5365 arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
5366 powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
5367
5368 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
5369
5370 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
5371 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
5372 they expand.
5373
5374 The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
5375 invocations in expression, and shows the result.
5376
5377 The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
5378 macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
5379
5380 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
5381 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
5382 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
5383 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
5384
5385 * Multi-arched targets.
5386
5387 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
5388 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
5389 NEC V850 v850-*-*
5390 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
5391 Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
5392 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
5393
5394 * New targets.
5395
5396 Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
5397
5398
5399 * New native configurations
5400
5401 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
5402 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
5403 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
5404 UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
5405
5406 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
5407
5408 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5409 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5410 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5411 permanently REMOVED.
5412
5413 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
5414 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
5415 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
5416 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
5417 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
5418 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
5419 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
5420 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
5421 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
5422 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
5423 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
5424 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
5425 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5426
5427 * OBSOLETE languages
5428
5429 CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
5430
5431 * REMOVED configurations and files
5432
5433 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
5434 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
5435 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
5436 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
5437 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
5438
5439 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
5440
5441 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
5442
5443 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
5444 commands. The default is 1024.
5445
5446 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
5447
5448 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
5449
5450 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
5451
5452 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
5453 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
5454 from a file into memory (restore).
5455
5456 * Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
5457
5458 The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
5459 including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
5460 of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
5461
5462 *** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
5463
5464 * New targets.
5465
5466 Atmel AVR avr*-*-*
5467
5468 * Bug fixes
5469
5470 gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
5471 mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
5472 Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
5473
5474 gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
5475 dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
5476 Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
5477
5478 Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
5479 Surprisingly enough, it works now.
5480 By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
5481
5482 i386 hardware watchpoint support:
5483 avoid misses on second run for some targets.
5484 By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
5485
5486 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
5487
5488 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
5489
5490 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
5491 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
5492 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
5493 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
5494 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
5495 (notably embedded) targets.
5496
5497 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
5498
5499 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
5500 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
5501 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
5502 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
5503
5504 * New command line option
5505
5506 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
5507
5508 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
5509
5510 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
5511 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
5512 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
5513 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
5514 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
5515 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
5516 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
5517 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
5518 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
5519 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
5520
5521 * Changes in ARM configurations.
5522
5523 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
5524 configuration is fully multi-arch.
5525
5526 * New native configurations
5527
5528 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
5529 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
5530 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
5531 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
5532
5533 * New targets
5534
5535 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
5536
5537 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
5538
5539 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5540 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5541 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5542 permanently REMOVED.
5543
5544 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
5545 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
5546 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
5547 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
5548 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
5549
5550 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
5551
5552 * REMOVED configurations and files
5553
5554 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
5555 WDC 65816 w65-*-*
5556 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
5557 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
5558 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
5559 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
5560 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
5561 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
5562 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
5563 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
5564 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
5565 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
5566 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
5567
5568 * Changes to command line processing
5569
5570 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
5571 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
5572
5573 * Changes to key bindings
5574
5575 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
5576
5577 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
5578
5579 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
5580
5581 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
5582 corrupted.
5583
5584 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
5585
5586 Numerous documentation fixes.
5587
5588 Numerous testsuite fixes.
5589
5590 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
5591
5592 * New native configurations
5593
5594 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
5595 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
5596 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
5597 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
5598 ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
5599 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
5600
5601 * New targets
5602
5603 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
5604 CRIS cris-axis
5605 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
5606
5607 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
5608
5609 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
5610 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
5611 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
5612 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
5613 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
5614 WDC 65816 w65-*-*
5615 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
5616 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
5617 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
5618 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
5619 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
5620 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
5621 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
5622 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
5623
5624 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
5625 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
5626
5627 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5628 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5629 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5630 permanently REMOVED.
5631
5632 * REMOVED configurations and files
5633
5634 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
5635 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
5636 Pyramid pyramid-*-*
5637 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
5638 Tahoe tahoe-*-*
5639 ser-ocd.c *-*-*
5640
5641 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
5642
5643 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
5644 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
5645 present.
5646
5647 * Other news:
5648
5649 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
5650
5651 * The MI enabled by default.
5652
5653 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
5654 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
5655 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
5656 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
5657 which is now deprecated.
5658
5659 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
5660
5661 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
5662 main features are supported:
5663
5664 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
5665
5666 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
5667 extension;
5668
5669 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
5670
5671 - a Pascal expression parser.
5672
5673 However, some important features are not yet supported.
5674
5675 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
5676
5677 - there are some problems with boolean types;
5678
5679 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
5680 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
5681
5682 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
5683
5684 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
5685
5686 * Changes in completion.
5687
5688 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
5689 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
5690 users expect at the shell prompt.
5691
5692 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
5693 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
5694 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
5695 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
5696 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
5697 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
5698 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
5699
5700 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
5701
5702 * New platform-independent commands:
5703
5704 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
5705 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
5706 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
5707
5708 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
5709
5710 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
5711 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
5712 many threads as your system allows you to have.
5713
5714 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
5715
5716 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
5717 multi-threaded programs though.
5718
5719 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
5720
5721 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
5722
5723 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
5724 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
5725 supported.)
5726
5727 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
5728
5729 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
5730 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
5731 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
5732 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
5733 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
5734 registers.
5735
5736 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
5737 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
5738 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
5739
5740 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
5741
5742 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
5743 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
5744
5745 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
5746 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
5747 IDT.
5748
5749 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
5750 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
5751 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
5752 a given linear address.
5753
5754 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
5755 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
5756 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
5757
5758 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
5759
5760 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
5761
5762 * Changes in documentation.
5763
5764 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
5765 Documentation License.
5766
5767 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
5768 manual.
5769
5770 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
5771
5772 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
5773 manual.
5774
5775 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
5776 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
5777 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
5778
5779 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
5780
5781 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
5782 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
5783 contents of this file.
5784
5785 * gdba.el deleted
5786
5787 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
5788
5789 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
5790
5791 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
5792
5793 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
5794 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
5795 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
5796 greater level of detail.
5797
5798 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
5799
5800 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
5801 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
5802 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
5803 written.
5804
5805 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
5806
5807 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
5808 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
5809 machines ``out of the box''.
5810
5811 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
5812 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
5813 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
5814 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
5815 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
5816
5817 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
5818 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
5819 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
5820 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
5821 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
5822
5823 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
5824 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
5825 also works.
5826
5827 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
5828 GDB.
5829
5830 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
5831 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
5832 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
5833 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
5834
5835 * New native configurations
5836
5837 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
5838 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
5839
5840 * New targets
5841
5842 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
5843 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
5844 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
5845 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
5846
5847 * OBSOLETE configurations
5848
5849 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
5850 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
5851 Pyramid pyramid-*-*
5852 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
5853 Tahoe tahoe-*-*
5854
5855 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
5856 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
5857 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
5858 be permanently REMOVED.
5859
5860 * Gould support removed
5861
5862 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
5863
5864 * New features for SVR4
5865
5866 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
5867 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
5868 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
5869
5870 * Many C++ enhancements
5871
5872 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
5873 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
5874
5875 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
5876
5877 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
5878 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
5879 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
5880 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
5881
5882 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
5883 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
5884
5885 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
5886
5887 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
5888 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
5889 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
5890
5891 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
5892 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
5893
5894 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
5895
5896 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
5897 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
5898 include ``set remote P-packet''.
5899
5900 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
5901
5902 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
5903 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
5904 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
5905
5906 * ``apropos'' command added.
5907
5908 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
5909 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
5910 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
5911
5912 * New MI interface
5913
5914 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
5915 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
5916 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
5917 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
5918 enabled by configuring with:
5919
5920 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
5921
5922 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
5923
5924 * New native configurations
5925
5926 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
5927 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
5928 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
5929
5930 * New targets
5931
5932 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
5933 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
5934 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
5935
5936 * OBSOLETE configurations
5937
5938 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
5939
5940 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
5941 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
5942 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
5943 be permanently REMOVED.
5944
5945 * ANSI/ISO C
5946
5947 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
5948 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
5949 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
5950 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
5951 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
5952 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
5953 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
5954 already.
5955
5956 * Readline 2.2
5957
5958 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
5959
5960 * set extension-language
5961
5962 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
5963 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
5964 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
5965 set extension-language .c c++
5966 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
5967 and their associated languages.
5968
5969 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
5970
5971 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
5972 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
5973 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
5974
5975 set processor NAME
5976
5977 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
5978 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
5979
5980 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
5981 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
5982 403 IBM PowerPC 403
5983 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
5984 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
5985 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
5986 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
5987 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
5988 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
5989 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
5990 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
5991
5992 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
5993 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
5994 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
5995 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
5996
5997 * HP-UX support
5998
5999 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
6000 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
6001 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
6002 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
6003 for xdb and dbx commands.
6004
6005 * Catchpoints
6006
6007 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
6008 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
6009 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
6010
6011 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
6012 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
6013 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
6014
6015 * Debugging across forks
6016
6017 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
6018 in the inferior.
6019
6020 * TUI
6021
6022 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
6023 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
6024 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
6025
6026 * GDB remote protocol additions
6027
6028 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
6029 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
6030 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
6031 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
6032
6033 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
6034 full 64-bit address. The command
6035
6036 set remoteaddresssize 32
6037
6038 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
6039 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
6040 will be discarded.
6041
6042 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
6043 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
6044
6045 maint packet heythere
6046
6047 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
6048 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
6049 time.
6050
6051 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
6052 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
6053 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
6054
6055 * Tracing can collect general expressions
6056
6057 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
6058 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
6059 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
6060
6061 * mask-address variable for Mips
6062
6063 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
6064 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
6065 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
6066
6067 * Higher serial baud rates
6068
6069 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
6070 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
6071 to achieve all of these rates.)
6072
6073 * i960 simulator
6074
6075 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
6076 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
6077
6078
6079 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
6080
6081 * New native configurations
6082
6083 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
6084 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
6085 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
6086 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
6087 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
6088 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
6089 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
6090
6091 * New targets
6092
6093 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
6094 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
6095 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
6096 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
6097 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
6098 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
6099 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
6100 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
6101 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
6102 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
6103 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
6104
6105 * New debugging protocols
6106
6107 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
6108 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
6109 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
6110 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
6111 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
6112 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
6113
6114 * DWARF 2
6115
6116 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
6117 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
6118 information.
6119
6120 * Java frontend
6121
6122 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
6123 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
6124
6125 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
6126
6127 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
6128 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
6129 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
6130
6131 * Live range splitting
6132
6133 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
6134 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
6135 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
6136
6137 * Hurd support
6138
6139 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
6140 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
6141
6142 * ARM Thumb support
6143
6144 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
6145 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
6146 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
6147 accordingly.
6148
6149 * MIPS16 support
6150
6151 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
6152 instruction set.
6153
6154 * Overlay support
6155
6156 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
6157 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
6158 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
6159 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
6160 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
6161 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
6162
6163 * info symbol
6164
6165 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
6166 the symbol at the specified address.
6167
6168 * Trace support
6169
6170 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
6171 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
6172 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
6173 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
6174 file tracepoint.c for more details.
6175
6176 * MIPS simulator
6177
6178 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
6179 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
6180 of most MIPS variants.
6181
6182 * Sparc simulator
6183
6184 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
6185 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
6186 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
6187
6188 * set architecture
6189
6190 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
6191 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
6192 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
6193 the possible architectures.
6194
6195 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
6196
6197 * New native configurations
6198
6199 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
6200 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
6201 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
6202 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
6203 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
6204 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
6205
6206 * New targets
6207
6208 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
6209 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
6210 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
6211 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
6212 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
6213 Hitachi SH3 sh-*-*
6214 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
6215
6216 * PowerPC simulator
6217
6218 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
6219 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
6220 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
6221 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
6222 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
6223
6224 * Solaris 2.5
6225
6226 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
6227
6228 * Windows 95/NT native
6229
6230 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
6231 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
6232 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
6233 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
6234 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
6235
6236 * dont-repeat command
6237
6238 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
6239 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
6240 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
6241 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
6242
6243 * Send break instead of ^C
6244
6245 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
6246 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
6247 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
6248
6249 * Remote protocol timeout
6250
6251 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
6252 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
6253 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
6254
6255 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
6256
6257 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
6258 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
6259 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
6260 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
6261 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
6262
6263 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
6264 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
6265 automatically on hpux10.
6266
6267 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
6268
6269 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
6270
6271 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
6272
6273 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
6274 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
6275 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
6276 every character. The default value is 1050.
6277
6278 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
6279
6280 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
6281 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
6282 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
6283 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
6284 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
6285 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
6286
6287 * Speedups for remote debugging
6288
6289 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
6290 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
6291 and more efficient S-record downloading.
6292
6293 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
6294
6295 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
6296 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
6297
6298 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
6299
6300 * Psymtabs for XCOFF
6301
6302 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
6303 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
6304
6305 * Remote targets use caching
6306
6307 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
6308 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
6309 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
6310 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
6311 off' turns the the data cache off.
6312
6313 * Remote targets may have threads
6314
6315 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
6316 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
6317 gdb/remote.c for details.
6318
6319 * NetROM support
6320
6321 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
6322 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
6323 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
6324 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
6325 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
6326 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
6327 sequence is something like
6328
6329 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
6330 load <prog>
6331 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
6332
6333 * Macintosh host
6334
6335 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
6336 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
6337 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
6338 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
6339 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
6340 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
6341 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
6342 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
6343
6344 * Autoconf
6345
6346 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
6347 but does simplify configuration and building.
6348
6349 * hpux10
6350
6351 GDB now supports hpux10.
6352
6353 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
6354
6355 * New native configurations
6356
6357 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
6358 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
6359 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
6360 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
6361
6362 * New targets
6363
6364 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
6365 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
6366 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
6367 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
6368 WDC 65816 w65-*-*
6369
6370 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
6371
6372 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
6373 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
6374 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
6375 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
6376 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
6377
6378 * Arguments to user-defined commands
6379
6380 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
6381 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
6382 trivial example:
6383 define adder
6384 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
6385
6386 To execute the command use:
6387 adder 1 2 3
6388
6389 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
6390 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
6391 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
6392
6393 * New `if' and `while' commands
6394
6395 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
6396 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
6397 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
6398 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
6399 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
6400 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
6401 if the expression is zero.
6402
6403 * Fortran source language mode
6404
6405 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
6406 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
6407 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
6408 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
6409 Fortran compilers.
6410
6411 * Better HPUX support
6412
6413 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
6414 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
6415 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
6416 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
6417 that behavior do the following before running the program:
6418
6419 adb -w a.out
6420 __dld_flags?W 0x5
6421 control-d
6422
6423 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
6424 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
6425
6426 adb -w a.out
6427 __dld_flags?W 0x4
6428 control-d
6429
6430 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
6431 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
6432 external linkage.
6433
6434 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
6435 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
6436
6437 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
6438
6439 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
6440 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
6441 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
6442 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
6443 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
6444 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
6445
6446 * New DOS host serial code
6447
6448 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
6449 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
6450 a PC's serial port.
6451
6452 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
6453
6454 * New "complete" command
6455
6456 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
6457 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
6458
6459 * Trailing space optional in prompt
6460
6461 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
6462 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
6463
6464 * Breakpoint hit counts
6465
6466 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
6467 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
6468 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
6469 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
6470 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
6471 that breakpoint.
6472
6473 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
6474
6475 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
6476 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
6477 arrays actually contain only short strings.
6478
6479 * Shared library breakpoints
6480
6481 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
6482 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
6483
6484 * Hardware watchpoints
6485
6486 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
6487 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
6488
6489 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
6490
6491 * Annotations
6492
6493 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
6494 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
6495
6496 * Improved Irix 5 support
6497
6498 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
6499
6500 * Improved HPPA support
6501
6502 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
6503
6504 * New native configurations
6505
6506 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
6507 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
6508 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
6509 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
6510
6511 * New targets
6512
6513 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
6514 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
6515 Sparc64 sparc64-*-*
6516
6517 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
6518
6519 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
6520 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
6521
6522 * Fixes
6523
6524 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
6525 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
6526
6527 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
6528
6529 * Irix 5 is now supported
6530
6531 * HPPA support
6532
6533 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
6534 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
6535 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
6536 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
6537 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
6538
6539
6540 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
6541
6542 * User visible changes:
6543
6544 * Remote Debugging
6545
6546 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
6547 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
6548 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
6549 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
6550 debugging info for the mips target).
6551
6552 * DEC Alpha native support
6553
6554 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
6555 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
6556 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
6557 Alpha-specific notes.
6558
6559 * Preliminary thread implementation
6560
6561 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
6562
6563 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
6564
6565 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
6566 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
6567 for details).
6568
6569 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
6570
6571 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
6572 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
6573 call methods, ...etc.
6574
6575 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
6576
6577 * User visible changes:
6578
6579 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
6580 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
6581 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
6582 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
6583
6584 Filename completion now works.
6585
6586 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
6587 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
6588 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
6589
6590 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
6591 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
6592 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
6593 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
6594 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
6595
6596 * DEC alpha support
6597
6598 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
6599 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
6600
6601
6602 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
6603
6604 * Testsuite
6605
6606 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
6607 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
6608 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
6609
6610 * C++ demangling
6611
6612 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
6613 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
6614 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
6615 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
6616 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
6617
6618 * Simulators
6619
6620 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
6621 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
6622 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
6623
6624 * New targets supported
6625
6626 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
6627 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
6628 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
6629 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
6630 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
6631
6632 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
6633 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
6634 GO32 memory extender.
6635
6636 * New remote protocols
6637
6638 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
6639
6640 * New source languages supported
6641
6642 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
6643 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
6644 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
6645
6646
6647 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
6648
6649 * HP Precision Architecture supported
6650
6651 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
6652 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
6653 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
6654 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
6655 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
6656 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
6657
6658 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
6659
6660 * Faster and better demangling
6661
6662 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
6663 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
6664 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
6665 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
6666 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
6667 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
6668 symbol lookups.
6669
6670 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
6671 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
6672 compiler does not actually implement.
6673
6674 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
6675
6676 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
6677 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
6678 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
6679 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
6680 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
6681 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
6682 fix.
6683
6684 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
6685 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
6686
6687 * Improved configure script
6688
6689 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
6690 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
6691 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
6692 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
6693
6694 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
6695 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
6696 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
6697 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
6698 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
6699 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
6700
6701 * Documentation improvements
6702
6703 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
6704 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
6705 before submitting changes.
6706
6707 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
6708 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
6709 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
6710 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
6711 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
6712
6713 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
6714 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
6715 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
6716 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
6717 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
6718 around this problem.
6719
6720 * New features
6721
6722 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
6723 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
6724 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
6725 the target program.
6726
6727 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
6728 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
6729
6730 * New native hosts supported
6731
6732 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
6733 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
6734
6735 * New targets supported
6736
6737 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
6738
6739 * New file formats supported
6740
6741 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
6742 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
6743
6744 * Major bug fixes
6745
6746 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
6747
6748 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
6749 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
6750
6751 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
6752 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
6753 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
6754
6755 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
6756 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
6757
6758 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
6759 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
6760 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
6761 libraries.
6762
6763 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
6764 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
6765 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
6766 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
6767 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
6768
6769 * Internal improvements
6770
6771 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
6772 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
6773
6774 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
6775 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
6776 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
6777 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
6778 shared code that handles any of them.
6779
6780 * New command line options
6781
6782 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
6783
6784 * Mmalloc licensing
6785
6786 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
6787 General Public License.
6788
6789 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
6790
6791 * Host/native/target split
6792
6793 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
6794 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
6795 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
6796 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
6797 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
6798
6799 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
6800 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
6801 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
6802 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
6803 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
6804 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
6805 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
6806
6807 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
6808 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
6809 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
6810
6811 * New hosts supported
6812
6813 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
6814 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
6815 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
6816
6817 * New targets supported
6818
6819 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
6820 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
6821
6822 * New native hosts supported
6823
6824 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
6825 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
6826 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
6827
6828 * New file formats supported
6829
6830 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
6831 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
6832 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
6833
6834 * New commands
6835
6836 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
6837 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
6838 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
6839
6840 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
6841
6842 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
6843 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
6844 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
6845 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
6846
6847 * C++ improvements
6848
6849 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
6850 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
6851 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
6852
6853 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
6854
6855 * Major bug fixes
6856
6857 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
6858 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
6859 by the compiler.
6860
6861 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
6862 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
6863
6864 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
6865 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
6866 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
6867 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
6868 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
6869 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
6870
6871 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
6872 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
6873 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
6874 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
6875
6876 * AMD 29k support
6877
6878 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
6879 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
6880 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
6881 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
6882 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
6883
6884 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
6885 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
6886 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
6887 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
6888
6889 * Remote interfaces
6890
6891 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
6892 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
6893 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
6894 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
6895 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
6896 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
6897 each instruction being stepped through.
6898
6899 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
6900 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
6901
6902 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
6903 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
6904 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
6905 processor with a serial port.
6906
6907 * Configuration
6908
6909 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
6910 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
6911 supported, and what files each one uses.
6912
6913 * Library changes
6914
6915 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
6916 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
6917 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
6918 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
6919
6920 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
6921 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
6922 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
6923 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
6924
6925 * Documentation
6926
6927 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
6928 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
6929 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
6930 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
6931 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
6932 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
6933
6934 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
6935
6936
6937 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
6938
6939 * Better support for C++ function names
6940
6941 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
6942 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
6943 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
6944 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
6945 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
6946
6947 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
6948 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
6949 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
6950 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
6951 for the list of formats.
6952
6953 * G++ symbol mangling problem
6954
6955 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
6956 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
6957 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
6958 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
6959 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
6960 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
6961 this problem.)
6962
6963 * New 'maintenance' command
6964
6965 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
6966 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
6967 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
6968
6969 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
6970 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
6971 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
6972 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
6973 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
6974 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
6975
6976 The following commands are new:
6977
6978 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
6979 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
6980 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
6981
6982 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
6983
6984 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
6985 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
6986 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
6987 read after argv processing.
6988
6989 * New hosts supported
6990
6991 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
6992
6993 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
6994
6995 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
6996 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
6997 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
6998 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
6999 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
7000 It costs extra.
7001
7002 * New targets supported
7003
7004 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
7005
7006 * More smarts about finding #include files
7007
7008 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
7009 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
7010 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
7011 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
7012 the one that contains your sources.
7013
7014 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
7015 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
7016 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
7017
7018 * Interesting infernals change
7019
7020 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
7021 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
7022 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
7023 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
7024
7025 * Bug fixes (of course!)
7026
7027 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
7028 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
7029 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
7030
7031 See the ChangeLog for details.
7032
7033 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
7034
7035 * New machines supported (host and target)
7036
7037 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
7038
7039 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
7040
7041 * New malloc package
7042
7043 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
7044 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
7045 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
7046 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
7047 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
7048 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
7049
7050 * info proc
7051
7052 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
7053 'help info proc' for details.
7054
7055 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
7056
7057 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
7058 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
7059 possible.
7060
7061 * File name changes for MS-DOS
7062
7063 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
7064 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
7065 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
7066 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
7067 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
7068 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
7069
7070 * Cross byte order fixes
7071
7072 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
7073 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
7074
7075 * New -mapped and -readnow options
7076
7077 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
7078 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
7079 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
7080 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
7081 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
7082 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
7083 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
7084 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
7085 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
7086 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
7087
7088 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
7089 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
7090 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
7091 slower, but makes future operations faster.
7092
7093 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
7094 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
7095 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
7096 use is:
7097
7098 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
7099
7100 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
7101 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
7102 shared across multiple host platforms.
7103
7104 * longjmp() handling
7105
7106 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
7107 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
7108 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
7109 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
7110
7111 * Solaris 2.0
7112
7113 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
7114 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
7115 reading symbols.
7116
7117 * Bug fixes
7118
7119 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
7120 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
7121 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
7122
7123 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
7124
7125 * New machines supported (host and target)
7126
7127 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
7128 (except core files)
7129 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
7130 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
7131
7132 * New machines supported (target)
7133
7134 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
7135
7136 * C++ support
7137
7138 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
7139 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
7140 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
7141
7142 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
7143 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
7144 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
7145 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
7146 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
7147 released.
7148
7149 * New features for SVR4
7150
7151 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
7152 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
7153 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
7154
7155 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
7156 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
7157 it prints the address mappings of the process.
7158
7159 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
7160 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
7161
7162 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
7163
7164 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
7165 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
7166 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
7167 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
7168 same code linked statically.
7169
7170 * New Getopt
7171
7172 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
7173 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
7174 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
7175 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
7176 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
7177 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
7178
7179 * Bugs fixed
7180
7181 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
7182 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
7183 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
7184
7185
7186 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
7187
7188 * New machines supported (host and target)
7189
7190 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
7191 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
7192 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
7193
7194 * Almost SCO Unix support
7195
7196 We had hoped to support:
7197 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
7198 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
7199 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
7200 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
7201
7202 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
7203
7204 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
7205 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
7206 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
7207 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
7208 reqired (if any).
7209
7210 * New Readline
7211
7212 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
7213 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
7214 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
7215
7216 * Bugs fixed
7217
7218 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
7219 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
7220 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
7221
7222 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
7223
7224 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
7225 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
7226 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
7227
7228 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
7229 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
7230 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
7231 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
7232 version 2.
7233
7234 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
7235 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
7236 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
7237 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
7238 situation somewhat.
7239
7240 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
7241 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
7242 methods.
7243
7244 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
7245 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
7246 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
7247
7248
7249 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
7250
7251 * Improved configuration
7252
7253 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
7254 Porting BFD is simpler.
7255
7256 * Stepping improved
7257
7258 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
7259 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
7260 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
7261 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
7262
7263 * Bug fixing
7264
7265 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
7266
7267 * New host supported (not target)
7268
7269 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
7270
7271
7272 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
7273
7274 * Multiple source language support
7275
7276 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
7277 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
7278 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
7279 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
7280 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
7281 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
7282
7283 * GDB and Modula-2
7284
7285 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
7286 currently under development at the State University of New York at
7287 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
7288 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
7289
7290 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
7291 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
7292 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
7293
7294 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
7295 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
7296
7297 * set write on/off
7298
7299 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
7300 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
7301 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
7302 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
7303 effect immediately.
7304
7305 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
7306
7307 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
7308 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
7309 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
7310 examining core files.
7311
7312 * set listsize
7313
7314 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
7315 The default is 10.
7316
7317 * New machines supported (host and target)
7318
7319 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
7320 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
7321 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
7322
7323 * New hosts supported (not targets)
7324
7325 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
7326
7327 * New targets supported (not hosts)
7328
7329 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
7330 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
7331 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
7332
7333 * New remote interfaces
7334
7335 AMD 29000 Adapt
7336 AMD 29000 Minimon
7337
7338
7339 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
7340
7341 * New Facilities
7342
7343 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
7344
7345 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
7346 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
7347 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
7348 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
7349 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
7350 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
7351 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
7352 stub on the target system.
7353
7354 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
7355
7356 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
7357 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
7358 object file types such as a.out and coff.
7359
7360 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
7361 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
7362
7363
7364 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
7365
7366 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
7367 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
7368
7369 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
7370 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
7371 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
7372
7373 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
7374 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
7375 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
7376 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
7377
7378 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
7379 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
7380 it is already running. Default is ON.
7381
7382 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
7383 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
7384 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
7385 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
7386 Default is ON.
7387
7388 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
7389 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
7390 or the value of the environment variable
7391 GDBHISTFILE.
7392
7393 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
7394 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
7395 HISTSIZE.
7396
7397 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
7398 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
7399 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
7400
7401 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
7402 history expansion will be performed on
7403 command line input. The default is OFF.
7404
7405 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
7406 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
7407 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
7408
7409 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
7410 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
7411 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
7412 variable TERM.
7413
7414 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
7415 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
7416 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
7417 variable TERM.
7418
7419 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
7420 ``set width'' instead.
7421
7422 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
7423 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
7424 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
7425 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
7426
7427 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
7428 is OFF.
7429
7430 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
7431 "raw" form if off.
7432
7433 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
7434 like instructions.
7435
7436 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
7437
7438
7439 * Support for Epoch Environment.
7440
7441 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
7442 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
7443 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
7444 window.
7445
7446
7447 * Support for Shared Libraries
7448
7449 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
7450 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
7451 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
7452 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
7453 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
7454 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
7455 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
7456 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
7457
7458 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
7459 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
7460 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
7461
7462 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
7463
7464
7465 * Watchpoints
7466
7467 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
7468 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
7469 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
7470 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
7471 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
7472 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
7473
7474 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
7475
7476 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
7477
7478 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
7479 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
7480 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
7481
7482
7483 * C++ multiple inheritance
7484
7485 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
7486 for C++ programs.
7487
7488 * C++ exception handling
7489
7490 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
7491 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
7492 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
7493 handler's context).
7494
7495 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
7496 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
7497 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
7498
7499 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
7500 current stack frame.
7501
7502
7503 * Minor command changes
7504
7505 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
7506 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
7507 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
7508
7509 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
7510 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
7511 frames without printing.
7512
7513 * New directory command
7514
7515 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
7516 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
7517 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
7518 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
7519 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
7520
7521 * Configuring GDB for compilation
7522
7523 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
7524 for more details.
7525
7526 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
7527 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
7528 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
7529 where the program that you are debugging will run.
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