Require GNU make 3.82
[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 ** The frame information printed by the python frame filtering code
40 is now consistent with what the 'backtrace' command prints when
41 there are no filters, or when the 'backtrace' '-no-filters' option
42 is given.
43
44 ** The new function gdb.lookup_static_symbol can be used to look up
45 symbols with static linkage.
46
47 ** gdb.Objfile has new methods 'lookup_global_symbol' and
48 'lookup_static_symbol' to lookup a symbol from this objfile only.
49
50 * New commands
51
52 | [COMMAND] | SHELL_COMMAND
53 | -d DELIM COMMAND DELIM SHELL_COMMAND
54 pipe [COMMAND] | SHELL_COMMAND
55 pipe -d DELIM COMMAND DELIM SHELL_COMMAND
56 Executes COMMAND and sends its output to SHELL_COMMAND.
57 With no COMMAND, repeat the last executed command
58 and send its output to SHELL_COMMAND.
59
60 with SETTING [VALUE] [-- COMMAND]
61 w SETTING [VALUE] [-- COMMAND]
62 Temporarily set SETTING, run COMMAND, and restore SETTING.
63 Usage: with SETTING -- COMMAND
64 With no COMMAND, repeats the last executed command.
65 SETTING is any GDB setting you can change with the "set"
66 subcommands. For example, 'with language c -- print someobj'
67 temporarily switches to the C language in order to print someobj.
68 Settings can be combined: 'w lang c -- w print elements unlimited --
69 usercmd' switches to the C language and runs usercmd with no limit
70 of array elements to print.
71
72 maint with SETTING [VALUE] [-- COMMAND]
73 Like "with", but works with "maintenance set" settings.
74
75 set may-call-functions [on|off]
76 show may-call-functions
77 This controls whether GDB will attempt to call functions in
78 the program, such as with expressions in the print command. It
79 defaults to on. Calling functions in the program being debugged
80 can have undesired side effects. It is now possible to forbid
81 such function calls. If function calls are forbidden, GDB will throw
82 an error when a command (such as print expression) calls a function
83 in the program.
84
85 set print finish [on|off]
86 show print finish
87 This controls whether the `finish' command will display the value
88 that is returned by the current function. When `off', the value is
89 still entered into the value history, but it is not printed. The
90 default is `on'.
91
92 set print max-depth
93 show print max-depth
94 Allows deeply nested structures to be simplified when printing by
95 replacing deeply nested parts (beyond the max-depth) with ellipses.
96 The default max-depth is 20, but this can be set to unlimited to get
97 the old behavior back.
98
99 set logging debugredirect [on|off]
100 By default, GDB debug output will go to both the terminal and the logfile.
101 Set if you want debug output to go only to the log file.
102
103 set style title foreground COLOR
104 set style title background COLOR
105 set style title intensity VALUE
106 Control the styling of titles.
107
108 set style highlight foreground COLOR
109 set style highlight background COLOR
110 set style highlight intensity VALUE
111 Control the styling of highlightings.
112
113 maint set test-settings KIND
114 maint show test-settings KIND
115 A set of commands used by the testsuite for exercising the settings
116 infrastructure.
117
118 set print frame-info [short-location|location|location-and-address
119 |source-and-location|source-line|auto]
120 show print frame-info
121 This controls what frame information is printed by the commands printing
122 a frame. This setting will e.g. influence the behaviour of 'backtrace',
123 'frame', 'stepi'. The python frame filtering also respect this setting.
124 The 'backtrace' '-frame-info' option can override this global setting.
125
126 * Changed commands
127
128 help
129 The "help" command uses the title style to enhance the
130 readibility of its output by styling the classes and
131 command names.
132
133 apropos [-v] REGEXP
134 Similarly to "help", the "apropos" command also uses the
135 title style for the command names. "apropos" accepts now
136 a flag "-v" (verbose) to show the full documentation
137 of matching commands and to use the highlight style to mark
138 the documentation parts matching REGEXP.
139
140 printf
141 eval
142 The GDB printf and eval commands can now print C-style and Ada-style
143 string convenience variables without calling functions in the program.
144 This allows to do formatted printing of strings without having
145 a running inferior, or when debugging a core dump.
146
147 show style
148 The "show style" and its subcommands are now styling
149 a style name in their output using its own style, to help
150 the user visualize the different styles.
151
152 set print frame-arguments
153 The new value 'presence' indicates to only indicate the presence of
154 arguments using ..., instead of printing argument names and values.
155
156 set print raw-frame-arguments
157 show print raw-frame-arguments
158
159 These commands replace the similarly-named "set/show print raw
160 frame-arguments" commands (now with a dash instead of a space). The
161 old commands are now deprecated and may be removed in a future
162 release.
163
164 maint test-options require-delimiter
165 maint test-options unknown-is-error
166 maint test-options unknown-is-operand
167 maint show test-options-completion-result
168 Commands used by the testsuite to validate the command options
169 framework.
170
171 * New command options, command completion
172
173 GDB now has a standard infrastructure to support dash-style command
174 options ('-OPT'). One benefit is that commands that use it can
175 easily support completion of command line arguments. Try "CMD
176 -[TAB]" or "help CMD" to find options supported by a command. Over
177 time, we intend to migrate most commands to this infrastructure. A
178 number of commands got support for new command options in this
179 release:
180
181 ** The "print" and "compile print" commands now support a number of
182 options that allow overriding relevant global print settings as
183 set by "set print" subcommands:
184
185 -address [on|off]
186 -array [on|off]
187 -array-indexes [on|off]
188 -elements NUMBER|unlimited
189 -null-stop [on|off]
190 -object [on|off]
191 -pretty [on|off]
192 -repeats NUMBER|unlimited
193 -static-members [on|off]
194 -symbol [on|off]
195 -union [on|off]
196 -vtbl [on|off]
197
198 Note that because the "print"/"compile print" commands accept
199 arbitrary expressions which may look like options (including
200 abbreviations), if you specify any command option, then you must
201 use a double dash ("--") to mark the end of argument processing.
202
203 ** The "backtrace" command now supports a number of options that
204 allow overriding relevant global print settings as set by "set
205 backtrace" and "set print" subcommands:
206
207 -entry-values no|only|preferred|if-needed|both|compact|default
208 -frame-arguments all|scalars|none
209 -raw-frame-arguments [on|off]
210 -frame-info auto|source-line|location|source-and-location
211 |location-and-address|short-location
212 -past-main [on|off]
213 -past-entry [on|off]
214
215 In addition, the full/no-filters/hide qualifiers are now also
216 exposed as command options too:
217
218 -full
219 -no-filters
220 -hide
221
222 ** The "frame apply", "tfaas" and "faas" commands similarly now
223 support the following options:
224
225 -past-main [on|off]
226 -past-entry [on|off]
227
228 All options above can also be abbreviated. The argument of boolean
229 (on/off) options can be 0/1 too, and also the argument is assumed
230 "on" if omitted. This allows writing compact command invocations,
231 like for example:
232
233 (gdb) p -r -p -o 0 -- *myptr
234
235 The above is equivalent to:
236
237 (gdb) print -raw -pretty -object off -- *myptr
238
239 ** The "info types" command now supports the '-q' flag to disable
240 printing of some header information in a similar fashion to "info
241 variables" and "info functions".
242
243 * Completion improvements
244
245 ** GDB can now complete the options of the "thread apply all" and
246 "taas" commands, and their "-ascending" option can now be
247 abbreviated.
248
249 ** GDB can now complete the options of the "info threads", "info
250 functions", "info variables", "info locals", and "info args"
251 commands.
252
253 ** GDB can now complete the options of the "compile file" and
254 "compile code" commands. The "compile file" command now
255 completes on filenames.
256
257 ** GDB can now complete the backtrace command's
258 "full/no-filters/hide" qualifiers.
259
260 * In settings, you can now abbreviate "unlimited".
261
262 E.g., "set print elements u" is now equivalent to "set print
263 elements unlimited".
264
265 * New MI commands
266
267 -complete
268 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
269 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by MI
270 frontends in cases when separate CLI and MI channels cannot be used.
271
272 -catch-throw, -catch-rethrow, and -catch-catch
273 These can be used to catch C++ exceptions in a similar fashion to
274 the CLI commands 'catch throw', 'catch rethrow', and 'catch catch'.
275
276 * Testsuite
277
278 The testsuite now creates the files gdb.cmd (containing the arguments
279 used to launch GDB) and gdb.in (containing all the commands sent to
280 GDB) in the output directory for each test script. Multiple invocations
281 are appended with .1, .2, .3 etc.
282
283 * Building GDB and GDBserver now requires GNU make >= 3.82.
284
285 Using another implementation of the make program or an earlier version of
286 GNU make to build GDB or GDBserver is not supported.
287
288 *** Changes in GDB 8.3
289
290 * GDB and GDBserver now support access to additional registers on
291 PowerPC GNU/Linux targets: PPR, DSCR, TAR, EBB/PMU registers, and
292 HTM registers.
293
294 * GDB now has experimental support for the compilation and injection of
295 C++ source code into the inferior. This beta release does not include
296 support for several language features, such as templates, constructors,
297 and operators.
298
299 This feature requires GCC 7.1 or higher built with libcp1.so
300 (the C++ plug-in).
301
302 * GDB and GDBserver now support IPv6 connections. IPv6 addresses
303 can be passed using the '[ADDRESS]:PORT' notation, or the regular
304 'ADDRESS:PORT' method.
305
306 * DWARF index cache: GDB can now automatically save indices of DWARF
307 symbols on disk to speed up further loading of the same binaries.
308
309 * Ada task switching is now supported on aarch64-elf targets when
310 debugging a program using the Ravenscar Profile. For more information,
311 see the "Tasking Support when using the Ravenscar Profile" section
312 in the GDB user manual.
313
314 * GDB in batch mode now exits with status 1 if the last command to be
315 executed failed.
316
317 * The RISC-V target now supports target descriptions.
318
319 * System call catchpoints now support system call aliases on FreeBSD.
320 When the ABI of a system call changes in FreeBSD, this is
321 implemented by leaving a compatibility system call using the old ABI
322 at the existing number and allocating a new system call number for
323 the new ABI. For example, FreeBSD 12 altered the layout of 'struct
324 kevent' used by the 'kevent' system call. As a result, FreeBSD 12
325 kernels ship with both 'kevent' and 'freebsd11_kevent' system calls.
326 The 'freebsd11_kevent' system call is assigned an alias of 'kevent'
327 so that a system call catchpoint for the 'kevent' system call will
328 catch invocations of both the 'kevent' and 'freebsd11_kevent'
329 binaries. This ensures that 'kevent' system calls are caught for
330 binaries using either the old or new ABIs.
331
332 * Terminal styling is now available for the CLI and the TUI. GNU
333 Source Highlight can additionally be used to provide styling of
334 source code snippets. See the "set style" commands, below, for more
335 information.
336
337 * Removed support for old demangling styles arm, edg, gnu, hp and
338 lucid.
339
340 * New commands
341
342 set debug compile-cplus-types
343 show debug compile-cplus-types
344 Control the display of debug output about type conversion in the
345 C++ compile feature. Commands have no effect while compiliong
346 for other languages.
347
348 set debug skip
349 show debug skip
350 Control whether debug output about files/functions skipping is
351 displayed.
352
353 frame apply [all | COUNT | -COUNT | level LEVEL...] [FLAG]... COMMAND
354 Apply a command to some frames.
355 FLAG arguments allow to control what output to produce and how to handle
356 errors raised when applying COMMAND to a frame.
357
358 taas COMMAND
359 Apply a command to all threads (ignoring errors and empty output).
360 Shortcut for 'thread apply all -s COMMAND'.
361
362 faas COMMAND
363 Apply a command to all frames (ignoring errors and empty output).
364 Shortcut for 'frame apply all -s COMMAND'.
365
366 tfaas COMMAND
367 Apply a command to all frames of all threads (ignoring errors and empty
368 output).
369 Shortcut for 'thread apply all -s frame apply all -s COMMAND'.
370
371 maint set dwarf unwinders (on|off)
372 maint show dwarf unwinders
373 Control whether DWARF unwinders can be used.
374
375 info proc files
376 Display a list of open files for a process.
377
378 * Changed commands
379
380 Changes to the "frame", "select-frame", and "info frame" CLI commands.
381 These commands all now take a frame specification which
382 is either a frame level, or one of the keywords 'level', 'address',
383 'function', or 'view' followed by a parameter. Selecting a frame by
384 address, or viewing a frame outside the current backtrace now
385 requires the use of a keyword. Selecting a frame by level is
386 unchanged. The MI comment "-stack-select-frame" is unchanged.
387
388 target remote FILENAME
389 target extended-remote FILENAME
390 If FILENAME is a Unix domain socket, GDB will attempt to connect
391 to this socket instead of opening FILENAME as a character device.
392
393 info args [-q] [-t TYPEREGEXP] [NAMEREGEXP]
394 info functions [-q] [-t TYPEREGEXP] [NAMEREGEXP]
395 info locals [-q] [-t TYPEREGEXP] [NAMEREGEXP]
396 info variables [-q] [-t TYPEREGEXP] [NAMEREGEXP]
397 These commands can now print only the searched entities
398 matching the provided regexp(s), giving a condition
399 on the entity names or entity types. The flag -q disables
400 printing headers or informations messages.
401
402 info functions
403 info types
404 info variables
405 rbreak
406 These commands now determine the syntax for the shown entities
407 according to the language chosen by `set language'. In particular,
408 `set language auto' means to automatically choose the language of
409 the shown entities.
410
411 thread apply [all | COUNT | -COUNT] [FLAG]... COMMAND
412 The 'thread apply' command accepts new FLAG arguments.
413 FLAG arguments allow to control what output to produce and how to handle
414 errors raised when applying COMMAND to a thread.
415
416 set tui tab-width NCHARS
417 show tui tab-width NCHARS
418 "set tui tab-width" replaces the "tabset" command, which has been deprecated.
419
420 set style enabled [on|off]
421 show style enabled
422 Enable or disable terminal styling. Styling is enabled by default
423 on most hosts, but disabled by default when in batch mode.
424
425 set style sources [on|off]
426 show style sources
427 Enable or disable source code styling. Source code styling is
428 enabled by default, but only takes effect if styling in general is
429 enabled, and if GDB was linked with GNU Source Highlight.
430
431 set style filename foreground COLOR
432 set style filename background COLOR
433 set style filename intensity VALUE
434 Control the styling of file names.
435
436 set style function foreground COLOR
437 set style function background COLOR
438 set style function intensity VALUE
439 Control the styling of function names.
440
441 set style variable foreground COLOR
442 set style variable background COLOR
443 set style variable intensity VALUE
444 Control the styling of variable names.
445
446 set style address foreground COLOR
447 set style address background COLOR
448 set style address intensity VALUE
449 Control the styling of addresses.
450
451 * MI changes
452
453 ** The default version of the MI interpreter is now 3 (-i=mi3).
454
455 ** The '-data-disassemble' MI command now accepts an '-a' option to
456 disassemble the whole function surrounding the given program
457 counter value or function name. Support for this feature can be
458 verified by using the "-list-features" command, which should
459 contain "data-disassemble-a-option".
460
461 ** Command responses and notifications that include a frame now include
462 the frame's architecture in a new "arch" attribute.
463
464 ** The output of information about multi-location breakpoints (which is
465 syntactically incorrect in MI 2) has changed in MI 3. This affects
466 the following commands and events:
467
468 - -break-insert
469 - -break-info
470 - =breakpoint-created
471 - =breakpoint-modified
472
473 The -fix-multi-location-breakpoint-output command can be used to enable
474 this behavior with previous MI versions.
475
476 * New native configurations
477
478 GNU/Linux/RISC-V riscv*-*-linux*
479 FreeBSD/riscv riscv*-*-freebsd*
480
481 * New targets
482
483 GNU/Linux/RISC-V riscv*-*-linux*
484 CSKY ELF csky*-*-elf
485 CSKY GNU/LINUX csky*-*-linux
486 FreeBSD/riscv riscv*-*-freebsd*
487 NXP S12Z s12z-*-elf
488 GNU/Linux/OpenRISC or1k*-*-linux*
489
490 * Removed targets
491
492 GDB no longer supports native debugging on versions of MS-Windows
493 before Windows XP.
494
495 * Python API
496
497 ** GDB no longer supports Python versions less than 2.6.
498
499 ** The gdb.Inferior type has a new 'progspace' property, which is the program
500 space associated to that inferior.
501
502 ** The gdb.Progspace type has a new 'objfiles' method, which returns the list
503 of objfiles associated to that program space.
504
505 ** gdb.SYMBOL_LOC_COMMON_BLOCK, gdb.SYMBOL_MODULE_DOMAIN, and
506 gdb.SYMBOL_COMMON_BLOCK_DOMAIN were added to reflect changes to
507 the gdb core.
508
509 ** gdb.SYMBOL_VARIABLES_DOMAIN, gdb.SYMBOL_FUNCTIONS_DOMAIN, and
510 gdb.SYMBOL_TYPES_DOMAIN are now deprecated. These were never
511 correct and did not work properly.
512
513 ** The gdb.Value type has a new constructor, which is used to construct a
514 gdb.Value from a Python buffer object and a gdb.Type.
515
516 * Configure changes
517
518 --enable-ubsan
519
520 Enable or disable the undefined behavior sanitizer. This is
521 disabled by default, but passing --enable-ubsan=yes or
522 --enable-ubsan=auto to configure will enable it. Enabling this can
523 cause a performance penalty. The undefined behavior sanitizer was
524 first introduced in GCC 4.9.
525
526 *** Changes in GDB 8.2
527
528 * The 'set disassembler-options' command now supports specifying options
529 for the MIPS target.
530
531 * The 'symbol-file' command now accepts an '-o' option to add a relative
532 offset to all sections.
533
534 * Similarly, the 'add-symbol-file' command also accepts an '-o' option to add
535 a relative offset to all sections, but it allows to override the load
536 address of individual sections using '-s'.
537
538 * The 'add-symbol-file' command no longer requires the second argument
539 (address of the text section).
540
541 * The endianness used with the 'set endian auto' mode in the absence of
542 an executable selected for debugging is now the last endianness chosen
543 either by one of the 'set endian big' and 'set endian little' commands
544 or by inferring from the last executable used, rather than the startup
545 default.
546
547 * The pager now allows a "c" response, meaning to disable the pager
548 for the rest of the current command.
549
550 * The commands 'info variables/functions/types' now show the source line
551 numbers of symbol definitions when available.
552
553 * 'info proc' now works on running processes on FreeBSD systems and core
554 files created on FreeBSD systems.
555
556 * C expressions can now use _Alignof, and C++ expressions can now use
557 alignof.
558
559 * Support for SVE on AArch64 Linux. Note that GDB does not detect changes to
560 the vector length while the process is running.
561
562 * New commands
563
564 set debug fbsd-nat
565 show debug fbsd-nat
566 Control display of debugging info regarding the FreeBSD native target.
567
568 set|show varsize-limit
569 This new setting allows the user to control the maximum size of Ada
570 objects being printed when those objects have a variable type,
571 instead of that maximum size being hardcoded to 65536 bytes.
572
573 set|show record btrace cpu
574 Controls the processor to be used for enabling errata workarounds for
575 branch trace decode.
576
577 maint check libthread-db
578 Run integrity checks on the current inferior's thread debugging
579 library
580
581 maint set check-libthread-db (on|off)
582 maint show check-libthread-db
583 Control whether to run integrity checks on inferior specific thread
584 debugging libraries as they are loaded. The default is not to
585 perform such checks.
586
587 * Python API
588
589 ** Type alignment is now exposed via the "align" attribute of a gdb.Type.
590
591 ** The commands attached to a breakpoint can be set by assigning to
592 the breakpoint's "commands" field.
593
594 ** gdb.execute can now execute multi-line gdb commands.
595
596 ** The new functions gdb.convenience_variable and
597 gdb.set_convenience_variable can be used to get and set the value
598 of convenience variables.
599
600 ** A gdb.Parameter will no longer print the "set" help text on an
601 ordinary "set"; instead by default a "set" will be silent unless
602 the get_set_string method returns a non-empty string.
603
604 * New targets
605
606 RiscV ELF riscv*-*-elf
607
608 * Removed targets and native configurations
609
610 m88k running OpenBSD m88*-*-openbsd*
611 SH-5/SH64 ELF sh64-*-elf*, SH-5/SH64 support in sh*
612 SH-5/SH64 running GNU/Linux SH-5/SH64 support in sh*-*-linux*
613 SH-5/SH64 running OpenBSD SH-5/SH64 support in sh*-*-openbsd*
614
615 * Aarch64/Linux hardware watchpoints improvements
616
617 Hardware watchpoints on unaligned addresses are now properly
618 supported when running Linux kernel 4.10 or higher: read and access
619 watchpoints are no longer spuriously missed, and all watchpoints
620 lengths between 1 and 8 bytes are supported. On older kernels,
621 watchpoints set on unaligned addresses are no longer missed, with
622 the tradeoff that there is a possibility of false hits being
623 reported.
624
625 * Configure changes
626
627 --enable-codesign=CERT
628 This can be used to invoke "codesign -s CERT" after building gdb.
629 This option is useful on macOS, where code signing is required for
630 gdb to work properly.
631
632 --disable-gdbcli has been removed
633 This is now silently accepted, but does nothing.
634
635 *** Changes in GDB 8.1
636
637 * GDB now supports dynamically creating arbitrary register groups specified
638 in XML target descriptions. This allows for finer grain grouping of
639 registers on systems with a large amount of registers.
640
641 * The 'ptype' command now accepts a '/o' flag, which prints the
642 offsets and sizes of fields in a struct, like the pahole(1) tool.
643
644 * New "--readnever" command line option instructs GDB to not read each
645 symbol file's symbolic debug information. This makes startup faster
646 but at the expense of not being able to perform symbolic debugging.
647 This option is intended for use cases where symbolic debugging will
648 not be used, e.g., when you only need to dump the debuggee's core.
649
650 * GDB now uses the GNU MPFR library, if available, to emulate target
651 floating-point arithmetic during expression evaluation when the target
652 uses different floating-point formats than the host. At least version
653 3.1 of GNU MPFR is required.
654
655 * GDB now supports access to the guarded-storage-control registers and the
656 software-based guarded-storage broadcast control registers on IBM z14.
657
658 * On Unix systems, GDB now supports transmitting environment variables
659 that are to be set or unset to GDBserver. These variables will
660 affect the environment to be passed to the remote inferior.
661
662 To inform GDB of environment variables that are to be transmitted to
663 GDBserver, use the "set environment" command. Only user set
664 environment variables are sent to GDBserver.
665
666 To inform GDB of environment variables that are to be unset before
667 the remote inferior is started by the GDBserver, use the "unset
668 environment" command.
669
670 * Completion improvements
671
672 ** GDB can now complete function parameters in linespecs and
673 explicit locations without quoting. When setting breakpoints,
674 quoting around functions names to help with TAB-completion is
675 generally no longer necessary. For example, this now completes
676 correctly:
677
678 (gdb) b function(in[TAB]
679 (gdb) b function(int)
680
681 Related, GDB is no longer confused with completing functions in
682 C++ anonymous namespaces:
683
684 (gdb) b (anon[TAB]
685 (gdb) b (anonymous namespace)::[TAB][TAB]
686 (anonymous namespace)::a_function()
687 (anonymous namespace)::b_function()
688
689 ** GDB now has much improved linespec and explicit locations TAB
690 completion support, that better understands what you're
691 completing and offers better suggestions. For example, GDB no
692 longer offers data symbols as possible completions when you're
693 setting a breakpoint.
694
695 ** GDB now TAB-completes label symbol names.
696
697 ** The "complete" command now mimics TAB completion accurately.
698
699 * New command line options (gcore)
700
701 -a
702 Dump all memory mappings.
703
704 * Breakpoints on C++ functions are now set on all scopes by default
705
706 By default, breakpoints on functions/methods are now interpreted as
707 specifying all functions with the given name ignoring missing
708 leading scopes (namespaces and classes).
709
710 For example, assuming a C++ program with symbols named:
711
712 A::B::func()
713 B::func()
714
715 both commands "break func()" and "break B::func()" set a breakpoint
716 on both symbols.
717
718 You can use the new flag "-qualified" to override this. This makes
719 GDB interpret the specified function name as a complete
720 fully-qualified name instead. For example, using the same C++
721 program, the "break -q B::func" command sets a breakpoint on
722 "B::func", only. A parameter has been added to the Python
723 gdb.Breakpoint constructor to achieve the same result when creating
724 a breakpoint from Python.
725
726 * Breakpoints on functions marked with C++ ABI tags
727
728 GDB can now set breakpoints on functions marked with C++ ABI tags
729 (e.g., [abi:cxx11]). See here for a description of ABI tags:
730 https://developers.redhat.com/blog/2015/02/05/gcc5-and-the-c11-abi/
731
732 Functions with a C++11 abi tag are demangled/displayed like this:
733
734 function[abi:cxx11](int)
735 ^^^^^^^^^^^
736
737 You can now set a breakpoint on such functions simply as if they had
738 no tag, like:
739
740 (gdb) b function(int)
741
742 Or if you need to disambiguate between tags, like:
743
744 (gdb) b function[abi:other_tag](int)
745
746 Tab completion was adjusted accordingly as well.
747
748 * Python Scripting
749
750 ** New events gdb.new_inferior, gdb.inferior_deleted, and
751 gdb.new_thread are emitted. See the manual for further
752 description of these.
753
754 ** A new function, "gdb.rbreak" has been added to the Python API.
755 This function allows the setting of a large number of breakpoints
756 via a regex pattern in Python. See the manual for further details.
757
758 ** Python breakpoints can now accept explicit locations. See the
759 manual for a further description of this feature.
760
761
762 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
763
764 ** GDBserver is now able to start inferior processes with a
765 specified initial working directory.
766
767 The user can set the desired working directory to be used from
768 GDB using the new "set cwd" command.
769
770 ** New "--selftest" command line option runs some GDBserver self
771 tests. These self tests are disabled in releases.
772
773 ** On Unix systems, GDBserver now does globbing expansion and variable
774 substitution in inferior command line arguments.
775
776 This is done by starting inferiors using a shell, like GDB does.
777 See "set startup-with-shell" in the user manual for how to disable
778 this from GDB when using "target extended-remote". When using
779 "target remote", you can disable the startup with shell by using the
780 new "--no-startup-with-shell" GDBserver command line option.
781
782 ** On Unix systems, GDBserver now supports receiving environment
783 variables that are to be set or unset from GDB. These variables
784 will affect the environment to be passed to the inferior.
785
786 * When catching an Ada exception raised with a message, GDB now prints
787 the message in the catchpoint hit notification. In GDB/MI mode, that
788 information is provided as an extra field named "exception-message"
789 in the *stopped notification.
790
791 * Trait objects can now be inspected When debugging Rust code. This
792 requires compiler support which will appear in Rust 1.24.
793
794 * New remote packets
795
796 QEnvironmentHexEncoded
797 Inform GDBserver of an environment variable that is to be passed to
798 the inferior when starting it.
799
800 QEnvironmentUnset
801 Inform GDBserver of an environment variable that is to be unset
802 before starting the remote inferior.
803
804 QEnvironmentReset
805 Inform GDBserver that the environment should be reset (i.e.,
806 user-set environment variables should be unset).
807
808 QStartupWithShell
809 Indicates whether the inferior must be started with a shell or not.
810
811 QSetWorkingDir
812 Tell GDBserver that the inferior to be started should use a specific
813 working directory.
814
815 * The "maintenance print c-tdesc" command now takes an optional
816 argument which is the file name of XML target description.
817
818 * The "maintenance selftest" command now takes an optional argument to
819 filter the tests to be run.
820
821 * The "enable", and "disable" commands now accept a range of
822 breakpoint locations, e.g. "enable 1.3-5".
823
824 * New commands
825
826 set|show cwd
827 Set and show the current working directory for the inferior.
828
829 set|show compile-gcc
830 Set and show compilation command used for compiling and injecting code
831 with the 'compile' commands.
832
833 set debug separate-debug-file
834 show debug separate-debug-file
835 Control the display of debug output about separate debug file search.
836
837 set dump-excluded-mappings
838 show dump-excluded-mappings
839 Control whether mappings marked with the VM_DONTDUMP flag should be
840 dumped when generating a core file.
841
842 maint info selftests
843 List the registered selftests.
844
845 starti
846 Start the debugged program stopping at the first instruction.
847
848 set|show debug or1k
849 Control display of debugging messages related to OpenRISC targets.
850
851 set|show print type nested-type-limit
852 Set and show the limit of nesting level for nested types that the
853 type printer will show.
854
855 * TUI Single-Key mode now supports two new shortcut keys: `i' for stepi and
856 `o' for nexti.
857
858 * Safer/improved support for debugging with no debug info
859
860 GDB no longer assumes functions with no debug information return
861 'int'.
862
863 This means that GDB now refuses to call such functions unless you
864 tell it the function's type, by either casting the call to the
865 declared return type, or by casting the function to a function
866 pointer of the right type, and calling that:
867
868 (gdb) p getenv ("PATH")
869 'getenv' has unknown return type; cast the call to its declared return type
870 (gdb) p (char *) getenv ("PATH")
871 $1 = 0x7fffffffe "/usr/local/bin:/"...
872 (gdb) p ((char * (*) (const char *)) getenv) ("PATH")
873 $2 = 0x7fffffffe "/usr/local/bin:/"...
874
875 Similarly, GDB no longer assumes that global variables with no debug
876 info have type 'int', and refuses to print the variable's value
877 unless you tell it the variable's type:
878
879 (gdb) p var
880 'var' has unknown type; cast it to its declared type
881 (gdb) p (float) var
882 $3 = 3.14
883
884 * New native configurations
885
886 FreeBSD/aarch64 aarch64*-*-freebsd*
887 FreeBSD/arm arm*-*-freebsd*
888
889 * New targets
890
891 FreeBSD/aarch64 aarch64*-*-freebsd*
892 FreeBSD/arm arm*-*-freebsd*
893 OpenRISC ELF or1k*-*-elf
894
895 * Removed targets and native configurations
896
897 Solaris 2.0-9 i?86-*-solaris2.[0-9], sparc*-*-solaris2.[0-9]
898
899 *** Changes in GDB 8.0
900
901 * GDB now supports access to the PKU register on GNU/Linux. The register is
902 added by the Memory Protection Keys for Userspace feature which will be
903 available in future Intel CPUs.
904
905 * GDB now supports C++11 rvalue references.
906
907 * Python Scripting
908
909 ** New functions to start, stop and access a running btrace recording.
910 ** Rvalue references are now supported in gdb.Type.
911
912 * GDB now supports recording and replaying rdrand and rdseed Intel 64
913 instructions.
914
915 * Building GDB and GDBserver now requires a C++11 compiler.
916
917 For example, GCC 4.8 or later.
918
919 It is no longer possible to build GDB or GDBserver with a C
920 compiler. The --disable-build-with-cxx configure option has been
921 removed.
922
923 * Building GDB and GDBserver now requires GNU make >= 3.81.
924
925 It is no longer supported to build GDB or GDBserver with another
926 implementation of the make program or an earlier version of GNU make.
927
928 * Native debugging on MS-Windows supports command-line redirection
929
930 Command-line arguments used for starting programs on MS-Windows can
931 now include redirection symbols supported by native Windows shells,
932 such as '<', '>', '>>', '2>&1', etc. This affects GDB commands such
933 as "run", "start", and "set args", as well as the corresponding MI
934 features.
935
936 * Support for thread names on MS-Windows.
937
938 GDB now catches and handles the special exception that programs
939 running on MS-Windows use to assign names to threads in the
940 debugger.
941
942 * Support for Java programs compiled with gcj has been removed.
943
944 * User commands now accept an unlimited number of arguments.
945 Previously, only up to 10 was accepted.
946
947 * The "eval" command now expands user-defined command arguments.
948
949 This makes it easier to process a variable number of arguments:
950
951 define mycommand
952 set $i = 0
953 while $i < $argc
954 eval "print $arg%d", $i
955 set $i = $i + 1
956 end
957 end
958
959 * Target descriptions can now describe registers for sparc32 and sparc64.
960
961 * GDB now supports DWARF version 5 (debug information format).
962 Its .debug_names index is not yet supported.
963
964 * New native configurations
965
966 FreeBSD/mips mips*-*-freebsd
967
968 * New targets
969
970 Synopsys ARC arc*-*-elf32
971 FreeBSD/mips mips*-*-freebsd
972
973 * Removed targets and native configurations
974
975 Alpha running FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
976 Alpha running GNU/kFreeBSD alpha*-*-kfreebsd*-gnu
977
978 * New commands
979
980 flash-erase
981 Erases all the flash memory regions reported by the target.
982
983 maint print arc arc-instruction address
984 Print internal disassembler information about instruction at a given address.
985
986 * New options
987
988 set disassembler-options
989 show disassembler-options
990 Controls the passing of target specific information to the disassembler.
991 If it is necessary to specify more than one disassembler option then
992 multiple options can be placed together into a comma separated list.
993 The default value is the empty string. Currently, the only supported
994 targets are ARM, PowerPC and S/390.
995
996 * New MI commands
997
998 -target-flash-erase
999 Erases all the flash memory regions reported by the target. This is
1000 equivalent to the CLI command flash-erase.
1001
1002 -file-list-shared-libraries
1003 List the shared libraries in the program. This is
1004 equivalent to the CLI command "info shared".
1005
1006 -catch-handlers
1007 Catchpoints stopping the program when Ada exceptions are
1008 handled. This is equivalent to the CLI command "catch handlers".
1009
1010 *** Changes in GDB 7.12
1011
1012 * GDB and GDBserver now build with a C++ compiler by default.
1013
1014 The --enable-build-with-cxx configure option is now enabled by
1015 default. One must now explicitly configure with
1016 --disable-build-with-cxx in order to build with a C compiler. This
1017 option will be removed in a future release.
1018
1019 * GDBserver now supports recording btrace without maintaining an active
1020 GDB connection.
1021
1022 * GDB now supports a negative repeat count in the 'x' command to examine
1023 memory backward from the given address. For example:
1024
1025 (gdb) bt
1026 #0 Func1 (n=42, p=0x40061c "hogehoge") at main.cpp:4
1027 #1 0x400580 in main (argc=1, argv=0x7fffffffe5c8) at main.cpp:8
1028 (gdb) x/-5i 0x0000000000400580
1029 0x40056a <main(int, char**)+8>: mov %edi,-0x4(%rbp)
1030 0x40056d <main(int, char**)+11>: mov %rsi,-0x10(%rbp)
1031 0x400571 <main(int, char**)+15>: mov $0x40061c,%esi
1032 0x400576 <main(int, char**)+20>: mov $0x2a,%edi
1033 0x40057b <main(int, char**)+25>:
1034 callq 0x400536 <Func1(int, char const*)>
1035
1036 * Fortran: Support structures with fields of dynamic types and
1037 arrays of dynamic types.
1038
1039 * The symbol dumping maintenance commands have new syntax.
1040 maint print symbols [-pc address] [--] [filename]
1041 maint print symbols [-objfile objfile] [-source source] [--] [filename]
1042 maint print psymbols [-objfile objfile] [-pc address] [--] [filename]
1043 maint print psymbols [-objfile objfile] [-source source] [--] [filename]
1044 maint print msymbols [-objfile objfile] [--] [filename]
1045
1046 * GDB now supports multibit bitfields and enums in target register
1047 descriptions.
1048
1049 * New Python-based convenience function $_as_string(val), which returns
1050 the textual representation of a value. This function is especially
1051 useful to obtain the text label of an enum value.
1052
1053 * Intel MPX bound violation handling.
1054
1055 Segmentation faults caused by a Intel MPX boundary violation
1056 now display the kind of violation (upper or lower), the memory
1057 address accessed and the memory bounds, along with the usual
1058 signal received and code location.
1059
1060 For example:
1061
1062 Program received signal SIGSEGV, Segmentation fault
1063 Upper bound violation while accessing address 0x7fffffffc3b3
1064 Bounds: [lower = 0x7fffffffc390, upper = 0x7fffffffc3a3]
1065 0x0000000000400d7c in upper () at i386-mpx-sigsegv.c:68
1066
1067 * Rust language support.
1068 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the Rust programming
1069 language. See https://www.rust-lang.org/ for more information about
1070 Rust.
1071
1072 * Support for running interpreters on specified input/output devices
1073
1074 GDB now supports a new mechanism that allows frontends to provide
1075 fully featured GDB console views, as a better alternative to
1076 building such views on top of the "-interpreter-exec console"
1077 command. See the new "new-ui" command below. With that command,
1078 frontends can now start GDB in the traditional command-line mode
1079 running in an embedded terminal emulator widget, and create a
1080 separate MI interpreter running on a specified i/o device. In this
1081 way, GDB handles line editing, history, tab completion, etc. in the
1082 console all by itself, and the GUI uses the separate MI interpreter
1083 for its own control and synchronization, invisible to the command
1084 line.
1085
1086 * The "catch syscall" command catches groups of related syscalls.
1087
1088 The "catch syscall" command now supports catching a group of related
1089 syscalls using the 'group:' or 'g:' prefix.
1090
1091 * New commands
1092
1093 skip -file file
1094 skip -gfile file-glob-pattern
1095 skip -function function
1096 skip -rfunction regular-expression
1097 A generalized form of the skip command, with new support for
1098 glob-style file names and regular expressions for function names.
1099 Additionally, a file spec and a function spec may now be combined.
1100
1101 maint info line-table REGEXP
1102 Display the contents of GDB's internal line table data struture.
1103
1104 maint selftest
1105 Run any GDB unit tests that were compiled in.
1106
1107 new-ui INTERP TTY
1108 Start a new user interface instance running INTERP as interpreter,
1109 using the TTY file for input/output.
1110
1111 * Python Scripting
1112
1113 ** gdb.Breakpoint objects have a new attribute "pending", which
1114 indicates whether the breakpoint is pending.
1115 ** Three new breakpoint-related events have been added:
1116 gdb.breakpoint_created, gdb.breakpoint_modified, and
1117 gdb.breakpoint_deleted.
1118
1119 signal-event EVENTID
1120 Signal ("set") the given MS-Windows event object. This is used in
1121 conjunction with the Windows JIT debugging (AeDebug) support, where
1122 the OS suspends a crashing process until a debugger can attach to
1123 it. Resuming the crashing process, in order to debug it, is done by
1124 signalling an event.
1125
1126 * Support for tracepoints and fast tracepoints on s390-linux and s390x-linux
1127 was added in GDBserver, including JIT compiling fast tracepoint's
1128 conditional expression bytecode into native code.
1129
1130 * Support for various remote target protocols and ROM monitors has
1131 been removed:
1132
1133 target m32rsdi Remote M32R debugging over SDI
1134 target mips MIPS remote debugging protocol
1135 target pmon PMON ROM monitor
1136 target ddb NEC's DDB variant of PMON for Vr4300
1137 target rockhopper NEC RockHopper variant of PMON
1138 target lsi LSI variant of PMO
1139
1140 * Support for tracepoints and fast tracepoints on powerpc-linux,
1141 powerpc64-linux, and powerpc64le-linux was added in GDBserver,
1142 including JIT compiling fast tracepoint's conditional expression
1143 bytecode into native code.
1144
1145 * MI async record =record-started now includes the method and format used for
1146 recording. For example:
1147
1148 =record-started,thread-group="i1",method="btrace",format="bts"
1149
1150 * MI async record =thread-selected now includes the frame field. For example:
1151
1152 =thread-selected,id="3",frame={level="0",addr="0x00000000004007c0"}
1153
1154 * New targets
1155
1156 Andes NDS32 nds32*-*-elf
1157
1158 *** Changes in GDB 7.11
1159
1160 * GDB now supports debugging kernel-based threads on FreeBSD.
1161
1162 * Per-inferior thread numbers
1163
1164 Thread numbers are now per inferior instead of global. If you're
1165 debugging multiple inferiors, GDB displays thread IDs using a
1166 qualified INF_NUM.THR_NUM form. For example:
1167
1168 (gdb) info threads
1169 Id Target Id Frame
1170 1.1 Thread 0x7ffff7fc2740 (LWP 8155) (running)
1171 1.2 Thread 0x7ffff7fc1700 (LWP 8168) (running)
1172 * 2.1 Thread 0x7ffff7fc2740 (LWP 8157) (running)
1173 2.2 Thread 0x7ffff7fc1700 (LWP 8190) (running)
1174
1175 As consequence, thread numbers as visible in the $_thread
1176 convenience variable and in Python's InferiorThread.num attribute
1177 are no longer unique between inferiors.
1178
1179 GDB now maintains a second thread ID per thread, referred to as the
1180 global thread ID, which is the new equivalent of thread numbers in
1181 previous releases. See also $_gthread below.
1182
1183 For backwards compatibility, MI's thread IDs always refer to global
1184 IDs.
1185
1186 * Commands that accept thread IDs now accept the qualified
1187 INF_NUM.THR_NUM form as well. For example:
1188
1189 (gdb) thread 2.1
1190 [Switching to thread 2.1 (Thread 0x7ffff7fc2740 (LWP 8157))] (running)
1191 (gdb)
1192
1193 * In commands that accept a list of thread IDs, you can now refer to
1194 all threads of an inferior using a star wildcard. GDB accepts
1195 "INF_NUM.*", to refer to all threads of inferior INF_NUM, and "*" to
1196 refer to all threads of the current inferior. For example, "info
1197 threads 2.*".
1198
1199 * You can use "info threads -gid" to display the global thread ID of
1200 all threads.
1201
1202 * The new convenience variable $_gthread holds the global number of
1203 the current thread.
1204
1205 * The new convenience variable $_inferior holds the number of the
1206 current inferior.
1207
1208 * GDB now displays the ID and name of the thread that hit a breakpoint
1209 or received a signal, if your program is multi-threaded. For
1210 example:
1211
1212 Thread 3 "bar" hit Breakpoint 1 at 0x40087a: file program.c, line 20.
1213 Thread 1 "main" received signal SIGINT, Interrupt.
1214
1215 * Record btrace now supports non-stop mode.
1216
1217 * Support for tracepoints on aarch64-linux was added in GDBserver.
1218
1219 * The 'record instruction-history' command now indicates speculative execution
1220 when using the Intel Processor Trace recording format.
1221
1222 * GDB now allows users to specify explicit locations, bypassing
1223 the linespec parser. This feature is also available to GDB/MI
1224 clients.
1225
1226 * Multi-architecture debugging is supported on AArch64 GNU/Linux.
1227 GDB now is able to debug both AArch64 applications and ARM applications
1228 at the same time.
1229
1230 * Support for fast tracepoints on aarch64-linux was added in GDBserver,
1231 including JIT compiling fast tracepoint's conditional expression bytecode
1232 into native code.
1233
1234 * GDB now supports displaced stepping on AArch64 GNU/Linux.
1235
1236 * "info threads", "info inferiors", "info display", "info checkpoints"
1237 and "maint info program-spaces" now list the corresponding items in
1238 ascending ID order, for consistency with all other "info" commands.
1239
1240 * In Ada, the overloads selection menu has been enhanced to display the
1241 parameter types and the return types for the matching overloaded subprograms.
1242
1243 * New commands
1244
1245 maint set target-non-stop (on|off|auto)
1246 maint show target-non-stop
1247 Control whether GDB targets always operate in non-stop mode even if
1248 "set non-stop" is "off". The default is "auto", meaning non-stop
1249 mode is enabled if supported by the target.
1250
1251 maint set bfd-sharing
1252 maint show bfd-sharing
1253 Control the reuse of bfd objects.
1254
1255 set debug bfd-cache
1256 show debug bfd-cache
1257 Control display of debugging info regarding bfd caching.
1258
1259 set debug fbsd-lwp
1260 show debug fbsd-lwp
1261 Control display of debugging info regarding FreeBSD threads.
1262
1263 set remote multiprocess-extensions-packet
1264 show remote multiprocess-extensions-packet
1265 Set/show the use of the remote protocol multiprocess extensions.
1266
1267 set remote thread-events
1268 show remote thread-events
1269 Set/show the use of thread create/exit events.
1270
1271 set ada print-signatures on|off
1272 show ada print-signatures"
1273 Control whether parameter types and return types are displayed in overloads
1274 selection menus. It is activaled (@code{on}) by default.
1275
1276 set max-value-size
1277 show max-value-size
1278 Controls the maximum size of memory, in bytes, that GDB will
1279 allocate for value contents. Prevents incorrect programs from
1280 causing GDB to allocate overly large buffers. Default is 64k.
1281
1282 * The "disassemble" command accepts a new modifier: /s.
1283 It prints mixed source+disassembly like /m with two differences:
1284 - disassembled instructions are now printed in program order, and
1285 - and source for all relevant files is now printed.
1286 The "/m" option is now considered deprecated: its "source-centric"
1287 output hasn't proved useful in practice.
1288
1289 * The "record instruction-history" command accepts a new modifier: /s.
1290 It behaves exactly like /m and prints mixed source+disassembly.
1291
1292 * The "set scheduler-locking" command supports a new mode "replay".
1293 It behaves like "off" in record mode and like "on" in replay mode.
1294
1295 * Support for various ROM monitors has been removed:
1296
1297 target dbug dBUG ROM monitor for Motorola ColdFire
1298 target picobug Motorola picobug monitor
1299 target dink32 DINK32 ROM monitor for PowerPC
1300 target m32r Renesas M32R/D ROM monitor
1301 target mon2000 mon2000 ROM monitor
1302 target ppcbug PPCBUG ROM monitor for PowerPC
1303
1304 * Support for reading/writing memory and extracting values on architectures
1305 whose memory is addressable in units of any integral multiple of 8 bits.
1306
1307 catch handlers
1308 Allows to break when an Ada exception is handled.
1309
1310 * New remote packets
1311
1312 exec stop reason
1313 Indicates that an exec system call was executed.
1314
1315 exec-events feature in qSupported
1316 The qSupported packet allows GDB to request support for exec
1317 events using the new 'gdbfeature' exec-event, and the qSupported
1318 response can contain the corresponding 'stubfeature'. Set and
1319 show commands can be used to display whether these features are enabled.
1320
1321 vCtrlC
1322 Equivalent to interrupting with the ^C character, but works in
1323 non-stop mode.
1324
1325 thread created stop reason (T05 create:...)
1326 Indicates that the thread was just created and is stopped at entry.
1327
1328 thread exit stop reply (w exitcode;tid)
1329 Indicates that the thread has terminated.
1330
1331 QThreadEvents
1332 Enables/disables thread create and exit event reporting. For
1333 example, this is used in non-stop mode when GDB stops a set of
1334 threads and synchronously waits for the their corresponding stop
1335 replies. Without exit events, if one of the threads exits, GDB
1336 would hang forever not knowing that it should no longer expect a
1337 stop for that same thread.
1338
1339 N stop reply
1340 Indicates that there are no resumed threads left in the target (all
1341 threads are stopped). The remote stub reports support for this stop
1342 reply to GDB's qSupported query.
1343
1344 QCatchSyscalls
1345 Enables/disables catching syscalls from the inferior process.
1346 The remote stub reports support for this packet to GDB's qSupported query.
1347
1348 syscall_entry stop reason
1349 Indicates that a syscall was just called.
1350
1351 syscall_return stop reason
1352 Indicates that a syscall just returned.
1353
1354 * Extended-remote exec events
1355
1356 ** GDB now has support for exec events on extended-remote Linux targets.
1357 For such targets with Linux kernels 2.5.46 and later, this enables
1358 follow-exec-mode and exec catchpoints.
1359
1360 set remote exec-event-feature-packet
1361 show remote exec-event-feature-packet
1362 Set/show the use of the remote exec event feature.
1363
1364 * Thread names in remote protocol
1365
1366 The reply to qXfer:threads:read may now include a name attribute for each
1367 thread.
1368
1369 * Target remote mode fork and exec events
1370
1371 ** GDB now has support for fork and exec events on target remote mode
1372 Linux targets. For such targets with Linux kernels 2.5.46 and later,
1373 this enables follow-fork-mode, detach-on-fork, follow-exec-mode, and
1374 fork and exec catchpoints.
1375
1376 * Remote syscall events
1377
1378 ** GDB now has support for catch syscall on remote Linux targets,
1379 currently enabled on x86/x86_64 architectures.
1380
1381 set remote catch-syscall-packet
1382 show remote catch-syscall-packet
1383 Set/show the use of the remote catch syscall feature.
1384
1385 * MI changes
1386
1387 ** The -var-set-format command now accepts the zero-hexadecimal
1388 format. It outputs data in hexadecimal format with zero-padding on the
1389 left.
1390
1391 * Python Scripting
1392
1393 ** gdb.InferiorThread objects have a new attribute "global_num",
1394 which refers to the thread's global thread ID. The existing
1395 "num" attribute now refers to the thread's per-inferior number.
1396 See "Per-inferior thread numbers" above.
1397 ** gdb.InferiorThread objects have a new attribute "inferior", which
1398 is the Inferior object the thread belongs to.
1399
1400 *** Changes in GDB 7.10
1401
1402 * Support for process record-replay and reverse debugging on aarch64*-linux*
1403 targets has been added. GDB now supports recording of A64 instruction set
1404 including advance SIMD instructions.
1405
1406 * Support for Sun's version of the "stabs" debug file format has been removed.
1407
1408 * GDB now honors the content of the file /proc/PID/coredump_filter
1409 (PID is the process ID) on GNU/Linux systems. This file can be used
1410 to specify the types of memory mappings that will be included in a
1411 corefile. For more information, please refer to the manual page of
1412 "core(5)". GDB also has a new command: "set use-coredump-filter
1413 on|off". It allows to set whether GDB will read the content of the
1414 /proc/PID/coredump_filter file when generating a corefile.
1415
1416 * The "info os" command on GNU/Linux can now display information on
1417 cpu information :
1418 "info os cpus" Listing of all cpus/cores on the system
1419
1420 * GDB has two new commands: "set serial parity odd|even|none" and
1421 "show serial parity". These allows to set or show parity for the
1422 remote serial I/O.
1423
1424 * The "info source" command now displays the producer string if it was
1425 present in the debug info. This typically includes the compiler version
1426 and may include things like its command line arguments.
1427
1428 * The "info dll", an alias of the "info sharedlibrary" command,
1429 is now available on all platforms.
1430
1431 * Directory names supplied to the "set sysroot" commands may be
1432 prefixed with "target:" to tell GDB to access shared libraries from
1433 the target system, be it local or remote. This replaces the prefix
1434 "remote:". The default sysroot has been changed from "" to
1435 "target:". "remote:" is automatically converted to "target:" for
1436 backward compatibility.
1437
1438 * The system root specified by "set sysroot" will be prepended to the
1439 filename of the main executable (if reported to GDB as absolute by
1440 the operating system) when starting processes remotely, and when
1441 attaching to already-running local or remote processes.
1442
1443 * GDB now supports automatic location and retrieval of executable
1444 files from remote targets. Remote debugging can now be initiated
1445 using only a "target remote" or "target extended-remote" command
1446 (no "set sysroot" or "file" commands are required). See "New remote
1447 packets" below.
1448
1449 * The "dump" command now supports verilog hex format.
1450
1451 * GDB now supports the vector ABI on S/390 GNU/Linux targets.
1452
1453 * On GNU/Linux, GDB and gdbserver are now able to access executable
1454 and shared library files without a "set sysroot" command when
1455 attaching to processes running in different mount namespaces from
1456 the debugger. This makes it possible to attach to processes in
1457 containers as simply as "gdb -p PID" or "gdbserver --attach PID".
1458 See "New remote packets" below.
1459
1460 * The "tui reg" command now provides completion for all of the
1461 available register groups, including target specific groups.
1462
1463 * The HISTSIZE environment variable is no longer read when determining
1464 the size of GDB's command history. GDB now instead reads the dedicated
1465 GDBHISTSIZE environment variable. Setting GDBHISTSIZE to "-1" or to "" now
1466 disables truncation of command history. Non-numeric values of GDBHISTSIZE
1467 are ignored.
1468
1469 * Guile Scripting
1470
1471 ** Memory ports can now be unbuffered.
1472
1473 * Python Scripting
1474
1475 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "username",
1476 which is the name of the objfile as specified by the user,
1477 without, for example, resolving symlinks.
1478 ** You can now write frame unwinders in Python.
1479 ** gdb.Type objects have a new method "optimized_out",
1480 returning optimized out gdb.Value instance of this type.
1481 ** gdb.Value objects have new methods "reference_value" and
1482 "const_value" which return a reference to the value and a
1483 "const" version of the value respectively.
1484
1485 * New commands
1486
1487 maint print symbol-cache
1488 Print the contents of the symbol cache.
1489
1490 maint print symbol-cache-statistics
1491 Print statistics of symbol cache usage.
1492
1493 maint flush-symbol-cache
1494 Flush the contents of the symbol cache.
1495
1496 record btrace bts
1497 record bts
1498 Start branch trace recording using Branch Trace Store (BTS) format.
1499
1500 compile print
1501 Evaluate expression by using the compiler and print result.
1502
1503 tui enable
1504 tui disable
1505 Explicit commands for enabling and disabling tui mode.
1506
1507 show mpx bound
1508 set mpx bound on i386 and amd64
1509 Support for bound table investigation on Intel MPX enabled applications.
1510
1511 record btrace pt
1512 record pt
1513 Start branch trace recording using Intel Processor Trace format.
1514
1515 maint info btrace
1516 Print information about branch tracing internals.
1517
1518 maint btrace packet-history
1519 Print the raw branch tracing data.
1520
1521 maint btrace clear-packet-history
1522 Discard the stored raw branch tracing data.
1523
1524 maint btrace clear
1525 Discard all branch tracing data. It will be fetched and processed
1526 anew by the next "record" command.
1527
1528 * New options
1529
1530 set debug dwarf-die
1531 Renamed from "set debug dwarf2-die".
1532 show debug dwarf-die
1533 Renamed from "show debug dwarf2-die".
1534
1535 set debug dwarf-read
1536 Renamed from "set debug dwarf2-read".
1537 show debug dwarf-read
1538 Renamed from "show debug dwarf2-read".
1539
1540 maint set dwarf always-disassemble
1541 Renamed from "maint set dwarf2 always-disassemble".
1542 maint show dwarf always-disassemble
1543 Renamed from "maint show dwarf2 always-disassemble".
1544
1545 maint set dwarf max-cache-age
1546 Renamed from "maint set dwarf2 max-cache-age".
1547 maint show dwarf max-cache-age
1548 Renamed from "maint show dwarf2 max-cache-age".
1549
1550 set debug dwarf-line
1551 show debug dwarf-line
1552 Control display of debugging info regarding DWARF line processing.
1553
1554 set max-completions
1555 show max-completions
1556 Set the maximum number of candidates to be considered during
1557 completion. The default value is 200. This limit allows GDB
1558 to avoid generating large completion lists, the computation of
1559 which can cause the debugger to become temporarily unresponsive.
1560
1561 set history remove-duplicates
1562 show history remove-duplicates
1563 Control the removal of duplicate history entries.
1564
1565 maint set symbol-cache-size
1566 maint show symbol-cache-size
1567 Control the size of the symbol cache.
1568
1569 set|show record btrace bts buffer-size
1570 Set and show the size of the ring buffer used for branch tracing in
1571 BTS format.
1572 The obtained size may differ from the requested size. Use "info
1573 record" to see the obtained buffer size.
1574
1575 set debug linux-namespaces
1576 show debug linux-namespaces
1577 Control display of debugging info regarding Linux namespaces.
1578
1579 set|show record btrace pt buffer-size
1580 Set and show the size of the ring buffer used for branch tracing in
1581 Intel Processor Trace format.
1582 The obtained size may differ from the requested size. Use "info
1583 record" to see the obtained buffer size.
1584
1585 maint set|show btrace pt skip-pad
1586 Set and show whether PAD packets are skipped when computing the
1587 packet history.
1588
1589 * The command 'thread apply all' can now support new option '-ascending'
1590 to call its specified command for all threads in ascending order.
1591
1592 * Python/Guile scripting
1593
1594 ** GDB now supports auto-loading of Python/Guile scripts contained in the
1595 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts'.
1596
1597 * New remote packets
1598
1599 qXfer:btrace-conf:read
1600 Return the branch trace configuration for the current thread.
1601
1602 Qbtrace-conf:bts:size
1603 Set the requested ring buffer size for branch tracing in BTS format.
1604
1605 Qbtrace:pt
1606 Enable Intel Procesor Trace-based branch tracing for the current
1607 process. The remote stub reports support for this packet to GDB's
1608 qSupported query.
1609
1610 Qbtrace-conf:pt:size
1611 Set the requested ring buffer size for branch tracing in Intel Processor
1612 Trace format.
1613
1614 swbreak stop reason
1615 Indicates a memory breakpoint instruction was executed, irrespective
1616 of whether it was GDB that planted the breakpoint or the breakpoint
1617 is hardcoded in the program. This is required for correct non-stop
1618 mode operation.
1619
1620 hwbreak stop reason
1621 Indicates the target stopped for a hardware breakpoint. This is
1622 required for correct non-stop mode operation.
1623
1624 vFile:fstat:
1625 Return information about files on the remote system.
1626
1627 qXfer:exec-file:read
1628 Return the full absolute name of the file that was executed to
1629 create a process running on the remote system.
1630
1631 vFile:setfs:
1632 Select the filesystem on which vFile: operations with filename
1633 arguments will operate. This is required for GDB to be able to
1634 access files on remote targets where the remote stub does not
1635 share a common filesystem with the inferior(s).
1636
1637 fork stop reason
1638 Indicates that a fork system call was executed.
1639
1640 vfork stop reason
1641 Indicates that a vfork system call was executed.
1642
1643 vforkdone stop reason
1644 Indicates that a vfork child of the specified process has executed
1645 an exec or exit, allowing the vfork parent to resume execution.
1646
1647 fork-events and vfork-events features in qSupported
1648 The qSupported packet allows GDB to request support for fork and
1649 vfork events using new 'gdbfeatures' fork-events and vfork-events,
1650 and the qSupported response can contain the corresponding
1651 'stubfeatures'. Set and show commands can be used to display
1652 whether these features are enabled.
1653
1654 * Extended-remote fork events
1655
1656 ** GDB now has support for fork events on extended-remote Linux
1657 targets. For targets with Linux kernels 2.5.60 and later, this
1658 enables follow-fork-mode and detach-on-fork for both fork and
1659 vfork, as well as fork and vfork catchpoints.
1660
1661 * The info record command now shows the recording format and the
1662 branch tracing configuration for the current thread when using
1663 the btrace record target.
1664 For the BTS format, it shows the ring buffer size.
1665
1666 * GDB now has support for DTrace USDT (Userland Static Defined
1667 Tracing) probes. The supported targets are x86_64-*-linux-gnu.
1668
1669 * GDB now supports access to vector registers on S/390 GNU/Linux
1670 targets.
1671
1672 * Removed command line options
1673
1674 -xdb HP-UX XDB compatibility mode.
1675
1676 * Removed targets and native configurations
1677
1678 HP/PA running HP-UX hppa*-*-hpux*
1679 Itanium running HP-UX ia64-*-hpux*
1680
1681 * New configure options
1682
1683 --with-intel-pt
1684 This configure option allows the user to build GDB with support for
1685 Intel Processor Trace (default: auto). This requires libipt.
1686
1687 --with-libipt-prefix=PATH
1688 Specify the path to the version of libipt that GDB should use.
1689 $PATH/include should contain the intel-pt.h header and
1690 $PATH/lib should contain the libipt.so library.
1691
1692 *** Changes in GDB 7.9.1
1693
1694 * Python Scripting
1695
1696 ** Xmethods can now specify a result type.
1697
1698 *** Changes in GDB 7.9
1699
1700 * GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on x86 GNU Hurd.
1701
1702 * Python Scripting
1703
1704 ** You can now access frame registers from Python scripts.
1705 ** New attribute 'producer' for gdb.Symtab objects.
1706 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "progspace",
1707 which is the gdb.Progspace object of the containing program space.
1708 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "owner".
1709 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "build_id",
1710 which is the build ID generated when the file was built.
1711 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new method "add_separate_debug_file".
1712 ** A new event "gdb.clear_objfiles" has been added, triggered when
1713 selecting a new file to debug.
1714 ** You can now add attributes to gdb.Objfile and gdb.Progspace objects.
1715 ** New function gdb.lookup_objfile.
1716
1717 New events which are triggered when GDB modifies the state of the
1718 inferior.
1719
1720 ** gdb.events.inferior_call_pre: Function call is about to be made.
1721 ** gdb.events.inferior_call_post: Function call has just been made.
1722 ** gdb.events.memory_changed: A memory location has been altered.
1723 ** gdb.events.register_changed: A register has been altered.
1724
1725 * New Python-based convenience functions:
1726
1727 ** $_caller_is(name [, number_of_frames])
1728 ** $_caller_matches(regexp [, number_of_frames])
1729 ** $_any_caller_is(name [, number_of_frames])
1730 ** $_any_caller_matches(regexp [, number_of_frames])
1731
1732 * GDB now supports the compilation and injection of source code into
1733 the inferior. GDB will use GCC 5.0 or higher built with libcc1.so
1734 to compile the source code to object code, and if successful, inject
1735 and execute that code within the current context of the inferior.
1736 Currently the C language is supported. The commands used to
1737 interface with this new feature are:
1738
1739 compile code [-raw|-r] [--] [source code]
1740 compile file [-raw|-r] filename
1741
1742 * New commands
1743
1744 demangle [-l language] [--] name
1745 Demangle "name" in the specified language, or the current language
1746 if elided. This command is renamed from the "maint demangle" command.
1747 The latter is kept as a no-op to avoid "maint demangle" being interpreted
1748 as "maint demangler-warning".
1749
1750 queue-signal signal-name-or-number
1751 Queue a signal to be delivered to the thread when it is resumed.
1752
1753 add-auto-load-scripts-directory directory
1754 Add entries to the list of directories from which to load auto-loaded
1755 scripts.
1756
1757 maint print user-registers
1758 List all currently available "user" registers.
1759
1760 compile code [-r|-raw] [--] [source code]
1761 Compile, inject, and execute in the inferior the executable object
1762 code produced by compiling the provided source code.
1763
1764 compile file [-r|-raw] filename
1765 Compile and inject into the inferior the executable object code
1766 produced by compiling the source code stored in the filename
1767 provided.
1768
1769 * On resume, GDB now always passes the signal the program had stopped
1770 for to the thread the signal was sent to, even if the user changed
1771 threads before resuming. Previously GDB would often (but not
1772 always) deliver the signal to the thread that happens to be current
1773 at resume time.
1774
1775 * Conversely, the "signal" command now consistently delivers the
1776 requested signal to the current thread. GDB now asks for
1777 confirmation if the program had stopped for a signal and the user
1778 switched threads meanwhile.
1779
1780 * "breakpoint always-inserted" modes "off" and "auto" merged.
1781
1782 Now, when 'breakpoint always-inserted mode' is set to "off", GDB
1783 won't remove breakpoints from the target until all threads stop,
1784 even in non-stop mode. The "auto" mode has been removed, and "off"
1785 is now the default mode.
1786
1787 * New options
1788
1789 set debug symbol-lookup
1790 show debug symbol-lookup
1791 Control display of debugging info regarding symbol lookup.
1792
1793 * MI changes
1794
1795 ** The -list-thread-groups command outputs an exit-code field for
1796 inferiors that have exited.
1797
1798 * New targets
1799
1800 MIPS SDE mips*-sde*-elf*
1801
1802 * Removed targets
1803
1804 Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
1805
1806 Alpha running OSF/1 (or Tru64) alpha*-*-osf*
1807 SGI Irix-5.x mips-*-irix5*
1808 SGI Irix-6.x mips-*-irix6*
1809 VAX running (4.2 - 4.3 Reno) BSD vax-*-bsd*
1810 VAX running Ultrix vax-*-ultrix*
1811
1812 * The "dll-symbols" command, and its two aliases ("add-shared-symbol-files"
1813 and "assf"), have been removed. Use the "sharedlibrary" command, or
1814 its alias "share", instead.
1815
1816 *** Changes in GDB 7.8
1817
1818 * New command line options
1819
1820 -D data-directory
1821 This is an alias for the --data-directory option.
1822
1823 * GDB supports printing and modifying of variable length automatic arrays
1824 as specified in ISO C99.
1825
1826 * The ARM simulator now supports instruction level tracing
1827 with or without disassembly.
1828
1829 * Guile scripting
1830
1831 GDB now has support for scripting using Guile. Whether this is
1832 available is determined at configure time.
1833 Guile version 2.0 or greater is required.
1834 Guile version 2.0.9 is well tested, earlier 2.0 versions are not.
1835
1836 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
1837
1838 guile [code]
1839 gu [code]
1840 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Guile interpreter.
1841
1842 guile-repl
1843 gr
1844 Start a Guile interactive prompt (or "repl" for "read-eval-print loop").
1845
1846 info auto-load guile-scripts [regexp]
1847 Print the list of automatically loaded Guile scripts.
1848
1849 * The source command is now capable of sourcing Guile scripts.
1850 This feature is dependent on the debugger being built with Guile support.
1851
1852 * New options
1853
1854 set print symbol-loading (off|brief|full)
1855 show print symbol-loading
1856 Control whether to print informational messages when loading symbol
1857 information for a file. The default is "full", but when debugging
1858 programs with large numbers of shared libraries the amount of output
1859 becomes less useful.
1860
1861 set guile print-stack (none|message|full)
1862 show guile print-stack
1863 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Guile script.
1864
1865 set auto-load guile-scripts (on|off)
1866 show auto-load guile-scripts
1867 Control auto-loading of Guile script files.
1868
1869 maint ada set ignore-descriptive-types (on|off)
1870 maint ada show ignore-descriptive-types
1871 Control whether the debugger should ignore descriptive types in Ada
1872 programs. The default is not to ignore the descriptive types. See
1873 the user manual for more details on descriptive types and the intended
1874 usage of this option.
1875
1876 set auto-connect-native-target
1877
1878 Control whether GDB is allowed to automatically connect to the
1879 native target for the run, attach, etc. commands when not connected
1880 to any target yet. See also "target native" below.
1881
1882 set record btrace replay-memory-access (read-only|read-write)
1883 show record btrace replay-memory-access
1884 Control what memory accesses are allowed during replay.
1885
1886 maint set target-async (on|off)
1887 maint show target-async
1888 This controls whether GDB targets operate in synchronous or
1889 asynchronous mode. Normally the default is asynchronous, if it is
1890 available; but this can be changed to more easily debug problems
1891 occurring only in synchronous mode.
1892
1893 set mi-async (on|off)
1894 show mi-async
1895 Control whether MI asynchronous mode is preferred. This supersedes
1896 "set target-async" of previous GDB versions.
1897
1898 * "set target-async" is deprecated as a CLI option and is now an alias
1899 for "set mi-async" (only puts MI into async mode).
1900
1901 * Background execution commands (e.g., "c&", "s&", etc.) are now
1902 possible ``out of the box'' if the target supports them. Previously
1903 the user would need to explicitly enable the possibility with the
1904 "set target-async on" command.
1905
1906 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
1907
1908 ** New option --debug-format=option1[,option2,...] allows one to add
1909 additional text to each output. At present only timestamps
1910 are supported: --debug-format=timestamps.
1911 Timestamps can also be turned on with the
1912 "monitor set debug-format timestamps" command from GDB.
1913
1914 * The 'record instruction-history' command now starts counting instructions
1915 at one. This also affects the instruction ranges reported by the
1916 'record function-call-history' command when given the /i modifier.
1917
1918 * The command 'record function-call-history' supports a new modifier '/c' to
1919 indent the function names based on their call stack depth.
1920 The fields for the '/i' and '/l' modifier have been reordered.
1921 The source line range is now prefixed with 'at'.
1922 The instruction range is now prefixed with 'inst'.
1923 Both ranges are now printed as '<from>, <to>' to allow copy&paste to the
1924 "record instruction-history" and "list" commands.
1925
1926 * The ranges given as arguments to the 'record function-call-history' and
1927 'record instruction-history' commands are now inclusive.
1928
1929 * The btrace record target now supports the 'record goto' command.
1930 For locations inside the execution trace, the back trace is computed
1931 based on the information stored in the execution trace.
1932
1933 * The btrace record target supports limited reverse execution and replay.
1934 The target does not record data and therefore does not allow reading
1935 memory or registers.
1936
1937 * The "catch syscall" command now works on s390*-linux* targets.
1938
1939 * The "compare-sections" command is no longer specific to target
1940 remote. It now works with all targets.
1941
1942 * All native targets are now consistently called "native".
1943 Consequently, the "target child", "target GNU", "target djgpp",
1944 "target procfs" (Solaris/Irix/OSF/AIX) and "target darwin-child"
1945 commands have been replaced with "target native". The QNX/NTO port
1946 leaves the "procfs" target in place and adds a "native" target for
1947 consistency with other ports. The impact on users should be minimal
1948 as these commands previously either throwed an error, or were
1949 no-ops. The target's name is visible in the output of the following
1950 commands: "help target", "info target", "info files", "maint print
1951 target-stack".
1952
1953 * The "target native" command now connects to the native target. This
1954 can be used to launch native programs even when "set
1955 auto-connect-native-target" is set to off.
1956
1957 * GDB now supports access to Intel MPX registers on GNU/Linux.
1958
1959 * Support for Intel AVX-512 registers on GNU/Linux.
1960 Support displaying and modifying Intel AVX-512 registers
1961 $zmm0 - $zmm31 and $k0 - $k7 on GNU/Linux.
1962
1963 * New remote packets
1964
1965 qXfer:btrace:read's annex
1966 The qXfer:btrace:read packet supports a new annex 'delta' to read
1967 branch trace incrementally.
1968
1969 * Python Scripting
1970
1971 ** Valid Python operations on gdb.Value objects representing
1972 structs/classes invoke the corresponding overloaded operators if
1973 available.
1974 ** New `Xmethods' feature in the Python API. Xmethods are
1975 additional methods or replacements for existing methods of a C++
1976 class. This feature is useful for those cases where a method
1977 defined in C++ source code could be inlined or optimized out by
1978 the compiler, making it unavailable to GDB.
1979
1980 * New targets
1981 PowerPC64 GNU/Linux little-endian powerpc64le-*-linux*
1982
1983 * The "dll-symbols" command, and its two aliases ("add-shared-symbol-files"
1984 and "assf"), have been deprecated. Use the "sharedlibrary" command, or
1985 its alias "share", instead.
1986
1987 * The commands "set remotebaud" and "show remotebaud" are no longer
1988 supported. Use "set serial baud" and "show serial baud" (respectively)
1989 instead.
1990
1991 * MI changes
1992
1993 ** A new option "-gdb-set mi-async" replaces "-gdb-set
1994 target-async". The latter is left as a deprecated alias of the
1995 former for backward compatibility. If the target supports it,
1996 CLI background execution commands are now always possible by
1997 default, independently of whether the frontend stated a
1998 preference for asynchronous execution with "-gdb-set mi-async".
1999 Previously "-gdb-set target-async off" affected both MI execution
2000 commands and CLI execution commands.
2001
2002 *** Changes in GDB 7.7
2003
2004 * Improved support for process record-replay and reverse debugging on
2005 arm*-linux* targets. Support for thumb32 and syscall instruction
2006 recording has been added.
2007
2008 * GDB now supports SystemTap SDT probes on AArch64 GNU/Linux.
2009
2010 * GDB now supports Fission DWP file format version 2.
2011 http://gcc.gnu.org/wiki/DebugFission
2012
2013 * New convenience function "$_isvoid", to check whether an expression
2014 is void. A void expression is an expression where the type of the
2015 result is "void". For example, some convenience variables may be
2016 "void" when evaluated (e.g., "$_exitcode" before the execution of
2017 the program being debugged; or an undefined convenience variable).
2018 Another example, when calling a function whose return type is
2019 "void".
2020
2021 * The "maintenance print objfiles" command now takes an optional regexp.
2022
2023 * The "catch syscall" command now works on arm*-linux* targets.
2024
2025 * GDB now consistently shows "<not saved>" when printing values of
2026 registers the debug info indicates have not been saved in the frame
2027 and there's nowhere to retrieve them from
2028 (callee-saved/call-clobbered registers):
2029
2030 (gdb) p $rax
2031 $1 = <not saved>
2032
2033 (gdb) info registers rax
2034 rax <not saved>
2035
2036 Before, the former would print "<optimized out>", and the latter
2037 "*value not available*".
2038
2039 * New script contrib/gdb-add-index.sh for adding .gdb_index sections
2040 to binaries.
2041
2042 * Python scripting
2043
2044 ** Frame filters and frame decorators have been added.
2045 ** Temporary breakpoints are now supported.
2046 ** Line tables representation has been added.
2047 ** New attribute 'parent_type' for gdb.Field objects.
2048 ** gdb.Field objects can be used as subscripts on gdb.Value objects.
2049 ** New attribute 'name' for gdb.Type objects.
2050
2051 * New targets
2052
2053 Nios II ELF nios2*-*-elf
2054 Nios II GNU/Linux nios2*-*-linux
2055 Texas Instruments MSP430 msp430*-*-elf
2056
2057 * Removed native configurations
2058
2059 Support for these a.out NetBSD and OpenBSD obsolete configurations has
2060 been removed. ELF variants of these configurations are kept supported.
2061
2062 arm*-*-netbsd* but arm*-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
2063 i[34567]86-*-netbsd* but i[34567]86-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
2064 i[34567]86-*-openbsd[0-2].* but i[34567]86-*-openbsd* is kept supported.
2065 i[34567]86-*-openbsd3.[0-3]
2066 m68*-*-netbsd* but m68*-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
2067 sparc-*-netbsd* but sparc-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
2068 vax-*-netbsd* but vax-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
2069
2070 * New commands:
2071 catch rethrow
2072 Like "catch throw", but catches a re-thrown exception.
2073 maint check-psymtabs
2074 Renamed from old "maint check-symtabs".
2075 maint check-symtabs
2076 Perform consistency checks on symtabs.
2077 maint expand-symtabs
2078 Expand symtabs matching an optional regexp.
2079
2080 show configuration
2081 Display the details of GDB configure-time options.
2082
2083 maint set|show per-command
2084 maint set|show per-command space
2085 maint set|show per-command time
2086 maint set|show per-command symtab
2087 Enable display of per-command gdb resource usage.
2088
2089 remove-symbol-file FILENAME
2090 remove-symbol-file -a ADDRESS
2091 Remove a symbol file added via add-symbol-file. The file to remove
2092 can be identified by its filename or by an address that lies within
2093 the boundaries of this symbol file in memory.
2094
2095 info exceptions
2096 info exceptions REGEXP
2097 Display the list of Ada exceptions defined in the program being
2098 debugged. If provided, only the exceptions whose names match REGEXP
2099 are listed.
2100
2101 * New options
2102
2103 set debug symfile off|on
2104 show debug symfile
2105 Control display of debugging info regarding reading symbol files and
2106 symbol tables within those files
2107
2108 set print raw frame-arguments
2109 show print raw frame-arguments
2110 Set/show whether to print frame arguments in raw mode,
2111 disregarding any defined pretty-printers.
2112
2113 set remote trace-status-packet
2114 show remote trace-status-packet
2115 Set/show the use of remote protocol qTStatus packet.
2116
2117 set debug nios2
2118 show debug nios2
2119 Control display of debugging messages related to Nios II targets.
2120
2121 set range-stepping
2122 show range-stepping
2123 Control whether target-assisted range stepping is enabled.
2124
2125 set startup-with-shell
2126 show startup-with-shell
2127 Specifies whether Unix child processes are started via a shell or
2128 directly.
2129
2130 set code-cache
2131 show code-cache
2132 Use the target memory cache for accesses to the code segment. This
2133 improves performance of remote debugging (particularly disassembly).
2134
2135 * You can now use a literal value 'unlimited' for options that
2136 interpret 0 or -1 as meaning "unlimited". E.g., "set
2137 trace-buffer-size unlimited" is now an alias for "set
2138 trace-buffer-size -1" and "set height unlimited" is now an alias for
2139 "set height 0".
2140
2141 * The "set debug symtab-create" debugging option of GDB has been changed to
2142 accept a verbosity level. 0 means "off", 1 provides basic debugging
2143 output, and values of 2 or greater provides more verbose output.
2144
2145 * New command-line options
2146 --configuration
2147 Display the details of GDB configure-time options.
2148
2149 * The command 'tsave' can now support new option '-ctf' to save trace
2150 buffer in Common Trace Format.
2151
2152 * Newly installed $prefix/bin/gcore acts as a shell interface for the
2153 GDB command gcore.
2154
2155 * GDB now implements the the C++ 'typeid' operator.
2156
2157 * The new convenience variable $_exception holds the exception being
2158 thrown or caught at an exception-related catchpoint.
2159
2160 * The exception-related catchpoints, like "catch throw", now accept a
2161 regular expression which can be used to filter exceptions by type.
2162
2163 * The new convenience variable $_exitsignal is automatically set to
2164 the terminating signal number when the program being debugged dies
2165 due to an uncaught signal.
2166
2167 * MI changes
2168
2169 ** All MI commands now accept an optional "--language" option.
2170 Support for this feature can be verified by using the "-list-features"
2171 command, which should contain "language-option".
2172
2173 ** The new command -info-gdb-mi-command allows the user to determine
2174 whether a GDB/MI command is supported or not.
2175
2176 ** The "^error" result record returned when trying to execute an undefined
2177 GDB/MI command now provides a variable named "code" whose content is the
2178 "undefined-command" error code. Support for this feature can be verified
2179 by using the "-list-features" command, which should contain
2180 "undefined-command-error-code".
2181
2182 ** The -trace-save MI command can optionally save trace buffer in Common
2183 Trace Format now.
2184
2185 ** The new command -dprintf-insert sets a dynamic printf breakpoint.
2186
2187 ** The command -data-list-register-values now accepts an optional
2188 "--skip-unavailable" option. When used, only the available registers
2189 are displayed.
2190
2191 ** The new command -trace-frame-collected dumps collected variables,
2192 computed expressions, tvars, memory and registers in a traceframe.
2193
2194 ** The commands -stack-list-locals, -stack-list-arguments and
2195 -stack-list-variables now accept an option "--skip-unavailable".
2196 When used, only the available locals or arguments are displayed.
2197
2198 ** The -exec-run command now accepts an optional "--start" option.
2199 When used, the command follows the same semantics as the "start"
2200 command, stopping the program's execution at the start of its
2201 main subprogram. Support for this feature can be verified using
2202 the "-list-features" command, which should contain
2203 "exec-run-start-option".
2204
2205 ** The new commands -catch-assert and -catch-exceptions insert
2206 catchpoints stopping the program when Ada exceptions are raised.
2207
2208 ** The new command -info-ada-exceptions provides the equivalent of
2209 the new "info exceptions" command.
2210
2211 * New system-wide configuration scripts
2212 A GDB installation now provides scripts suitable for use as system-wide
2213 configuration scripts for the following systems:
2214 ** ElinOS
2215 ** Wind River Linux
2216
2217 * GDB now supports target-assigned range stepping with remote targets.
2218 This improves the performance of stepping source lines by reducing
2219 the number of control packets from/to GDB. See "New remote packets"
2220 below.
2221
2222 * GDB now understands the element 'tvar' in the XML traceframe info.
2223 It has the id of the collected trace state variables.
2224
2225 * On S/390 targets that provide the transactional-execution feature,
2226 the program interruption transaction diagnostic block (TDB) is now
2227 represented as a number of additional "registers" in GDB.
2228
2229 * New remote packets
2230
2231 vCont;r
2232
2233 The vCont packet supports a new 'r' action, that tells the remote
2234 stub to step through an address range itself, without GDB
2235 involvemement at each single-step.
2236
2237 qXfer:libraries-svr4:read's annex
2238 The previously unused annex of the qXfer:libraries-svr4:read packet
2239 is now used to support passing an argument list. The remote stub
2240 reports support for this argument list to GDB's qSupported query.
2241 The defined arguments are "start" and "prev", used to reduce work
2242 necessary for library list updating, resulting in significant
2243 speedup.
2244
2245 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
2246
2247 ** GDBserver now supports target-assisted range stepping. Currently
2248 enabled on x86/x86_64 GNU/Linux targets.
2249
2250 ** GDBserver now adds element 'tvar' in the XML in the reply to
2251 'qXfer:traceframe-info:read'. It has the id of the collected
2252 trace state variables.
2253
2254 ** GDBserver now supports hardware watchpoints on the MIPS GNU/Linux
2255 target.
2256
2257 * New 'z' formatter for printing and examining memory, this displays the
2258 value as hexadecimal zero padded on the left to the size of the type.
2259
2260 * GDB can now use Windows x64 unwinding data.
2261
2262 * The "set remotebaud" command has been replaced by "set serial baud".
2263 Similarly, "show remotebaud" has been replaced by "show serial baud".
2264 The "set remotebaud" and "show remotebaud" commands are still available
2265 to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
2266
2267 *** Changes in GDB 7.6
2268
2269 * Target record has been renamed to record-full.
2270 Record/replay is now enabled with the "record full" command.
2271 This also affects settings that are associated with full record/replay
2272 that have been moved from "set/show record" to "set/show record full":
2273
2274 set|show record full insn-number-max
2275 set|show record full stop-at-limit
2276 set|show record full memory-query
2277
2278 * A new record target "record-btrace" has been added. The new target
2279 uses hardware support to record the control-flow of a process. It
2280 does not support replaying the execution, but it implements the
2281 below new commands for investigating the recorded execution log.
2282 This new recording method can be enabled using:
2283
2284 record btrace
2285
2286 The "record-btrace" target is only available on Intel Atom processors
2287 and requires a Linux kernel 2.6.32 or later.
2288
2289 * Two new commands have been added for record/replay to give information
2290 about the recorded execution without having to replay the execution.
2291 The commands are only supported by "record btrace".
2292
2293 record instruction-history prints the execution history at
2294 instruction granularity
2295
2296 record function-call-history prints the execution history at
2297 function granularity
2298
2299 * New native configurations
2300
2301 ARM AArch64 GNU/Linux aarch64*-*-linux-gnu
2302 FreeBSD/powerpc powerpc*-*-freebsd
2303 x86_64/Cygwin x86_64-*-cygwin*
2304 Tilera TILE-Gx GNU/Linux tilegx*-*-linux-gnu
2305
2306 * New targets
2307
2308 ARM AArch64 aarch64*-*-elf
2309 ARM AArch64 GNU/Linux aarch64*-*-linux
2310 Lynx 178 PowerPC powerpc-*-lynx*178
2311 x86_64/Cygwin x86_64-*-cygwin*
2312 Tilera TILE-Gx GNU/Linux tilegx*-*-linux
2313
2314 * If the configured location of system.gdbinit file (as given by the
2315 --with-system-gdbinit option at configure time) is in the
2316 data-directory (as specified by --with-gdb-datadir at configure
2317 time) or in one of its subdirectories, then GDB will look for the
2318 system-wide init file in the directory specified by the
2319 --data-directory command-line option.
2320
2321 * New command line options:
2322
2323 -nh Disables auto-loading of ~/.gdbinit, but still executes all the
2324 other initialization files, unlike -nx which disables all of them.
2325
2326 * Removed command line options
2327
2328 -epoch This was used by the gdb mode in Epoch, an ancient fork of
2329 Emacs.
2330
2331 * The 'ptype' and 'whatis' commands now accept an argument to control
2332 type formatting.
2333
2334 * 'info proc' now works on some core files.
2335
2336 * Python scripting
2337
2338 ** Vectors can be created with gdb.Type.vector.
2339
2340 ** Python's atexit.register now works in GDB.
2341
2342 ** Types can be pretty-printed via a Python API.
2343
2344 ** Python 3 is now supported (in addition to Python 2.4 or later)
2345
2346 ** New class gdb.Architecture exposes GDB's internal representation
2347 of architecture in the Python API.
2348
2349 ** New method Frame.architecture returns the gdb.Architecture object
2350 corresponding to the frame's architecture.
2351
2352 * New Python-based convenience functions:
2353
2354 ** $_memeq(buf1, buf2, length)
2355 ** $_streq(str1, str2)
2356 ** $_strlen(str)
2357 ** $_regex(str, regex)
2358
2359 * The 'cd' command now defaults to using '~' (the home directory) if not
2360 given an argument.
2361
2362 * The C++ ABI now defaults to the GNU v3 ABI. This has been the
2363 default for GCC since November 2000.
2364
2365 * The command 'forward-search' can now be abbreviated as 'fo'.
2366
2367 * The command 'info tracepoints' can now display 'installed on target'
2368 or 'not installed on target' for each non-pending location of tracepoint.
2369
2370 * New configure options
2371
2372 --enable-libmcheck/--disable-libmcheck
2373 By default, development versions are built with -lmcheck on hosts
2374 that support it, in order to help track memory corruption issues.
2375 Release versions, on the other hand, are built without -lmcheck
2376 by default. The --enable-libmcheck/--disable-libmcheck configure
2377 options allow the user to override that default.
2378 --with-babeltrace/--with-babeltrace-include/--with-babeltrace-lib
2379 This configure option allows the user to build GDB with
2380 libbabeltrace using which GDB can read Common Trace Format data.
2381
2382 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
2383
2384 catch signal
2385 Catch signals. This is similar to "handle", but allows commands and
2386 conditions to be attached.
2387
2388 maint info bfds
2389 List the BFDs known to GDB.
2390
2391 python-interactive [command]
2392 pi [command]
2393 Start a Python interactive prompt, or evaluate the optional command
2394 and print the result of expressions.
2395
2396 py [command]
2397 "py" is a new alias for "python".
2398
2399 enable type-printer [name]...
2400 disable type-printer [name]...
2401 Enable or disable type printers.
2402
2403 * Removed commands
2404
2405 ** For the Renesas Super-H architecture, the "regs" command has been removed
2406 (has been deprecated in GDB 7.5), and "info all-registers" should be used
2407 instead.
2408
2409 * New options
2410
2411 set print type methods (on|off)
2412 show print type methods
2413 Control whether method declarations are displayed by "ptype".
2414 The default is to show them.
2415
2416 set print type typedefs (on|off)
2417 show print type typedefs
2418 Control whether typedef definitions are displayed by "ptype".
2419 The default is to show them.
2420
2421 set filename-display basename|relative|absolute
2422 show filename-display
2423 Control the way in which filenames is displayed.
2424 The default is "relative", which preserves previous behavior.
2425
2426 set trace-buffer-size
2427 show trace-buffer-size
2428 Request target to change the size of trace buffer.
2429
2430 set remote trace-buffer-size-packet auto|on|off
2431 show remote trace-buffer-size-packet
2432 Control the use of the remote protocol `QTBuffer:size' packet.
2433
2434 set debug aarch64
2435 show debug aarch64
2436 Control display of debugging messages related to ARM AArch64.
2437 The default is off.
2438
2439 set debug coff-pe-read
2440 show debug coff-pe-read
2441 Control display of debugging messages related to reading of COFF/PE
2442 exported symbols.
2443
2444 set debug mach-o
2445 show debug mach-o
2446 Control display of debugging messages related to Mach-O symbols
2447 processing.
2448
2449 set debug notification
2450 show debug notification
2451 Control display of debugging info for async remote notification.
2452
2453 * MI changes
2454
2455 ** Command parameter changes are now notified using new async record
2456 "=cmd-param-changed".
2457 ** Trace frame changes caused by command "tfind" are now notified using
2458 new async record "=traceframe-changed".
2459 ** The creation, deletion and modification of trace state variables
2460 are now notified using new async records "=tsv-created",
2461 "=tsv-deleted" and "=tsv-modified".
2462 ** The start and stop of process record are now notified using new
2463 async record "=record-started" and "=record-stopped".
2464 ** Memory changes are now notified using new async record
2465 "=memory-changed".
2466 ** The data-disassemble command response will include a "fullname" field
2467 containing the absolute file name when source has been requested.
2468 ** New optional parameter COUNT added to the "-data-write-memory-bytes"
2469 command, to allow pattern filling of memory areas.
2470 ** New commands "-catch-load"/"-catch-unload" added for intercepting
2471 library load/unload events.
2472 ** The response to breakpoint commands and breakpoint async records
2473 includes an "installed" field containing a boolean state about each
2474 non-pending tracepoint location is whether installed on target or not.
2475 ** Output of the "-trace-status" command includes a "trace-file" field
2476 containing the name of the trace file being examined. This field is
2477 optional, and only present when examining a trace file.
2478 ** The "fullname" field is now always present along with the "file" field,
2479 even if the file cannot be found by GDB.
2480
2481 * GDB now supports the "mini debuginfo" section, .gnu_debugdata.
2482 You must have the LZMA library available when configuring GDB for this
2483 feature to be enabled. For more information, see:
2484 http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Features/MiniDebugInfo
2485
2486 * New remote packets
2487
2488 QTBuffer:size
2489 Set the size of trace buffer. The remote stub reports support for this
2490 packet to gdb's qSupported query.
2491
2492 Qbtrace:bts
2493 Enable Branch Trace Store (BTS)-based branch tracing for the current
2494 thread. The remote stub reports support for this packet to gdb's
2495 qSupported query.
2496
2497 Qbtrace:off
2498 Disable branch tracing for the current thread. The remote stub reports
2499 support for this packet to gdb's qSupported query.
2500
2501 qXfer:btrace:read
2502 Read the traced branches for the current thread. The remote stub
2503 reports support for this packet to gdb's qSupported query.
2504
2505 *** Changes in GDB 7.5
2506
2507 * GDB now supports x32 ABI. Visit <http://sites.google.com/site/x32abi/>
2508 for more x32 ABI info.
2509
2510 * GDB now supports access to MIPS DSP registers on Linux targets.
2511
2512 * GDB now supports debugging microMIPS binaries.
2513
2514 * The "info os" command on GNU/Linux can now display information on
2515 several new classes of objects managed by the operating system:
2516 "info os procgroups" lists process groups
2517 "info os files" lists file descriptors
2518 "info os sockets" lists internet-domain sockets
2519 "info os shm" lists shared-memory regions
2520 "info os semaphores" lists semaphores
2521 "info os msg" lists message queues
2522 "info os modules" lists loaded kernel modules
2523
2524 * GDB now has support for SDT (Static Defined Tracing) probes. Currently,
2525 the only implemented backend is for SystemTap probes (<sys/sdt.h>). You
2526 can set a breakpoint using the new "-probe, "-pstap" or "-probe-stap"
2527 options and inspect the probe arguments using the new $_probe_arg family
2528 of convenience variables. You can obtain more information about SystemTap
2529 in <http://sourceware.org/systemtap/>.
2530
2531 * GDB now supports reversible debugging on ARM, it allows you to
2532 debug basic ARM and THUMB instructions, and provides
2533 record/replay support.
2534
2535 * The option "symbol-reloading" has been deleted as it is no longer used.
2536
2537 * Python scripting
2538
2539 ** GDB commands implemented in Python can now be put in command class
2540 "gdb.COMMAND_USER".
2541
2542 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" is now deleted.
2543
2544 ** A new class, gdb.printing.FlagEnumerationPrinter, can be used to
2545 apply "flag enum"-style pretty-printing to any enum.
2546
2547 ** gdb.lookup_symbol can now work when there is no current frame.
2548
2549 ** gdb.Symbol now has a 'line' attribute, holding the line number in
2550 the source at which the symbol was defined.
2551
2552 ** gdb.Symbol now has the new attribute 'needs_frame' and the new
2553 method 'value'. The former indicates whether the symbol needs a
2554 frame in order to compute its value, and the latter computes the
2555 symbol's value.
2556
2557 ** A new method 'referenced_value' on gdb.Value objects which can
2558 dereference pointer as well as C++ reference values.
2559
2560 ** New methods 'global_block' and 'static_block' on gdb.Symtab objects
2561 which return the global and static blocks (as gdb.Block objects),
2562 of the underlying symbol table, respectively.
2563
2564 ** New function gdb.find_pc_line which returns the gdb.Symtab_and_line
2565 object associated with a PC value.
2566
2567 ** gdb.Symtab_and_line has new attribute 'last' which holds the end
2568 of the address range occupied by code for the current source line.
2569
2570 * Go language support.
2571 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the Go programming
2572 language.
2573
2574 * GDBserver now supports stdio connections.
2575 E.g. (gdb) target remote | ssh myhost gdbserver - hello
2576
2577 * The binary "gdbtui" can no longer be built or installed.
2578 Use "gdb -tui" instead.
2579
2580 * GDB will now print "flag" enums specially. A flag enum is one where
2581 all the enumerator values have no bits in common when pairwise
2582 "and"ed. When printing a value whose type is a flag enum, GDB will
2583 show all the constants, e.g., for enum E { ONE = 1, TWO = 2}:
2584 (gdb) print (enum E) 3
2585 $1 = (ONE | TWO)
2586
2587 * The filename part of a linespec will now match trailing components
2588 of a source file name. For example, "break gcc/expr.c:1000" will
2589 now set a breakpoint in build/gcc/expr.c, but not
2590 build/libcpp/expr.c.
2591
2592 * The "info proc" and "generate-core-file" commands will now also
2593 work on remote targets connected to GDBserver on Linux.
2594
2595 * The command "info catch" has been removed. It has been disabled
2596 since December 2007.
2597
2598 * The "catch exception" and "catch assert" commands now accept
2599 a condition at the end of the command, much like the "break"
2600 command does. For instance:
2601
2602 (gdb) catch exception Constraint_Error if Barrier = True
2603
2604 Previously, it was possible to add a condition to such catchpoints,
2605 but it had to be done as a second step, after the catchpoint had been
2606 created, using the "condition" command.
2607
2608 * The "info static-tracepoint-marker" command will now also work on
2609 native Linux targets with in-process agent.
2610
2611 * GDB can now set breakpoints on inlined functions.
2612
2613 * The .gdb_index section has been updated to include symbols for
2614 inlined functions. GDB will ignore older .gdb_index sections by
2615 default, which could cause symbol files to be loaded more slowly
2616 until their .gdb_index sections can be recreated. The new command
2617 "set use-deprecated-index-sections on" will cause GDB to use any older
2618 .gdb_index sections it finds. This will restore performance, but the
2619 ability to set breakpoints on inlined functions will be lost in symbol
2620 files with older .gdb_index sections.
2621
2622 The .gdb_index section has also been updated to record more information
2623 about each symbol. This speeds up the "info variables", "info functions"
2624 and "info types" commands when used with programs having the .gdb_index
2625 section, as well as speeding up debugging with shared libraries using
2626 the .gdb_index section.
2627
2628 * Ada support for GDB/MI Variable Objects has been added.
2629
2630 * GDB can now support 'breakpoint always-inserted mode' in 'record'
2631 target.
2632
2633 * MI changes
2634
2635 ** New command -info-os is the MI equivalent of "info os".
2636
2637 ** Output logs ("set logging" and related) now include MI output.
2638
2639 * New commands
2640
2641 ** "set use-deprecated-index-sections on|off"
2642 "show use-deprecated-index-sections on|off"
2643 Controls the use of deprecated .gdb_index sections.
2644
2645 ** "catch load" and "catch unload" can be used to stop when a shared
2646 library is loaded or unloaded, respectively.
2647
2648 ** "enable count" can be used to auto-disable a breakpoint after
2649 several hits.
2650
2651 ** "info vtbl" can be used to show the virtual method tables for
2652 C++ and Java objects.
2653
2654 ** "explore" and its sub commands "explore value" and "explore type"
2655 can be used to recursively explore values and types of
2656 expressions. These commands are available only if GDB is
2657 configured with '--with-python'.
2658
2659 ** "info auto-load" shows status of all kinds of auto-loaded files,
2660 "info auto-load gdb-scripts" shows status of auto-loading GDB canned
2661 sequences of commands files, "info auto-load python-scripts"
2662 shows status of auto-loading Python script files,
2663 "info auto-load local-gdbinit" shows status of loading init file
2664 (.gdbinit) from current directory and "info auto-load libthread-db" shows
2665 status of inferior specific thread debugging shared library loading.
2666
2667 ** "info auto-load-scripts", "set auto-load-scripts on|off"
2668 and "show auto-load-scripts" commands have been deprecated, use their
2669 "info auto-load python-scripts", "set auto-load python-scripts on|off"
2670 and "show auto-load python-scripts" counterparts instead.
2671
2672 ** "dprintf location,format,args..." creates a dynamic printf, which
2673 is basically a breakpoint that does a printf and immediately
2674 resumes your program's execution, so it is like a printf that you
2675 can insert dynamically at runtime instead of at compiletime.
2676
2677 ** "set print symbol"
2678 "show print symbol"
2679 Controls whether GDB attempts to display the symbol, if any,
2680 corresponding to addresses it prints. This defaults to "on", but
2681 you can set it to "off" to restore GDB's previous behavior.
2682
2683 * Deprecated commands
2684
2685 ** For the Renesas Super-H architecture, the "regs" command has been
2686 deprecated, and "info all-registers" should be used instead.
2687
2688 * New targets
2689
2690 Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
2691 HP OpenVMS ia64 ia64-hp-openvms*
2692
2693 * GDBserver supports evaluation of breakpoint conditions. When
2694 support is advertised by GDBserver, GDB may be told to send the
2695 breakpoint conditions in bytecode form to GDBserver. GDBserver
2696 will only report the breakpoint trigger to GDB when its condition
2697 evaluates to true.
2698
2699 * New options
2700
2701 set mips compression
2702 show mips compression
2703 Select the compressed ISA encoding used in functions that have no symbol
2704 information available. The encoding can be set to either of:
2705 mips16
2706 micromips
2707 and is updated automatically from ELF file flags if available.
2708
2709 set breakpoint condition-evaluation
2710 show breakpoint condition-evaluation
2711 Control whether breakpoint conditions are evaluated by GDB ("host") or by
2712 GDBserver ("target"). Default option "auto" chooses the most efficient
2713 available mode.
2714 This option can improve debugger efficiency depending on the speed of the
2715 target.
2716
2717 set auto-load off
2718 Disable auto-loading globally.
2719
2720 show auto-load
2721 Show auto-loading setting of all kinds of auto-loaded files.
2722
2723 set auto-load gdb-scripts on|off
2724 show auto-load gdb-scripts
2725 Control auto-loading of GDB canned sequences of commands files.
2726
2727 set auto-load python-scripts on|off
2728 show auto-load python-scripts
2729 Control auto-loading of Python script files.
2730
2731 set auto-load local-gdbinit on|off
2732 show auto-load local-gdbinit
2733 Control loading of init file (.gdbinit) from current directory.
2734
2735 set auto-load libthread-db on|off
2736 show auto-load libthread-db
2737 Control auto-loading of inferior specific thread debugging shared library.
2738
2739 set auto-load scripts-directory <dir1>[:<dir2>...]
2740 show auto-load scripts-directory
2741 Set a list of directories from which to load auto-loaded scripts.
2742 Automatically loaded Python scripts and GDB scripts are located in one
2743 of the directories listed by this option.
2744 The delimiter (':' above) may differ according to the host platform.
2745
2746 set auto-load safe-path <dir1>[:<dir2>...]
2747 show auto-load safe-path
2748 Set a list of directories from which it is safe to auto-load files.
2749 The delimiter (':' above) may differ according to the host platform.
2750
2751 set debug auto-load on|off
2752 show debug auto-load
2753 Control display of debugging info for auto-loading the files above.
2754
2755 set dprintf-style gdb|call|agent
2756 show dprintf-style
2757 Control the way in which a dynamic printf is performed; "gdb"
2758 requests a GDB printf command, while "call" causes dprintf to call a
2759 function in the inferior. "agent" requests that the target agent
2760 (such as GDBserver) do the printing.
2761
2762 set dprintf-function <expr>
2763 show dprintf-function
2764 set dprintf-channel <expr>
2765 show dprintf-channel
2766 Set the function and optional first argument to the call when using
2767 the "call" style of dynamic printf.
2768
2769 set disconnected-dprintf on|off
2770 show disconnected-dprintf
2771 Control whether agent-style dynamic printfs continue to be in effect
2772 after GDB disconnects.
2773
2774 * New configure options
2775
2776 --with-auto-load-dir
2777 Configure default value for the 'set auto-load scripts-directory'
2778 setting above. It defaults to '$debugdir:$datadir/auto-load',
2779 $debugdir representing global debugging info directories (available
2780 via 'show debug-file-directory') and $datadir representing GDB's data
2781 directory (available via 'show data-directory').
2782
2783 --with-auto-load-safe-path
2784 Configure default value for the 'set auto-load safe-path' setting
2785 above. It defaults to the --with-auto-load-dir setting.
2786
2787 --without-auto-load-safe-path
2788 Set 'set auto-load safe-path' to '/', effectively disabling this
2789 security feature.
2790
2791 * New remote packets
2792
2793 z0/z1 conditional breakpoints extension
2794
2795 The z0/z1 breakpoint insertion packets have been extended to carry
2796 a list of conditional expressions over to the remote stub depending on the
2797 condition evaluation mode. The use of this extension can be controlled
2798 via the "set remote conditional-breakpoints-packet" command.
2799
2800 QProgramSignals:
2801
2802 Specify the signals which the remote stub may pass to the debugged
2803 program without GDB involvement.
2804
2805 * New command line options
2806
2807 --init-command=FILE, -ix Like --command, -x but execute it
2808 before loading inferior.
2809 --init-eval-command=COMMAND, -iex Like --eval-command=COMMAND, -ex but
2810 execute it before loading inferior.
2811
2812 *** Changes in GDB 7.4
2813
2814 * GDB now handles ambiguous linespecs more consistently; the existing
2815 FILE:LINE support has been expanded to other types of linespecs. A
2816 breakpoint will now be set on all matching locations in all
2817 inferiors, and locations will be added or removed according to
2818 inferior changes.
2819
2820 * GDB now allows you to skip uninteresting functions and files when
2821 stepping with the "skip function" and "skip file" commands.
2822
2823 * GDB has two new commands: "set remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit"
2824 and "show remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit". These allows to
2825 set or show the maximum length limit (in bytes) of a remote
2826 target hardware watchpoint.
2827
2828 This allows e.g. to use "unlimited" hardware watchpoints with the
2829 gdbserver integrated in Valgrind version >= 3.7.0. Such Valgrind
2830 watchpoints are slower than real hardware watchpoints but are
2831 significantly faster than gdb software watchpoints.
2832
2833 * Python scripting
2834
2835 ** The register_pretty_printer function in module gdb.printing now takes
2836 an optional `replace' argument. If True, the new printer replaces any
2837 existing one.
2838
2839 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" command has been
2840 deprecated and will be deleted in GDB 7.5.
2841 A new command: "set python print-stack none|full|message" has
2842 replaced it. Additionally, the default for "print-stack" is
2843 now "message", which just prints the error message without
2844 the stack trace.
2845
2846 ** A prompt substitution hook (prompt_hook) is now available to the
2847 Python API.
2848
2849 ** A new Python module, gdb.prompt has been added to the GDB Python
2850 modules library. This module provides functionality for
2851 escape sequences in prompts (used by set/show
2852 extended-prompt). These escape sequences are replaced by their
2853 corresponding value.
2854
2855 ** Python commands and convenience-functions located in
2856 'data-directory'/python/gdb/command and
2857 'data-directory'/python/gdb/function are now automatically loaded
2858 on GDB start-up.
2859
2860 ** Blocks now provide four new attributes. global_block and
2861 static_block will return the global and static blocks
2862 respectively. is_static and is_global are boolean attributes
2863 that indicate if the block is one of those two types.
2864
2865 ** Symbols now provide the "type" attribute, the type of the symbol.
2866
2867 ** The "gdb.breakpoint" function has been deprecated in favor of
2868 "gdb.breakpoints".
2869
2870 ** A new class "gdb.FinishBreakpoint" is provided to catch the return
2871 of a function. This class is based on the "finish" command
2872 available in the CLI.
2873
2874 ** Type objects for struct and union types now allow access to
2875 the fields using standard Python dictionary (mapping) methods.
2876 For example, "some_type['myfield']" now works, as does
2877 "some_type.items()".
2878
2879 ** A new event "gdb.new_objfile" has been added, triggered by loading a
2880 new object file.
2881
2882 ** A new function, "deep_items" has been added to the gdb.types
2883 module in the GDB Python modules library. This function returns
2884 an iterator over the fields of a struct or union type. Unlike
2885 the standard Python "iteritems" method, it will recursively traverse
2886 any anonymous fields.
2887
2888 * MI changes
2889
2890 ** "*stopped" events can report several new "reason"s, such as
2891 "solib-event".
2892
2893 ** Breakpoint changes are now notified using new async records, like
2894 "=breakpoint-modified".
2895
2896 ** New command -ada-task-info.
2897
2898 * libthread-db-search-path now supports two special values: $sdir and $pdir.
2899 $sdir specifies the default system locations of shared libraries.
2900 $pdir specifies the directory where the libpthread used by the application
2901 lives.
2902
2903 GDB no longer looks in $sdir and $pdir after it has searched the directories
2904 mentioned in libthread-db-search-path. If you want to search those
2905 directories, they must be specified in libthread-db-search-path.
2906 The default value of libthread-db-search-path on GNU/Linux and Solaris
2907 systems is now "$sdir:$pdir".
2908
2909 $pdir is not supported by gdbserver, it is currently ignored.
2910 $sdir is supported by gdbserver.
2911
2912 * New configure option --with-iconv-bin.
2913 When using the internationalization support like the one in the GNU C
2914 library, GDB will invoke the "iconv" program to get a list of supported
2915 character sets. If this program lives in a non-standard location, one can
2916 use this option to specify where to find it.
2917
2918 * When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
2919 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports masked hardware
2920 watchpoints, which specify a mask in addition to an address to watch.
2921 The mask specifies that some bits of an address (the bits which are
2922 reset in the mask) should be ignored when matching the address accessed
2923 by the inferior against the watchpoint address. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
2924 section in the user manual for more details.
2925
2926 * The new option --once causes GDBserver to stop listening for connections once
2927 the first connection is made. The listening port used by GDBserver will
2928 become available after that.
2929
2930 * New commands "info macros" and "alias" have been added.
2931
2932 * New function parameters suffix @entry specifies value of function parameter
2933 at the time the function got called. Entry values are available only since
2934 gcc version 4.7.
2935
2936 * New commands
2937
2938 !SHELL COMMAND
2939 "!" is now an alias of the "shell" command.
2940 Note that no space is needed between "!" and SHELL COMMAND.
2941
2942 * Changed commands
2943
2944 watch EXPRESSION mask MASK_VALUE
2945 The watch command now supports the mask argument which allows creation
2946 of masked watchpoints, if the current architecture supports this feature.
2947
2948 info auto-load-scripts [REGEXP]
2949 This command was formerly named "maintenance print section-scripts".
2950 It is now generally useful and is no longer a maintenance-only command.
2951
2952 info macro [-all] [--] MACRO
2953 The info macro command has new options `-all' and `--'. The first for
2954 printing all definitions of a macro. The second for explicitly specifying
2955 the end of arguments and the beginning of the macro name in case the macro
2956 name starts with a hyphen.
2957
2958 collect[/s] EXPRESSIONS
2959 The tracepoint collect command now takes an optional modifier "/s"
2960 that directs it to dereference pointer-to-character types and
2961 collect the bytes of memory up to a zero byte. The behavior is
2962 similar to what you see when you use the regular print command on a
2963 string. An optional integer following the "/s" sets a bound on the
2964 number of bytes that will be collected.
2965
2966 tstart [NOTES]
2967 The trace start command now interprets any supplied arguments as a
2968 note to be recorded with the trace run, with an effect similar to
2969 setting the variable trace-notes.
2970
2971 tstop [NOTES]
2972 The trace stop command now interprets any arguments as a note to be
2973 mentioned along with the tstatus report that the trace was stopped
2974 with a command. The effect is similar to setting the variable
2975 trace-stop-notes.
2976
2977 * Tracepoints can now be enabled and disabled at any time after a trace
2978 experiment has been started using the standard "enable" and "disable"
2979 commands. It is now possible to start a trace experiment with no enabled
2980 tracepoints; GDB will display a warning, but will allow the experiment to
2981 begin, assuming that tracepoints will be enabled as needed while the trace
2982 is running.
2983
2984 * Fast tracepoints on 32-bit x86-architectures can now be placed at
2985 locations with 4-byte instructions, when they were previously
2986 limited to locations with instructions of 5 bytes or longer.
2987
2988 * New options
2989
2990 set debug dwarf2-read
2991 show debug dwarf2-read
2992 Turns on or off display of debugging messages related to reading
2993 DWARF debug info. The default is off.
2994
2995 set debug symtab-create
2996 show debug symtab-create
2997 Turns on or off display of debugging messages related to symbol table
2998 creation. The default is off.
2999
3000 set extended-prompt
3001 show extended-prompt
3002 Set the GDB prompt, and allow escape sequences to be inserted to
3003 display miscellaneous information (see 'help set extended-prompt'
3004 for the list of sequences). This prompt (and any information
3005 accessed through the escape sequences) is updated every time the
3006 prompt is displayed.
3007
3008 set print entry-values (both|compact|default|if-needed|no|only|preferred)
3009 show print entry-values
3010 Set printing of frame argument values at function entry. In some cases
3011 GDB can determine the value of function argument which was passed by the
3012 function caller, even if the value was modified inside the called function.
3013
3014 set debug entry-values
3015 show debug entry-values
3016 Control display of debugging info for determining frame argument values at
3017 function entry and virtual tail call frames.
3018
3019 set basenames-may-differ
3020 show basenames-may-differ
3021 Set whether a source file may have multiple base names.
3022 (A "base name" is the name of a file with the directory part removed.
3023 Example: The base name of "/home/user/hello.c" is "hello.c".)
3024 If set, GDB will canonicalize file names (e.g., expand symlinks)
3025 before comparing them. Canonicalization is an expensive operation,
3026 but it allows the same file be known by more than one base name.
3027 If not set (the default), all source files are assumed to have just
3028 one base name, and gdb will do file name comparisons more efficiently.
3029
3030 set trace-user
3031 show trace-user
3032 set trace-notes
3033 show trace-notes
3034 Set a user name and notes for the current and any future trace runs.
3035 This is useful for long-running and/or disconnected traces, to
3036 inform others (or yourself) as to who is running the trace, supply
3037 contact information, or otherwise explain what is going on.
3038
3039 set trace-stop-notes
3040 show trace-stop-notes
3041 Set a note attached to the trace run, that is displayed when the
3042 trace has been stopped by a tstop command. This is useful for
3043 instance as an explanation, if you are stopping a trace run that was
3044 started by someone else.
3045
3046 * New remote packets
3047
3048 QTEnable
3049
3050 Dynamically enable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
3051
3052 QTDisable
3053
3054 Dynamically disable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
3055
3056 QTNotes
3057
3058 Set the user and notes of the trace run.
3059
3060 qTP
3061
3062 Query the current status of a tracepoint.
3063
3064 qTMinFTPILen
3065
3066 Query the minimum length of instruction at which a fast tracepoint may
3067 be placed.
3068
3069 * Dcache size (number of lines) and line-size are now runtime-configurable
3070 via "set dcache line" and "set dcache line-size" commands.
3071
3072 * New targets
3073
3074 Texas Instruments TMS320C6x tic6x-*-*
3075
3076 * New Simulators
3077
3078 Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
3079
3080 *** Changes in GDB 7.3.1
3081
3082 * The build failure for NetBSD and OpenBSD targets have now been fixed.
3083
3084 *** Changes in GDB 7.3
3085
3086 * GDB has a new command: "thread find [REGEXP]".
3087 It finds the thread id whose name, target id, or thread extra info
3088 matches the given regular expression.
3089
3090 * The "catch syscall" command now works on mips*-linux* targets.
3091
3092 * The -data-disassemble MI command now supports modes 2 and 3 for
3093 dumping the instruction opcodes.
3094
3095 * New command line options
3096
3097 -data-directory DIR Specify DIR as the "data-directory".
3098 This is mostly for testing purposes.
3099
3100 * The "maint set python auto-load on|off" command has been renamed to
3101 "set auto-load-scripts on|off".
3102
3103 * GDB has a new command: "set directories".
3104 It is like the "dir" command except that it replaces the
3105 source path list instead of augmenting it.
3106
3107 * GDB now understands thread names.
3108
3109 On GNU/Linux, "info threads" will display the thread name as set by
3110 prctl or pthread_setname_np.
3111
3112 There is also a new command, "thread name", which can be used to
3113 assign a name internally for GDB to display.
3114
3115 * OpenCL C
3116 Initial support for the OpenCL C language (http://www.khronos.org/opencl)
3117 has been integrated into GDB.
3118
3119 * Python scripting
3120
3121 ** The function gdb.Write now accepts an optional keyword 'stream'.
3122 This keyword, when provided, will direct the output to either
3123 stdout, stderr, or GDB's logging output.
3124
3125 ** Parameters can now be be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
3126 you may implement the get_set_doc and get_show_doc functions.
3127 This improves how Parameter set/show documentation is processed
3128 and allows for more dynamic content.
3129
3130 ** Symbols, Symbol Table, Symbol Table and Line, Object Files,
3131 Inferior, Inferior Thread, Blocks, and Block Iterator APIs now
3132 have an is_valid method.
3133
3134 ** Breakpoints can now be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
3135 you may implement a 'stop' function that is executed each time
3136 the inferior reaches that breakpoint.
3137
3138 ** New function gdb.lookup_global_symbol looks up a global symbol.
3139
3140 ** GDB values in Python are now callable if the value represents a
3141 function. For example, if 'some_value' represents a function that
3142 takes two integer parameters and returns a value, you can call
3143 that function like so:
3144
3145 result = some_value (10,20)
3146
3147 ** Module gdb.types has been added.
3148 It contains a collection of utilities for working with gdb.Types objects:
3149 get_basic_type, has_field, make_enum_dict.
3150
3151 ** Module gdb.printing has been added.
3152 It contains utilities for writing and registering pretty-printers.
3153 New classes: PrettyPrinter, SubPrettyPrinter,
3154 RegexpCollectionPrettyPrinter.
3155 New function: register_pretty_printer.
3156
3157 ** New commands "info pretty-printers", "enable pretty-printer" and
3158 "disable pretty-printer" have been added.
3159
3160 ** gdb.parameter("directories") is now available.
3161
3162 ** New function gdb.newest_frame returns the newest frame in the
3163 selected thread.
3164
3165 ** The gdb.InferiorThread class has a new "name" attribute. This
3166 holds the thread's name.
3167
3168 ** Python Support for Inferior events.
3169 Python scripts can add observers to be notified of events
3170 occurring in the process being debugged.
3171 The following events are currently supported:
3172 - gdb.events.cont Continue event.
3173 - gdb.events.exited Inferior exited event.
3174 - gdb.events.stop Signal received, and Breakpoint hit events.
3175
3176 * C++ Improvements:
3177
3178 ** GDB now puts template parameters in scope when debugging in an
3179 instantiation. For example, if you have:
3180
3181 template<int X> int func (void) { return X; }
3182
3183 then if you step into func<5>, "print X" will show "5". This
3184 feature requires proper debuginfo support from the compiler; it
3185 was added to GCC 4.5.
3186
3187 ** The motion commands "next", "finish", "until", and "advance" now
3188 work better when exceptions are thrown. In particular, GDB will
3189 no longer lose control of the inferior; instead, the GDB will
3190 stop the inferior at the point at which the exception is caught.
3191 This functionality requires a change in the exception handling
3192 code that was introduced in GCC 4.5.
3193
3194 * GDB now follows GCC's rules on accessing volatile objects when
3195 reading or writing target state during expression evaluation.
3196 One notable difference to prior behavior is that "print x = 0"
3197 no longer generates a read of x; the value of the assignment is
3198 now always taken directly from the value being assigned.
3199
3200 * GDB now has some support for using labels in the program's source in
3201 linespecs. For instance, you can use "advance label" to continue
3202 execution to a label.
3203
3204 * GDB now has support for reading and writing a new .gdb_index
3205 section. This section holds a fast index of DWARF debugging
3206 information and can be used to greatly speed up GDB startup and
3207 operation. See the documentation for `save gdb-index' for details.
3208
3209 * The "watch" command now accepts an optional "-location" argument.
3210 When used, this causes GDB to watch the memory referred to by the
3211 expression. Such a watchpoint is never deleted due to it going out
3212 of scope.
3213
3214 * GDB now supports thread debugging of core dumps on GNU/Linux.
3215
3216 GDB now activates thread debugging using the libthread_db library
3217 when debugging GNU/Linux core dumps, similarly to when debugging
3218 live processes. As a result, when debugging a core dump file, GDB
3219 is now able to display pthread_t ids of threads. For example, "info
3220 threads" shows the same output as when debugging the process when it
3221 was live. In earlier releases, you'd see something like this:
3222
3223 (gdb) info threads
3224 * 1 LWP 6780 main () at main.c:10
3225
3226 While now you see this:
3227
3228 (gdb) info threads
3229 * 1 Thread 0x7f0f5712a700 (LWP 6780) main () at main.c:10
3230
3231 It is also now possible to inspect TLS variables when debugging core
3232 dumps.
3233
3234 When debugging a core dump generated on a machine other than the one
3235 used to run GDB, you may need to point GDB at the correct
3236 libthread_db library with the "set libthread-db-search-path"
3237 command. See the user manual for more details on this command.
3238
3239 * When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
3240 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports ranged breakpoints,
3241 which stop execution of the inferior whenever it executes an instruction
3242 at any address within the specified range. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
3243 section in the user manual for more details.
3244
3245 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
3246
3247 ** GDBserver is now supported on PowerPC LynxOS (versions 4.x and 5.x),
3248 and i686 LynxOS (version 5.x).
3249
3250 ** GDBserver is now supported on Blackfin Linux.
3251
3252 * New native configurations
3253
3254 ia64 HP-UX ia64-*-hpux*
3255
3256 * New targets:
3257
3258 Analog Devices, Inc. Blackfin Processor bfin-*
3259
3260 * Ada task switching is now supported on sparc-elf targets when
3261 debugging a program using the Ravenscar Profile. For more information,
3262 see the "Tasking Support when using the Ravenscar Profile" section
3263 in the GDB user manual.
3264
3265 * Guile support was removed.
3266
3267 * New features in the GNU simulator
3268
3269 ** The --map-info flag lists all known core mappings.
3270
3271 ** CFI flashes may be simulated via the "cfi" device.
3272
3273 *** Changes in GDB 7.2
3274
3275 * Shared library support for remote targets by default
3276
3277 When GDB is configured for a generic, non-OS specific target, like
3278 for example, --target=arm-eabi or one of the many *-*-elf targets,
3279 GDB now queries remote stubs for loaded shared libraries using the
3280 `qXfer:libraries:read' packet. Previously, shared library support
3281 was always disabled for such configurations.
3282
3283 * C++ Improvements:
3284
3285 ** Argument Dependent Lookup (ADL)
3286
3287 In C++ ADL lookup directs function search to the namespaces of its
3288 arguments even if the namespace has not been imported.
3289 For example:
3290 namespace A
3291 {
3292 class B { };
3293 void foo (B) { }
3294 }
3295 ...
3296 A::B b
3297 foo(b)
3298 Here the compiler will search for `foo' in the namespace of 'b'
3299 and find A::foo. GDB now supports this. This construct is commonly
3300 used in the Standard Template Library for operators.
3301
3302 ** Improved User Defined Operator Support
3303
3304 In addition to member operators, GDB now supports lookup of operators
3305 defined in a namespace and imported with a `using' directive, operators
3306 defined in the global scope, operators imported implicitly from an
3307 anonymous namespace, and the ADL operators mentioned in the previous
3308 entry.
3309 GDB now also supports proper overload resolution for all the previously
3310 mentioned flavors of operators.
3311
3312 ** static const class members
3313
3314 Printing of static const class members that are initialized in the
3315 class definition has been fixed.
3316
3317 * Windows Thread Information Block access.
3318
3319 On Windows targets, GDB now supports displaying the Windows Thread
3320 Information Block (TIB) structure. This structure is visible either
3321 by using the new command `info w32 thread-information-block' or, by
3322 dereferencing the new convenience variable named `$_tlb', a
3323 thread-specific pointer to the TIB. This feature is also supported
3324 when remote debugging using GDBserver.
3325
3326 * Static tracepoints
3327
3328 Static tracepoints are calls in the user program into a tracing
3329 library. One such library is a port of the LTTng kernel tracer to
3330 userspace --- UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer, http://lttng.org/ust).
3331 When debugging with GDBserver, GDB now supports combining the GDB
3332 tracepoint machinery with such libraries. For example: the user can
3333 use GDB to probe a static tracepoint marker (a call from the user
3334 program into the tracing library) with the new "strace" command (see
3335 "New commands" below). This creates a "static tracepoint" in the
3336 breakpoint list, that can be manipulated with the same feature set
3337 as fast and regular tracepoints. E.g., collect registers, local and
3338 global variables, collect trace state variables, and define
3339 tracepoint conditions. In addition, the user can collect extra
3340 static tracepoint marker specific data, by collecting the new
3341 $_sdata internal variable. When analyzing the trace buffer, you can
3342 inspect $_sdata like any other variable available to GDB. For more
3343 information, see the "Tracepoints" chapter in GDB user manual. New
3344 remote packets have been defined to support static tracepoints, see
3345 the "New remote packets" section below.
3346
3347 * Better reconstruction of tracepoints after disconnected tracing
3348
3349 GDB will attempt to download the original source form of tracepoint
3350 definitions when starting a trace run, and then will upload these
3351 upon reconnection to the target, resulting in a more accurate
3352 reconstruction of the tracepoints that are in use on the target.
3353
3354 * Observer mode
3355
3356 You can now exercise direct control over the ways that GDB can
3357 affect your program. For instance, you can disallow the setting of
3358 breakpoints, so that the program can run continuously (assuming
3359 non-stop mode). In addition, the "observer" variable is available
3360 to switch all of the different controls; in observer mode, GDB
3361 cannot affect the target's behavior at all, which is useful for
3362 tasks like diagnosing live systems in the field.
3363
3364 * The new convenience variable $_thread holds the number of the
3365 current thread.
3366
3367 * New remote packets
3368
3369 qGetTIBAddr
3370
3371 Return the address of the Windows Thread Information Block of a given thread.
3372
3373 qRelocInsn
3374
3375 In response to several of the tracepoint packets, the target may now
3376 also respond with a number of intermediate `qRelocInsn' request
3377 packets before the final result packet, to have GDB handle
3378 relocating an instruction to execute at a different address. This
3379 is particularly useful for stubs that support fast tracepoints. GDB
3380 reports support for this feature in the qSupported packet.
3381
3382 qTfSTM, qTsSTM
3383
3384 List static tracepoint markers in the target program.
3385
3386 qTSTMat
3387
3388 List static tracepoint markers at a given address in the target
3389 program.
3390
3391 qXfer:statictrace:read
3392
3393 Read the static trace data collected (by a `collect $_sdata'
3394 tracepoint action). The remote stub reports support for this packet
3395 to gdb's qSupported query.
3396
3397 QAllow
3398
3399 Send the current settings of GDB's permission flags.
3400
3401 QTDPsrc
3402
3403 Send part of the source (textual) form of a tracepoint definition,
3404 which includes location, conditional, and action list.
3405
3406 * The source command now accepts a -s option to force searching for the
3407 script in the source search path even if the script name specifies
3408 a directory.
3409
3410 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
3411
3412 - GDBserver now support tracepoints (including fast tracepoints, and
3413 static tracepoints). The feature is currently supported by the
3414 i386-linux and amd64-linux builds. See the "Tracepoints support
3415 in gdbserver" section in the manual for more information.
3416
3417 GDBserver JIT compiles the tracepoint's conditional agent
3418 expression bytecode into native code whenever possible for low
3419 overhead dynamic tracepoints conditionals. For such tracepoints,
3420 an expression that examines program state is evaluated when the
3421 tracepoint is reached, in order to determine whether to capture
3422 trace data. If the condition is simple and false, processing the
3423 tracepoint finishes very quickly and no data is gathered.
3424
3425 GDBserver interfaces with the UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer) library
3426 for static tracepoints support.
3427
3428 - GDBserver now supports x86_64 Windows 64-bit debugging.
3429
3430 * GDB now sends xmlRegisters= in qSupported packet to indicate that
3431 it understands register description.
3432
3433 * The --batch flag now disables pagination and queries.
3434
3435 * X86 general purpose registers
3436
3437 GDB now supports reading/writing byte, word and double-word x86
3438 general purpose registers directly. This means you can use, say,
3439 $ah or $ax to refer, respectively, to the byte register AH and
3440 16-bit word register AX that are actually portions of the 32-bit
3441 register EAX or 64-bit register RAX.
3442
3443 * The `commands' command now accepts a range of breakpoints to modify.
3444 A plain `commands' following a command that creates multiple
3445 breakpoints affects all the breakpoints set by that command. This
3446 applies to breakpoints set by `rbreak', and also applies when a
3447 single `break' command creates multiple breakpoints (e.g.,
3448 breakpoints on overloaded c++ functions).
3449
3450 * The `rbreak' command now accepts a filename specification as part of
3451 its argument, limiting the functions selected by the regex to those
3452 in the specified file.
3453
3454 * Support for remote debugging Windows and SymbianOS shared libraries
3455 from Unix hosts has been improved. Non Windows GDB builds now can
3456 understand target reported file names that follow MS-DOS based file
3457 system semantics, such as file names that include drive letters and
3458 use the backslash character as directory separator. This makes it
3459 possible to transparently use the "set sysroot" and "set
3460 solib-search-path" on Unix hosts to point as host copies of the
3461 target's shared libraries. See the new command "set
3462 target-file-system-kind" described below, and the "Commands to
3463 specify files" section in the user manual for more information.
3464
3465 * New commands
3466
3467 eval template, expressions...
3468 Convert the values of one or more expressions under the control
3469 of the string template to a command line, and call it.
3470
3471 set target-file-system-kind unix|dos-based|auto
3472 show target-file-system-kind
3473 Set or show the assumed file system kind for target reported file
3474 names.
3475
3476 save breakpoints <filename>
3477 Save all current breakpoint definitions to a file suitable for use
3478 in a later debugging session. To read the saved breakpoint
3479 definitions, use the `source' command.
3480
3481 `save tracepoints' is a new alias for `save-tracepoints'. The latter
3482 is now deprecated.
3483
3484 info static-tracepoint-markers
3485 Display information about static tracepoint markers in the target.
3486
3487 strace FN | FILE:LINE | *ADDR | -m MARKER_ID
3488 Define a static tracepoint by probing a marker at the given
3489 function, line, address, or marker ID.
3490
3491 set observer on|off
3492 show observer
3493 Enable and disable observer mode.
3494
3495 set may-write-registers on|off
3496 set may-write-memory on|off
3497 set may-insert-breakpoints on|off
3498 set may-insert-tracepoints on|off
3499 set may-insert-fast-tracepoints on|off
3500 set may-interrupt on|off
3501 Set individual permissions for GDB effects on the target. Note that
3502 some of these settings can have undesirable or surprising
3503 consequences, particularly when changed in the middle of a session.
3504 For instance, disabling the writing of memory can prevent
3505 breakpoints from being inserted, cause single-stepping to fail, or
3506 even crash your program, if you disable after breakpoints have been
3507 inserted. However, GDB should not crash.
3508
3509 set record memory-query on|off
3510 show record memory-query
3511 Control whether to stop the inferior if memory changes caused
3512 by an instruction cannot be recorded.
3513
3514 * Changed commands
3515
3516 disassemble
3517 The disassemble command now supports "start,+length" form of two arguments.
3518
3519 * Python scripting
3520
3521 ** GDB now provides a new directory location, called the python directory,
3522 where Python scripts written for GDB can be installed. The location
3523 of that directory is <data-directory>/python, where <data-directory>
3524 is the GDB data directory. For more details, see section `Scripting
3525 GDB using Python' in the manual.
3526
3527 ** The GDB Python API now has access to breakpoints, symbols, symbol
3528 tables, program spaces, inferiors, threads and frame's code blocks.
3529 Additionally, GDB Parameters can now be created from the API, and
3530 manipulated via set/show in the CLI.
3531
3532 ** New functions gdb.target_charset, gdb.target_wide_charset,
3533 gdb.progspaces, gdb.current_progspace, and gdb.string_to_argv.
3534
3535 ** New exception gdb.GdbError.
3536
3537 ** Pretty-printers are now also looked up in the current program space.
3538
3539 ** Pretty-printers can now be individually enabled and disabled.
3540
3541 ** GDB now looks for names of Python scripts to auto-load in a
3542 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts', in addition to looking
3543 for a OBJFILE-gdb.py script when OBJFILE is read by the debugger.
3544
3545 * Tracepoint actions were unified with breakpoint commands. In particular,
3546 there are no longer differences in "info break" output for breakpoints and
3547 tracepoints and the "commands" command can be used for both tracepoints and
3548 regular breakpoints.
3549
3550 * New targets
3551
3552 ARM Symbian arm*-*-symbianelf*
3553
3554 * D language support.
3555 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the D programming
3556 language.
3557
3558 * GDB now supports the extended ptrace interface for PowerPC which is
3559 available since Linux kernel version 2.6.34. This automatically enables
3560 any hardware breakpoints and additional hardware watchpoints available in
3561 the processor. The old ptrace interface exposes just one hardware
3562 watchpoint and no hardware breakpoints.
3563
3564 * GDB is now able to use the Data Value Compare (DVC) register available on
3565 embedded PowerPC processors to implement in hardware simple watchpoint
3566 conditions of the form:
3567
3568 watch ADDRESS|VARIABLE if ADDRESS|VARIABLE == CONSTANT EXPRESSION
3569
3570 This works in native GDB running on Linux kernels with the extended ptrace
3571 interface mentioned above.
3572
3573 *** Changes in GDB 7.1
3574
3575 * C++ Improvements
3576
3577 ** Namespace Support
3578
3579 GDB now supports importing of namespaces in C++. This enables the
3580 user to inspect variables from imported namespaces. Support for
3581 namepace aliasing has also been added. So, if a namespace is
3582 aliased in the current scope (e.g. namepace C=A; ) the user can
3583 print variables using the alias (e.g. (gdb) print C::x).
3584
3585 ** Bug Fixes
3586
3587 All known bugs relating to the printing of virtual base class were
3588 fixed. It is now possible to call overloaded static methods using a
3589 qualified name.
3590
3591 ** Cast Operators
3592
3593 The C++ cast operators static_cast<>, dynamic_cast<>, const_cast<>,
3594 and reinterpret_cast<> are now handled by the C++ expression parser.
3595
3596 * New targets
3597
3598 Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze-*-*
3599 Renesas RX rx-*-elf
3600
3601 * New Simulators
3602
3603 Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze
3604 Renesas RX rx
3605
3606 * Multi-program debugging.
3607
3608 GDB now has support for multi-program (a.k.a. multi-executable or
3609 multi-exec) debugging. This allows for debugging multiple inferiors
3610 simultaneously each running a different program under the same GDB
3611 session. See "Debugging Multiple Inferiors and Programs" in the
3612 manual for more information. This implied some user visible changes
3613 in the multi-inferior support. For example, "info inferiors" now
3614 lists inferiors that are not running yet or that have exited
3615 already. See also "New commands" and "New options" below.
3616
3617 * New tracing features
3618
3619 GDB's tracepoint facility now includes several new features:
3620
3621 ** Trace state variables
3622
3623 GDB tracepoints now include support for trace state variables, which
3624 are variables managed by the target agent during a tracing
3625 experiment. They are useful for tracepoints that trigger each
3626 other, so for instance one tracepoint can count hits in a variable,
3627 and then a second tracepoint has a condition that is true when the
3628 count reaches a particular value. Trace state variables share the
3629 $-syntax of GDB convenience variables, and can appear in both
3630 tracepoint actions and condition expressions. Use the "tvariable"
3631 command to create, and "info tvariables" to view; see "Trace State
3632 Variables" in the manual for more detail.
3633
3634 ** Fast tracepoints
3635
3636 GDB now includes an option for defining fast tracepoints, which
3637 targets may implement more efficiently, such as by installing a jump
3638 into the target agent rather than a trap instruction. The resulting
3639 speedup can be by two orders of magnitude or more, although the
3640 tradeoff is that some program locations on some target architectures
3641 might not allow fast tracepoint installation, for instance if the
3642 instruction to be replaced is shorter than the jump. To request a
3643 fast tracepoint, use the "ftrace" command, with syntax identical to
3644 the regular trace command.
3645
3646 ** Disconnected tracing
3647
3648 It is now possible to detach GDB from the target while it is running
3649 a trace experiment, then reconnect later to see how the experiment
3650 is going. In addition, a new variable disconnected-tracing lets you
3651 tell the target agent whether to continue running a trace if the
3652 connection is lost unexpectedly.
3653
3654 ** Trace files
3655
3656 GDB now has the ability to save the trace buffer into a file, and
3657 then use that file as a target, similarly to you can do with
3658 corefiles. You can select trace frames, print data that was
3659 collected in them, and use tstatus to display the state of the
3660 tracing run at the moment that it was saved. To create a trace
3661 file, use "tsave <filename>", and to use it, do "target tfile
3662 <name>".
3663
3664 ** Circular trace buffer
3665
3666 You can ask the target agent to handle the trace buffer as a
3667 circular buffer, discarding the oldest trace frames to make room for
3668 newer ones, by setting circular-trace-buffer to on. This feature may
3669 not be available for all target agents.
3670
3671 * Changed commands
3672
3673 disassemble
3674 The disassemble command, when invoked with two arguments, now requires
3675 the arguments to be comma-separated.
3676
3677 info variables
3678 The info variables command now displays variable definitions. Files
3679 which only declare a variable are not shown.
3680
3681 source
3682 The source command is now capable of sourcing Python scripts.
3683 This feature is dependent on the debugger being build with Python
3684 support.
3685
3686 Related to this enhancement is also the introduction of a new command
3687 "set script-extension" (see below).
3688
3689 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
3690
3691 record save [<FILENAME>]
3692 Save a file (in core file format) containing the process record
3693 execution log for replay debugging at a later time.
3694
3695 record restore <FILENAME>
3696 Restore the process record execution log that was saved at an
3697 earlier time, for replay debugging.
3698
3699 add-inferior [-copies <N>] [-exec <FILENAME>]
3700 Add a new inferior.
3701
3702 clone-inferior [-copies <N>] [ID]
3703 Make a new inferior ready to execute the same program another
3704 inferior has loaded.
3705
3706 remove-inferior ID
3707 Remove an inferior.
3708
3709 maint info program-spaces
3710 List the program spaces loaded into GDB.
3711
3712 set remote interrupt-sequence [Ctrl-C | BREAK | BREAK-g]
3713 show remote interrupt-sequence
3714 Allow the user to select one of ^C, a BREAK signal or BREAK-g
3715 as the sequence to the remote target in order to interrupt the execution.
3716 Ctrl-C is a default. Some system prefers BREAK which is high level of
3717 serial line for some certain time. Linux kernel prefers BREAK-g, a.k.a
3718 Magic SysRq g. It is BREAK signal and character 'g'.
3719
3720 set remote interrupt-on-connect [on | off]
3721 show remote interrupt-on-connect
3722 When interrupt-on-connect is ON, gdb sends interrupt-sequence to
3723 remote target when gdb connects to it. This is needed when you debug
3724 Linux kernel.
3725
3726 set remotebreak [on | off]
3727 show remotebreak
3728 Deprecated. Use "set/show remote interrupt-sequence" instead.
3729
3730 tvariable $NAME [ = EXP ]
3731 Create or modify a trace state variable.
3732
3733 info tvariables
3734 List trace state variables and their values.
3735
3736 delete tvariable $NAME ...
3737 Delete one or more trace state variables.
3738
3739 teval EXPR, ...
3740 Evaluate the given expressions without collecting anything into the
3741 trace buffer. (Valid in tracepoint actions only.)
3742
3743 ftrace FN / FILE:LINE / *ADDR
3744 Define a fast tracepoint at the given function, line, or address.
3745
3746 * New expression syntax
3747
3748 GDB now parses the 0b prefix of binary numbers the same way as GCC does.
3749 GDB now parses 0b101010 identically with 42.
3750
3751 * New options
3752
3753 set follow-exec-mode new|same
3754 show follow-exec-mode
3755 Control whether GDB reuses the same inferior across an exec call or
3756 creates a new one. This is useful to be able to restart the old
3757 executable after the inferior having done an exec call.
3758
3759 set default-collect EXPR, ...
3760 show default-collect
3761 Define a list of expressions to be collected at each tracepoint.
3762 This is a useful way to ensure essential items are not overlooked,
3763 such as registers or a critical global variable.
3764
3765 set disconnected-tracing
3766 show disconnected-tracing
3767 If set to 1, the target is instructed to continue tracing if it
3768 loses its connection to GDB. If 0, the target is to stop tracing
3769 upon disconnection.
3770
3771 set circular-trace-buffer
3772 show circular-trace-buffer
3773 If set to on, the target is instructed to use a circular trace buffer
3774 and discard the oldest trace frames instead of stopping the trace due
3775 to a full trace buffer. If set to off, the trace stops when the buffer
3776 fills up. Some targets may not support this.
3777
3778 set script-extension off|soft|strict
3779 show script-extension
3780 If set to "off", the debugger does not perform any script language
3781 recognition, and all sourced files are assumed to be GDB scripts.
3782 If set to "soft" (the default), files are sourced according to
3783 filename extension, falling back to GDB scripts if the first
3784 evaluation failed.
3785 If set to "strict", files are sourced according to filename extension.
3786
3787 set ada trust-PAD-over-XVS on|off
3788 show ada trust-PAD-over-XVS
3789 If off, activate a workaround against a bug in the debugging information
3790 generated by the compiler for PAD types (see gcc/exp_dbug.ads in
3791 the GCC sources for more information about the GNAT encoding and
3792 PAD types in particular). It is always safe to set this option to
3793 off, but this introduces a slight performance penalty. The default
3794 is on.
3795
3796 * Python API Improvements
3797
3798 ** GDB provides the new class gdb.LazyString. This is useful in
3799 some pretty-printing cases. The new method gdb.Value.lazy_string
3800 provides a simple way to create objects of this type.
3801
3802 ** The fields returned by gdb.Type.fields now have an
3803 `is_base_class' attribute.
3804
3805 ** The new method gdb.Type.range returns the range of an array type.
3806
3807 ** The new method gdb.parse_and_eval can be used to parse and
3808 evaluate an expression.
3809
3810 * New remote packets
3811
3812 QTDV
3813 Define a trace state variable.
3814
3815 qTV
3816 Get the current value of a trace state variable.
3817
3818 QTDisconnected
3819 Set desired tracing behavior upon disconnection.
3820
3821 QTBuffer:circular
3822 Set the trace buffer to be linear or circular.
3823
3824 qTfP, qTsP
3825 Get data about the tracepoints currently in use.
3826
3827 * Bug fixes
3828
3829 Process record now works correctly with hardware watchpoints.
3830
3831 Multiple bug fixes have been made to the mips-irix port, making it
3832 much more reliable. In particular:
3833 - Debugging threaded applications is now possible again. Previously,
3834 GDB would hang while starting the program, or while waiting for
3835 the program to stop at a breakpoint.
3836 - Attaching to a running process no longer hangs.
3837 - An error occurring while loading a core file has been fixed.
3838 - Changing the value of the PC register now works again. This fixes
3839 problems observed when using the "jump" command, or when calling
3840 a function from GDB, or even when assigning a new value to $pc.
3841 - With the "finish" and "return" commands, the return value for functions
3842 returning a small array is now correctly printed.
3843 - It is now possible to break on shared library code which gets executed
3844 during a shared library init phase (code executed while executing
3845 their .init section). Previously, the breakpoint would have no effect.
3846 - GDB is now able to backtrace through the signal handler for
3847 non-threaded programs.
3848
3849 PIE (Position Independent Executable) programs debugging is now supported.
3850 This includes debugging execution of PIC (Position Independent Code) shared
3851 libraries although for that, it should be possible to run such libraries as an
3852 executable program.
3853
3854 *** Changes in GDB 7.0
3855
3856 * GDB now has an interface for JIT compilation. Applications that
3857 dynamically generate code can create symbol files in memory and register
3858 them with GDB. For users, the feature should work transparently, and
3859 for JIT developers, the interface is documented in the GDB manual in the
3860 "JIT Compilation Interface" chapter.
3861
3862 * Tracepoints may now be conditional. The syntax is as for
3863 breakpoints; either an "if" clause appended to the "trace" command,
3864 or the "condition" command is available. GDB sends the condition to
3865 the target for evaluation using the same bytecode format as is used
3866 for tracepoint actions.
3867
3868 * The disassemble command now supports: an optional /r modifier, print the
3869 raw instructions in hex as well as in symbolic form, and an optional /m
3870 modifier to print mixed source+assembly.
3871
3872 * Process record and replay
3873
3874 In a architecture environment that supports ``process record and
3875 replay'', ``process record and replay'' target can record a log of
3876 the process execution, and replay it with both forward and reverse
3877 execute commands.
3878
3879 * Reverse debugging: GDB now has new commands reverse-continue, reverse-
3880 step, reverse-next, reverse-finish, reverse-stepi, reverse-nexti, and
3881 set execution-direction {forward|reverse}, for targets that support
3882 reverse execution.
3883
3884 * GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on MIPS/Linux systems. This
3885 feature is available with a native GDB running on kernel version
3886 2.6.28 or later.
3887
3888 * GDB now has support for multi-byte and wide character sets on the
3889 target. Strings whose character type is wchar_t, char16_t, or
3890 char32_t are now correctly printed. GDB supports wide- and unicode-
3891 literals in C, that is, L'x', L"string", u'x', u"string", U'x', and
3892 U"string" syntax. And, GDB allows the "%ls" and "%lc" formats in
3893 `printf'. This feature requires iconv to work properly; if your
3894 system does not have a working iconv, GDB can use GNU libiconv. See
3895 the installation instructions for more information.
3896
3897 * GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
3898 remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
3899 with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
3900 the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
3901
3902 * "info sharedlibrary" now takes an optional regex of libraries to show,
3903 and it now reports if a shared library has no debugging information.
3904
3905 * Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
3906 now complete on file names.
3907
3908 * When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
3909 completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
3910 For instance, consider:
3911
3912 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
3913 # struct example variable;
3914 (gdb) p variable.
3915
3916 If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
3917 completions will be "f1" and "f2".
3918
3919 * Inlined functions are now supported. They show up in backtraces, and
3920 the "step", "next", and "finish" commands handle them automatically.
3921
3922 * GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
3923 operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
3924 macros.
3925
3926 * GDB now supports inspecting extra signal information, exported by
3927 the new $_siginfo convenience variable. The feature is currently
3928 implemented on linux ARM, i386 and amd64.
3929
3930 * GDB can now display the VFP floating point registers and NEON vector
3931 registers on ARM targets. Both ARM GNU/Linux native GDB and gdbserver
3932 can provide these registers (requires Linux 2.6.30 or later). Remote
3933 and simulator targets may also provide them.
3934
3935 * New remote packets
3936
3937 qSearch:memory:
3938 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
3939
3940 QStartNoAckMode
3941 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
3942 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
3943 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
3944
3945 vKill
3946 Kill the process with the specified process ID. Use this in preference
3947 to `k' when multiprocess protocol extensions are supported.
3948
3949 qXfer:osdata:read
3950 Obtains additional operating system information
3951
3952 qXfer:siginfo:read
3953 qXfer:siginfo:write
3954 Read or write additional signal information.
3955
3956 * Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
3957
3958 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
3959 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
3960 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
3961
3962 * GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
3963 DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
3964
3965 * The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
3966 and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
3967 `set/show sh calling-convention'.
3968
3969 * GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
3970 with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
3971
3972 * 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
3973
3974 * Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
3975
3976 * Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
3977 which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
3978
3979 * The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
3980 list of section offsets.
3981
3982 * On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
3983 conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
3984 have also been fixed.
3985
3986 * GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
3987 From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
3988 are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
3989
3990 * GDB now parses C++ symbol and type names more flexibly. For
3991 example, given:
3992
3993 template<typename T> class C { };
3994 C<char const *> c;
3995
3996 GDB will now correctly handle all of:
3997
3998 ptype C<char const *>
3999 ptype C<char const*>
4000 ptype C<const char *>
4001 ptype C<const char*>
4002
4003 * New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
4004
4005 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
4006 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
4007
4008 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
4009 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
4010 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
4011
4012 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
4013 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
4014
4015 - Support for the sparc64-linux-gnu target is now included in
4016 gdbserver.
4017
4018 - The amd64-linux build of gdbserver now supports debugging both
4019 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
4020
4021 - The i386-linux, amd64-linux, and i386-win32 builds of gdbserver
4022 now support hardware watchpoints, and will use them automatically
4023 as appropriate.
4024
4025 * Python scripting
4026
4027 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
4028 available is determined at configure time.
4029
4030 New GDB commands can now be written in Python.
4031
4032 * Ada tasking support
4033
4034 Ada tasks can now be inspected in GDB. The following commands have
4035 been introduced:
4036
4037 info tasks
4038 Print the list of Ada tasks.
4039 info task N
4040 Print detailed information about task number N.
4041 task
4042 Print the task number of the current task.
4043 task N
4044 Switch the context of debugging to task number N.
4045
4046 * Support for user-defined prefixed commands. The "define" command can
4047 add new commands to existing prefixes, e.g. "target".
4048
4049 * Multi-inferior, multi-process debugging.
4050
4051 GDB now has generalized support for multi-inferior debugging. See
4052 "Debugging Multiple Inferiors" in the manual for more information.
4053 Although availability still depends on target support, the command
4054 set is more uniform now. The GNU/Linux specific multi-forks support
4055 has been migrated to this new framework. This implied some user
4056 visible changes; see "New commands" and also "Removed commands"
4057 below.
4058
4059 * Target descriptions can now describe the target OS ABI. See the
4060 "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for more
4061 information.
4062
4063 * Target descriptions can now describe "compatible" architectures
4064 to indicate that the target can execute applications for a different
4065 architecture in addition to those for the main target architecture.
4066 See the "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for
4067 more information.
4068
4069 * Multi-architecture debugging.
4070
4071 GDB now includes general supports for debugging applications on
4072 hybrid systems that use more than one single processor architecture
4073 at the same time. Each such hybrid architecture still requires
4074 specific support to be added. The only hybrid architecture supported
4075 in this version of GDB is the Cell Broadband Engine.
4076
4077 * GDB now supports integrated debugging of Cell/B.E. applications that
4078 use both the PPU and SPU architectures. To enable support for hybrid
4079 Cell/B.E. debugging, you need to configure GDB to support both the
4080 powerpc-linux or powerpc64-linux and the spu-elf targets, using the
4081 --enable-targets configure option.
4082
4083 * Non-stop mode debugging.
4084
4085 For some targets, GDB now supports an optional mode of operation in
4086 which you can examine stopped threads while other threads continue
4087 to execute freely. This is referred to as non-stop mode, with the
4088 old mode referred to as all-stop mode. See the "Non-Stop Mode"
4089 section in the user manual for more information.
4090
4091 To be able to support remote non-stop debugging, a remote stub needs
4092 to implement the non-stop mode remote protocol extensions, as
4093 described in the "Remote Non-Stop" section of the user manual. The
4094 GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been adjusted to support these
4095 extensions on linux targets.
4096
4097 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
4098
4099 catch syscall [NAME(S) | NUMBER(S)]
4100 Catch system calls. Arguments, which should be names of system
4101 calls or their numbers, mean catch only those syscalls. Without
4102 arguments, every syscall will be caught. When the inferior issues
4103 any of the specified syscalls, GDB will stop and announce the system
4104 call, both when it is called and when its call returns. This
4105 feature is currently available with a native GDB running on the
4106 Linux Kernel, under the following architectures: x86, x86_64,
4107 PowerPC and PowerPC64.
4108
4109 find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
4110 val1 [, val2, ...]
4111 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
4112
4113 maint set python print-stack
4114 maint show python print-stack
4115 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
4116
4117 python [CODE]
4118 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
4119
4120 macro define
4121 macro list
4122 macro undef
4123 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
4124 interactively.
4125
4126 info os processes
4127 Show operating system information about processes.
4128
4129 info inferiors
4130 List the inferiors currently under GDB's control.
4131
4132 inferior NUM
4133 Switch focus to inferior number NUM.
4134
4135 detach inferior NUM
4136 Detach from inferior number NUM.
4137
4138 kill inferior NUM
4139 Kill inferior number NUM.
4140
4141 * New options
4142
4143 set spu stop-on-load
4144 show spu stop-on-load
4145 Control whether to stop for new SPE threads during Cell/B.E. debugging.
4146
4147 set spu auto-flush-cache
4148 show spu auto-flush-cache
4149 Control whether to automatically flush the software-managed cache
4150 during Cell/B.E. debugging.
4151
4152 set sh calling-convention
4153 show sh calling-convention
4154 Control the calling convention used when calling SH target functions.
4155
4156 set debug timestamp
4157 show debug timestamp
4158 Control display of timestamps with GDB debugging output.
4159
4160 set disassemble-next-line
4161 show disassemble-next-line
4162 Control display of disassembled source lines or instructions when
4163 the debuggee stops.
4164
4165 set remote noack-packet
4166 show remote noack-packet
4167 Set/show the use of remote protocol QStartNoAckMode packet. See above
4168 under "New remote packets."
4169
4170 set remote query-attached-packet
4171 show remote query-attached-packet
4172 Control use of remote protocol `qAttached' (query-attached) packet.
4173
4174 set remote read-siginfo-object
4175 show remote read-siginfo-object
4176 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:read' (read-siginfo-object)
4177 packet.
4178
4179 set remote write-siginfo-object
4180 show remote write-siginfo-object
4181 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:write' (write-siginfo-object)
4182 packet.
4183
4184 set remote reverse-continue
4185 show remote reverse-continue
4186 Control use of remote protocol 'bc' (reverse-continue) packet.
4187
4188 set remote reverse-step
4189 show remote reverse-step
4190 Control use of remote protocol 'bs' (reverse-step) packet.
4191
4192 set displaced-stepping
4193 show displaced-stepping
4194 Control displaced stepping mode. Displaced stepping is a way to
4195 single-step over breakpoints without removing them from the debuggee.
4196 Also known as "out-of-line single-stepping".
4197
4198 set debug displaced
4199 show debug displaced
4200 Control display of debugging info for displaced stepping.
4201
4202 maint set internal-error
4203 maint show internal-error
4204 Control what GDB does when an internal error is detected.
4205
4206 maint set internal-warning
4207 maint show internal-warning
4208 Control what GDB does when an internal warning is detected.
4209
4210 set exec-wrapper
4211 show exec-wrapper
4212 unset exec-wrapper
4213 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
4214
4215 set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
4216 show multiple-symbols
4217 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
4218 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
4219 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
4220
4221 set breakpoint always-inserted
4222 show breakpoint always-inserted
4223 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
4224 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
4225 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
4226
4227 set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
4228 show arm fallback-mode
4229 set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
4230 show arm force-mode
4231 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
4232 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
4233 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
4234 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
4235
4236 set disable-randomization
4237 show disable-randomization
4238 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
4239 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
4240 multiple debugging sessions.
4241
4242 set non-stop
4243 show non-stop
4244 Control whether other threads are stopped or not when some thread hits
4245 a breakpoint.
4246
4247 set target-async
4248 show target-async
4249 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
4250 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
4251 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
4252 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
4253
4254 set target-wide-charset
4255 show target-wide-charset
4256 The target-wide-charset is the name of the character set that GDB
4257 uses when printing characters whose type is wchar_t.
4258
4259 set tcp auto-retry (on|off)
4260 show tcp auto-retry
4261 set tcp connect-timeout
4262 show tcp connect-timeout
4263 These commands allow GDB to retry failed TCP connections to a remote stub
4264 with a specified timeout period; this is useful if the stub is launched
4265 in parallel with GDB but may not be ready to accept connections immediately.
4266
4267 set libthread-db-search-path
4268 show libthread-db-search-path
4269 Control list of directories which GDB will search for appropriate
4270 libthread_db.
4271
4272 set schedule-multiple (on|off)
4273 show schedule-multiple
4274 Allow GDB to resume all threads of all processes or only threads of
4275 the current process.
4276
4277 set stack-cache
4278 show stack-cache
4279 Use more aggressive caching for accesses to the stack. This improves
4280 performance of remote debugging (particularly backtraces) without
4281 affecting correctness.
4282
4283 set interactive-mode (on|off|auto)
4284 show interactive-mode
4285 Control whether GDB runs in interactive mode (on) or not (off).
4286 When in interactive mode, GDB waits for the user to answer all
4287 queries. Otherwise, GDB does not wait and assumes the default
4288 answer. When set to auto (the default), GDB determines which
4289 mode to use based on the stdin settings.
4290
4291 * Removed commands
4292
4293 info forks
4294 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `info
4295 inferiors' command. To list checkpoints, you can still use the
4296 `info checkpoints' command, which was an alias for the `info forks'
4297 command.
4298
4299 fork NUM
4300 Replaced by the new `inferior' command. To switch between
4301 checkpoints, you can still use the `restart' command, which was an
4302 alias for the `fork' command.
4303
4304 process PID
4305 This is removed, since some targets don't have a notion of
4306 processes. To switch between processes, you can still use the
4307 `inferior' command using GDB's own inferior number.
4308
4309 delete fork NUM
4310 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `kill
4311 inferior' command. To delete a checkpoint, you can still use the
4312 `delete checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `delete
4313 fork' command.
4314
4315 detach fork NUM
4316 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `detach
4317 inferior' command. To detach a checkpoint, you can still use the
4318 `detach checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `detach
4319 fork' command.
4320
4321 * New native configurations
4322
4323 x86/x86_64 Darwin i[34567]86-*-darwin*
4324
4325 x86_64 MinGW x86_64-*-mingw*
4326
4327 * New targets
4328
4329 Lattice Mico32 lm32-*
4330 x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
4331 x86_64 DICOS x86_64-*-dicos*
4332 S+core 3 score-*-*
4333
4334 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports x86 Windows CE
4335 (mingw32ce) debugging.
4336
4337 * Removed commands
4338
4339 catch load
4340 catch unload
4341 These commands were actually not implemented on any target.
4342
4343 *** Changes in GDB 6.8
4344
4345 * New native configurations
4346
4347 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
4348 Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
4349
4350 * New targets
4351
4352 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
4353 Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
4354
4355 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
4356
4357 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
4358 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
4359 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
4360 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
4361
4362 * GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
4363 (mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
4364
4365 * Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
4366 is resolved.
4367
4368 * GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
4369 including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
4370 and in inlined functions.
4371
4372 * GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
4373 accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
4374 more than one contiguous range of addresses.
4375
4376 * Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
4377
4378 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
4379 registers on PowerPC targets.
4380
4381 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
4382 targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
4383
4384 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
4385 commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
4386
4387 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
4388 extended-remote mode.
4389
4390 * hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
4391 The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
4392 error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
4393 The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
4394
4395 * GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
4396 building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
4397 target architectures.
4398
4399 * GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
4400 Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
4401 now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
4402 stored in two consecutive float registers.
4403
4404 * The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
4405 breakpoints now.
4406
4407 * Improved support for debugging Ada
4408 Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
4409 include:
4410 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
4411 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
4412 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
4413 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
4414 of an assignment
4415 - Improved command completion in Ada
4416 - Several bug fixes
4417
4418 * GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
4419 process.
4420
4421 * New commands
4422
4423 set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
4424 show print frame-arguments
4425 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
4426 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
4427
4428 remote put
4429 remote get
4430 remote delete
4431 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
4432
4433 * New MI commands
4434
4435 -target-file-put
4436 -target-file-get
4437 -target-file-delete
4438 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
4439
4440 * New remote packets
4441
4442 vFile:open:
4443 vFile:close:
4444 vFile:pread:
4445 vFile:pwrite:
4446 vFile:unlink:
4447 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
4448
4449 vAttach
4450 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
4451 mode.
4452
4453 vRun
4454 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
4455
4456 *** Changes in GDB 6.7
4457
4458 * Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
4459 bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
4460 Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
4461
4462 * When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
4463 symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
4464 -Bsymbolic linker option.
4465
4466 * When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
4467 recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
4468 is not supported.
4469
4470 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
4471 frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
4472
4473 * GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
4474 32-bit or 64-bit register values.
4475
4476 * Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
4477
4478 * GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
4479 target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
4480 a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
4481
4482 * Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
4483 automatically displayed as character or string data.
4484
4485 * The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
4486 arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
4487 as strings.
4488
4489 * Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
4490 for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
4491 only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
4492
4493 * GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
4494 iWMMXt coprocessor.
4495
4496 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
4497 ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
4498 has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
4499
4500 * GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
4501
4502 * GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
4503
4504 * The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
4505 layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
4506 segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
4507
4508 * The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
4509 immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
4510
4511 * The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
4512 "library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
4513 packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
4514 where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
4515 Windows and SymbianOS).
4516
4517 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
4518 (DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
4519
4520 * GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
4521 according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
4522
4523 * New commands
4524
4525 set remoteflow
4526 show remoteflow
4527 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
4528 when debugging using remote targets.
4529
4530 set mem inaccessible-by-default
4531 show mem inaccessible-by-default
4532 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
4533 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
4534 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
4535 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
4536 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
4537
4538 set breakpoint auto-hw
4539 show breakpoint auto-hw
4540 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
4541 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
4542 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
4543 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
4544 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
4545 including "next" and "finish".
4546
4547 catch exception
4548 catch exception unhandled
4549 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
4550
4551 catch assert
4552 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
4553
4554 set sysroot
4555 show sysroot
4556 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
4557 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
4558 an alias to "set sysroot".
4559
4560 info spu
4561 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
4562 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
4563 architecture.
4564
4565 * New native configurations
4566
4567 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
4568
4569 set tdesc filename
4570 unset tdesc filename
4571 show tdesc filename
4572 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
4573 not query the target for its built-in description.
4574
4575 * New targets
4576
4577 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
4578 MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
4579 Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
4580
4581 * New remote packets
4582
4583 QPassSignals:
4584 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
4585 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
4586
4587 qXfer:features:read:
4588 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
4589 features.
4590
4591 qXfer:spu:read:
4592 qXfer:spu:write:
4593 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
4594 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
4595
4596 qXfer:libraries:read:
4597 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
4598 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
4599 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
4600 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
4601
4602 * Removed targets
4603
4604 Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
4605
4606 alpha*-*-osf1*
4607 alpha*-*-osf2*
4608 d10v-*-*
4609 hppa*-*-hiux*
4610 i[34567]86-ncr-*
4611 i[34567]86-*-dgux*
4612 i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
4613 i[34567]86-*-netware*
4614 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
4615 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
4616 i[34567]86-*-sco*
4617 i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
4618 i[34567]86-*-sysv4*
4619 i[34567]86-*-sysv5*
4620 i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
4621 i[34567]86-*-unixware*
4622 i[34567]86-*-sysv*
4623 i[34567]86-*-isc*
4624 m68*-cisco*-*
4625 m68*-tandem-*
4626 mips*-*-pe
4627 rs6000-*-lynxos*
4628 sh*-*-pe
4629
4630 * Other removed features
4631
4632 target abug
4633 target cpu32bug
4634 target est
4635 target rom68k
4636
4637 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
4638
4639 target hms
4640 target e7000
4641 target sh3
4642 target sh3e
4643
4644 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
4645 H8/300.
4646
4647 target ocd
4648
4649 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
4650 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
4651 interfaces.
4652
4653 DWARF 1 support
4654
4655 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
4656 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
4657
4658 Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
4659
4660 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
4661 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
4662 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
4663 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
4664
4665 MIPS ".pdr" sections
4666
4667 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
4668 in debugging information.
4669
4670 Scheme support
4671
4672 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
4673 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
4674
4675 set mips stack-arg-size
4676 set mips saved-gpreg-size
4677
4678 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
4679
4680 *** Changes in GDB 6.6
4681
4682 * New targets
4683
4684 Xtensa xtensa-elf
4685 Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
4686
4687 * GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
4688 (mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
4689 running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
4690
4691 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
4692 Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
4693 supported.
4694
4695 * The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
4696 broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
4697
4698 * The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
4699 stub provides the required support.
4700
4701 * Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
4702 longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
4703
4704 * New commands
4705
4706 set substitute-path
4707 unset substitute-path
4708 show substitute-path
4709 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
4710 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
4711 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
4712 between compilation and debugging.
4713
4714 set trace-commands
4715 show trace-commands
4716 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
4717 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
4718 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
4719
4720 * REMOVED features
4721
4722 The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
4723
4724 Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
4725 an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
4726
4727 The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
4728
4729 * New remote packets
4730
4731 qSupported:
4732 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
4733 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
4734 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
4735 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
4736 target.
4737
4738 qXfer:auxv:read:
4739 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
4740 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
4741
4742 qXfer:memory-map:read:
4743 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
4744 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
4745
4746 vFlashErase:
4747 vFlashWrite:
4748 vFlashDone:
4749 Erase and program a flash memory device.
4750
4751 * Removed remote packets
4752
4753 qPart:auxv:read:
4754 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
4755 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
4756
4757 *** Changes in GDB 6.5
4758
4759 * New targets
4760
4761 Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
4762
4763 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
4764
4765 * New commands
4766
4767 init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
4768 only if it doesn't already have a value.
4769
4770 The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
4771
4772 checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
4773
4774 restart <n> Return the program state to a
4775 previously saved state.
4776
4777 info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
4778
4779 delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
4780
4781 set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
4782 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
4783
4784 info forks List forks of the user program that
4785 are available to be debugged.
4786
4787 fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
4788 forks of the user program that are
4789 available to be debugged.
4790
4791 delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
4792 that are available to be debugged (and
4793 kill the forked process).
4794
4795 detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
4796 that are available to be debugged (and
4797 allow the process to continue).
4798
4799 * New architecture
4800
4801 Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
4802
4803 * Improved Windows host support
4804
4805 GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
4806 native console support, and remote communications using either
4807 network sockets or serial ports.
4808
4809 * Improved Modula-2 language support
4810
4811 GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
4812 basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
4813 pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
4814 printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
4815 written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
4816 GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
4817
4818 * REMOVED features
4819
4820 The ARM rdi-share module.
4821
4822 The Netware NLM debug server.
4823
4824 *** Changes in GDB 6.4
4825
4826 * New native configurations
4827
4828 OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
4829 OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
4830
4831 * New targets
4832
4833 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
4834
4835 * New command line options
4836
4837 --batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
4838 --return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
4839 the child (debugged) program exited with.
4840 --eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
4841 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
4842 specified multiple times and in conjunction
4843 with the --command (-x) option.
4844
4845 * Deprecated commands removed
4846
4847 The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
4848 removed:
4849
4850 Command Replacement
4851 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
4852 othernames set arm disassembler
4853 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
4854 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
4855 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
4856 regs info registers
4857
4858 * New BSD user-level threads support
4859
4860 It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
4861 library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
4862 configurations are:
4863
4864 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
4865 FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
4866 OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
4867
4868 Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
4869 are not yet supported.
4870
4871 * New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
4872 (Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
4873
4874 * REMOVED configurations and files
4875
4876 VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
4877 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
4878 National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
4879
4880 * New "set print array-indexes" command
4881
4882 After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
4883 when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
4884 behavior.
4885
4886 * VAX floating point support
4887
4888 GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
4889
4890 * User-defined command support
4891
4892 In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
4893 to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
4894 section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
4895
4896 *** Changes in GDB 6.3:
4897
4898 * New command line option
4899
4900 GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
4901 debugging.
4902
4903 * GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
4904
4905 GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
4906 information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
4907 by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
4908 proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
4909 to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
4910
4911 * Internationalization
4912
4913 When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
4914 internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
4915 continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
4916
4917 * Ada
4918
4919 Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
4920 implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
4921 into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
4922
4923 * New native configurations
4924
4925 GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
4926
4927 * Remote 'p' packet
4928
4929 GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
4930 packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
4931
4932 * END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
4933
4934 GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
4935 The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
4936 features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
4937 i386 application).
4938
4939 GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
4940 compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
4941 continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
4942 configurations:
4943
4944 hppa-*-hpux
4945 ia64-*-aix
4946 mips-*-irix*
4947 *-*-lynx
4948 mips-*-linux-gnu
4949 sds protocol
4950 xdr protocol
4951 powerpc bdm protocol
4952
4953 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
4954 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
4955
4956 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
4957
4958 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
4959 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
4960 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
4961 permanently REMOVED.
4962
4963 h8300-*-*
4964 mcore-*-*
4965 mn10300-*-*
4966 ns32k-*-*
4967 sh64-*-*
4968 v850-*-*
4969
4970 *** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
4971
4972 * MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
4973
4974 When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
4975 heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
4976 been fixed.
4977
4978 * MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
4979
4980 When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
4981 fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
4982 IRIX long double values).
4983
4984 * VAX and "next"
4985
4986 A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
4987 command. This problem has been fixed.
4988
4989 *** Changes in GDB 6.2:
4990
4991 * Fix for ``many threads''
4992
4993 On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
4994 rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
4995 error message:
4996
4997 ptrace: No such process.
4998 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
4999
5000 This problem has been fixed.
5001
5002 * "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
5003
5004 Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
5005 GDB to dump core).
5006
5007 * New ``start'' command.
5008
5009 This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
5010
5011 * New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
5012
5013 Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
5014 live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
5015 platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
5016
5017 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
5018 FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
5019 NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
5020 NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
5021 NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
5022 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
5023 OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
5024 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
5025 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
5026
5027 * Signal trampoline code overhauled
5028
5029 Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
5030 These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
5031 of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
5032 call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
5033 signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
5034
5035 Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
5036 features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
5037 include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
5038
5039 * Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
5040
5041 * New native configurations
5042
5043 GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
5044 OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
5045 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
5046 OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
5047 OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
5048 NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
5049 OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
5050
5051 * END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
5052
5053 GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
5054 The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
5055 including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
5056 migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
5057 compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
5058 work, was also included.
5059
5060 GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
5061 module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
5062
5063 h8300-*-*
5064 mcore-*-*
5065 mn10300-*-*
5066 ns32k-*-*
5067 sh64-*-*
5068 v850-*-*
5069 xstormy16-*-*
5070
5071 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
5072 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
5073
5074 * REMOVED configurations and files
5075
5076 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
5077 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
5078 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
5079 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
5080 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
5081 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
5082 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
5083 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
5084 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
5085 sonymips mips-sony-*
5086 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
5087
5088 *** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
5089
5090 * TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
5091
5092 The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
5093 GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
5094 command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
5095 program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
5096 with GDB".
5097
5098 * Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
5099
5100 Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
5101 libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
5102 cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
5103 GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
5104 shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
5105 the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
5106 are created.
5107
5108 Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
5109
5110 * Fixed ISO-C build problems
5111
5112 The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
5113 non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
5114 compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
5115
5116 * Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
5117
5118 Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
5119 wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
5120
5121 * Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
5122
5123 The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
5124 permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
5125 systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
5126
5127 * Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
5128
5129 Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
5130 has been updated to use constant array sizes.
5131
5132 * Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
5133
5134 GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
5135 its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
5136 panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
5137
5138 * Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
5139
5140 When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
5141 by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
5142 not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
5143
5144 *** Changes in GDB 6.1:
5145
5146 * Removed --with-mmalloc
5147
5148 Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
5149 conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
5150
5151 * Changes in AMD64 configurations
5152
5153 The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
5154 the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
5155 and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
5156 you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
5157
5158 * Revised SPARC target
5159
5160 The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
5161 FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
5162 support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
5163 from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
5164 (Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
5165
5166 * New C++ demangler
5167
5168 GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
5169 names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
5170 with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
5171 programs.
5172
5173 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
5174
5175 GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
5176 arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
5177 encountered these.
5178
5179 * C++ nested types and namespaces
5180
5181 GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
5182 improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
5183 is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
5184 Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
5185 namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
5186 "Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
5187 frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
5188 if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
5189 GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
5190
5191 * New native configurations
5192
5193 NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
5194 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
5195 OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
5196 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
5197 OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
5198
5199 * New debugging protocols
5200
5201 M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
5202
5203 * "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
5204
5205 The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
5206 and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
5207 tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
5208
5209 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
5210
5211 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5212 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5213 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5214 permanently REMOVED.
5215
5216 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
5217 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
5218 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
5219 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
5220 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
5221 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
5222 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
5223 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
5224 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
5225 sonymips mips-sony-*
5226 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
5227
5228 * REMOVED configurations and files
5229
5230 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
5231 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
5232 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
5233 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
5234 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
5235 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
5236 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
5237 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
5238 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
5239 386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
5240 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
5241 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
5242 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
5243 SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
5244 SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
5245 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
5246 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
5247
5248 *** Changes in GDB 6.0:
5249
5250 * Objective-C
5251
5252 Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
5253 integrated into GDB.
5254
5255 * New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
5256
5257 DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
5258 information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
5259 By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
5260 backtraces.
5261
5262 The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
5263 have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
5264 DWARF 2 CFI support.
5265
5266 * Hosted file I/O.
5267
5268 GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
5269 file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
5270 remote protocol documentation for details.
5271
5272 * All targets using the new architecture framework.
5273
5274 All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
5275 architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
5276 to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
5277 ppc32 on ppc64).
5278
5279 * GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
5280
5281 GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
5282 per-thread variables.
5283
5284 * GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
5285
5286 GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
5287 GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
5288
5289 * Separate debug info.
5290
5291 GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
5292 automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
5293 of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
5294 system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
5295 and optional debug files.
5296
5297 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
5298
5299 DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
5300 describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
5301 debugger.
5302
5303 GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
5304 for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
5305
5306 * Java
5307
5308 A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
5309 Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
5310 considered "useable".
5311
5312 * GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
5313
5314 The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
5315 commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
5316 kernel.
5317
5318 * GDB supports logging output to a file
5319
5320 There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
5321 used to capture GDB's output to a file.
5322
5323 * The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
5324
5325 The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
5326 disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
5327 command.
5328
5329 * d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
5330
5331 The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
5332 registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
5333
5334 * Profiling support
5335
5336 A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
5337 be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
5338 session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
5339 "--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
5340 data, for more informative profiling results.
5341
5342 * Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
5343
5344 The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
5345 option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
5346 "mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
5347
5348 Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
5349 removed.
5350
5351 Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
5352 Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
5353 Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
5354 in a subsequent -var-update.
5355
5356 * New native configurations.
5357
5358 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
5359
5360 * Multi-arched targets.
5361
5362 HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
5363 Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
5364
5365 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
5366
5367 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5368 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5369 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5370 permanently REMOVED.
5371
5372 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
5373 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
5374 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
5375 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
5376 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
5377 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
5378 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
5379 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
5380 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
5381 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
5382 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
5383 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
5384
5385 * REMOVED configurations and files
5386
5387 V850EA ISA
5388 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
5389 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
5390 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
5391 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
5392 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
5393 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
5394 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
5395 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
5396 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
5397 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
5398 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
5399 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
5400 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5401
5402 * MIPS $fp behavior changed
5403
5404 The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
5405 the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
5406 context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
5407 address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
5408 The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
5409
5410 *** Changes in GDB 5.3:
5411
5412 * GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
5413
5414 When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
5415 `/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
5416 in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
5417 library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
5418 shared libs like mad''.
5419
5420 * ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
5421
5422 Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
5423 the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
5424 arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
5425 powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
5426
5427 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
5428
5429 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
5430 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
5431 they expand.
5432
5433 The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
5434 invocations in expression, and shows the result.
5435
5436 The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
5437 macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
5438
5439 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
5440 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
5441 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
5442 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
5443
5444 * Multi-arched targets.
5445
5446 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
5447 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
5448 NEC V850 v850-*-*
5449 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
5450 Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
5451 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
5452
5453 * New targets.
5454
5455 Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
5456
5457
5458 * New native configurations
5459
5460 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
5461 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
5462 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
5463 UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
5464
5465 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
5466
5467 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5468 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5469 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5470 permanently REMOVED.
5471
5472 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
5473 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
5474 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
5475 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
5476 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
5477 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
5478 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
5479 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
5480 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
5481 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
5482 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
5483 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
5484 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5485
5486 * OBSOLETE languages
5487
5488 CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
5489
5490 * REMOVED configurations and files
5491
5492 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
5493 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
5494 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
5495 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
5496 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
5497
5498 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
5499
5500 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
5501
5502 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
5503 commands. The default is 1024.
5504
5505 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
5506
5507 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
5508
5509 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
5510
5511 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
5512 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
5513 from a file into memory (restore).
5514
5515 * Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
5516
5517 The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
5518 including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
5519 of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
5520
5521 *** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
5522
5523 * New targets.
5524
5525 Atmel AVR avr*-*-*
5526
5527 * Bug fixes
5528
5529 gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
5530 mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
5531 Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
5532
5533 gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
5534 dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
5535 Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
5536
5537 Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
5538 Surprisingly enough, it works now.
5539 By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
5540
5541 i386 hardware watchpoint support:
5542 avoid misses on second run for some targets.
5543 By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
5544
5545 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
5546
5547 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
5548
5549 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
5550 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
5551 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
5552 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
5553 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
5554 (notably embedded) targets.
5555
5556 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
5557
5558 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
5559 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
5560 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
5561 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
5562
5563 * New command line option
5564
5565 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
5566
5567 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
5568
5569 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
5570 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
5571 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
5572 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
5573 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
5574 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
5575 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
5576 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
5577 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
5578 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
5579
5580 * Changes in ARM configurations.
5581
5582 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
5583 configuration is fully multi-arch.
5584
5585 * New native configurations
5586
5587 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
5588 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
5589 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
5590 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
5591
5592 * New targets
5593
5594 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
5595
5596 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
5597
5598 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5599 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5600 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5601 permanently REMOVED.
5602
5603 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
5604 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
5605 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
5606 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
5607 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
5608
5609 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
5610
5611 * REMOVED configurations and files
5612
5613 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
5614 WDC 65816 w65-*-*
5615 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
5616 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
5617 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
5618 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
5619 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
5620 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
5621 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
5622 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
5623 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
5624 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
5625 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
5626
5627 * Changes to command line processing
5628
5629 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
5630 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
5631
5632 * Changes to key bindings
5633
5634 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
5635
5636 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
5637
5638 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
5639
5640 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
5641 corrupted.
5642
5643 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
5644
5645 Numerous documentation fixes.
5646
5647 Numerous testsuite fixes.
5648
5649 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
5650
5651 * New native configurations
5652
5653 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
5654 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
5655 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
5656 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
5657 ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
5658 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
5659
5660 * New targets
5661
5662 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
5663 CRIS cris-axis
5664 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
5665
5666 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
5667
5668 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
5669 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
5670 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
5671 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
5672 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
5673 WDC 65816 w65-*-*
5674 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
5675 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
5676 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
5677 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
5678 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
5679 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
5680 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
5681 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
5682
5683 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
5684 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
5685
5686 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5687 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5688 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5689 permanently REMOVED.
5690
5691 * REMOVED configurations and files
5692
5693 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
5694 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
5695 Pyramid pyramid-*-*
5696 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
5697 Tahoe tahoe-*-*
5698 ser-ocd.c *-*-*
5699
5700 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
5701
5702 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
5703 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
5704 present.
5705
5706 * Other news:
5707
5708 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
5709
5710 * The MI enabled by default.
5711
5712 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
5713 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
5714 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
5715 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
5716 which is now deprecated.
5717
5718 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
5719
5720 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
5721 main features are supported:
5722
5723 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
5724
5725 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
5726 extension;
5727
5728 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
5729
5730 - a Pascal expression parser.
5731
5732 However, some important features are not yet supported.
5733
5734 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
5735
5736 - there are some problems with boolean types;
5737
5738 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
5739 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
5740
5741 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
5742
5743 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
5744
5745 * Changes in completion.
5746
5747 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
5748 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
5749 users expect at the shell prompt.
5750
5751 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
5752 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
5753 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
5754 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
5755 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
5756 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
5757 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
5758
5759 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
5760
5761 * New platform-independent commands:
5762
5763 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
5764 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
5765 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
5766
5767 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
5768
5769 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
5770 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
5771 many threads as your system allows you to have.
5772
5773 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
5774
5775 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
5776 multi-threaded programs though.
5777
5778 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
5779
5780 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
5781
5782 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
5783 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
5784 supported.)
5785
5786 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
5787
5788 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
5789 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
5790 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
5791 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
5792 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
5793 registers.
5794
5795 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
5796 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
5797 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
5798
5799 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
5800
5801 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
5802 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
5803
5804 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
5805 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
5806 IDT.
5807
5808 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
5809 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
5810 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
5811 a given linear address.
5812
5813 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
5814 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
5815 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
5816
5817 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
5818
5819 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
5820
5821 * Changes in documentation.
5822
5823 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
5824 Documentation License.
5825
5826 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
5827 manual.
5828
5829 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
5830
5831 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
5832 manual.
5833
5834 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
5835 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
5836 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
5837
5838 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
5839
5840 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
5841 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
5842 contents of this file.
5843
5844 * gdba.el deleted
5845
5846 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
5847
5848 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
5849
5850 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
5851
5852 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
5853 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
5854 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
5855 greater level of detail.
5856
5857 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
5858
5859 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
5860 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
5861 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
5862 written.
5863
5864 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
5865
5866 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
5867 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
5868 machines ``out of the box''.
5869
5870 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
5871 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
5872 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
5873 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
5874 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
5875
5876 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
5877 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
5878 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
5879 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
5880 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
5881
5882 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
5883 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
5884 also works.
5885
5886 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
5887 GDB.
5888
5889 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
5890 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
5891 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
5892 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
5893
5894 * New native configurations
5895
5896 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
5897 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
5898
5899 * New targets
5900
5901 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
5902 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
5903 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
5904 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
5905
5906 * OBSOLETE configurations
5907
5908 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
5909 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
5910 Pyramid pyramid-*-*
5911 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
5912 Tahoe tahoe-*-*
5913
5914 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
5915 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
5916 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
5917 be permanently REMOVED.
5918
5919 * Gould support removed
5920
5921 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
5922
5923 * New features for SVR4
5924
5925 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
5926 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
5927 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
5928
5929 * Many C++ enhancements
5930
5931 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
5932 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
5933
5934 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
5935
5936 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
5937 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
5938 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
5939 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
5940
5941 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
5942 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
5943
5944 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
5945
5946 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
5947 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
5948 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
5949
5950 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
5951 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
5952
5953 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
5954
5955 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
5956 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
5957 include ``set remote P-packet''.
5958
5959 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
5960
5961 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
5962 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
5963 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
5964
5965 * ``apropos'' command added.
5966
5967 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
5968 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
5969 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
5970
5971 * New MI interface
5972
5973 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
5974 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
5975 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
5976 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
5977 enabled by configuring with:
5978
5979 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
5980
5981 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
5982
5983 * New native configurations
5984
5985 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
5986 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
5987 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
5988
5989 * New targets
5990
5991 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
5992 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
5993 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
5994
5995 * OBSOLETE configurations
5996
5997 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
5998
5999 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
6000 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
6001 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
6002 be permanently REMOVED.
6003
6004 * ANSI/ISO C
6005
6006 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
6007 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
6008 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
6009 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
6010 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
6011 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
6012 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
6013 already.
6014
6015 * Readline 2.2
6016
6017 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
6018
6019 * set extension-language
6020
6021 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
6022 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
6023 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
6024 set extension-language .c c++
6025 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
6026 and their associated languages.
6027
6028 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
6029
6030 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
6031 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
6032 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
6033
6034 set processor NAME
6035
6036 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
6037 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
6038
6039 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
6040 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
6041 403 IBM PowerPC 403
6042 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
6043 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
6044 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
6045 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
6046 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
6047 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
6048 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
6049 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
6050
6051 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
6052 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
6053 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
6054 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
6055
6056 * HP-UX support
6057
6058 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
6059 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
6060 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
6061 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
6062 for xdb and dbx commands.
6063
6064 * Catchpoints
6065
6066 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
6067 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
6068 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
6069
6070 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
6071 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
6072 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
6073
6074 * Debugging across forks
6075
6076 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
6077 in the inferior.
6078
6079 * TUI
6080
6081 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
6082 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
6083 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
6084
6085 * GDB remote protocol additions
6086
6087 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
6088 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
6089 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
6090 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
6091
6092 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
6093 full 64-bit address. The command
6094
6095 set remoteaddresssize 32
6096
6097 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
6098 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
6099 will be discarded.
6100
6101 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
6102 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
6103
6104 maint packet heythere
6105
6106 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
6107 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
6108 time.
6109
6110 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
6111 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
6112 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
6113
6114 * Tracing can collect general expressions
6115
6116 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
6117 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
6118 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
6119
6120 * mask-address variable for Mips
6121
6122 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
6123 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
6124 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
6125
6126 * Higher serial baud rates
6127
6128 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
6129 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
6130 to achieve all of these rates.)
6131
6132 * i960 simulator
6133
6134 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
6135 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
6136
6137
6138 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
6139
6140 * New native configurations
6141
6142 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
6143 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
6144 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
6145 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
6146 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
6147 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
6148 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
6149
6150 * New targets
6151
6152 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
6153 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
6154 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
6155 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
6156 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
6157 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
6158 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
6159 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
6160 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
6161 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
6162 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
6163
6164 * New debugging protocols
6165
6166 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
6167 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
6168 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
6169 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
6170 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
6171 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
6172
6173 * DWARF 2
6174
6175 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
6176 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
6177 information.
6178
6179 * Java frontend
6180
6181 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
6182 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
6183
6184 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
6185
6186 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
6187 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
6188 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
6189
6190 * Live range splitting
6191
6192 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
6193 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
6194 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
6195
6196 * Hurd support
6197
6198 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
6199 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
6200
6201 * ARM Thumb support
6202
6203 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
6204 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
6205 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
6206 accordingly.
6207
6208 * MIPS16 support
6209
6210 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
6211 instruction set.
6212
6213 * Overlay support
6214
6215 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
6216 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
6217 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
6218 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
6219 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
6220 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
6221
6222 * info symbol
6223
6224 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
6225 the symbol at the specified address.
6226
6227 * Trace support
6228
6229 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
6230 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
6231 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
6232 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
6233 file tracepoint.c for more details.
6234
6235 * MIPS simulator
6236
6237 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
6238 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
6239 of most MIPS variants.
6240
6241 * Sparc simulator
6242
6243 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
6244 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
6245 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
6246
6247 * set architecture
6248
6249 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
6250 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
6251 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
6252 the possible architectures.
6253
6254 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
6255
6256 * New native configurations
6257
6258 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
6259 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
6260 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
6261 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
6262 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
6263 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
6264
6265 * New targets
6266
6267 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
6268 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
6269 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
6270 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
6271 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
6272 Hitachi SH3 sh-*-*
6273 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
6274
6275 * PowerPC simulator
6276
6277 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
6278 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
6279 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
6280 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
6281 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
6282
6283 * Solaris 2.5
6284
6285 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
6286
6287 * Windows 95/NT native
6288
6289 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
6290 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
6291 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
6292 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
6293 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
6294
6295 * dont-repeat command
6296
6297 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
6298 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
6299 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
6300 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
6301
6302 * Send break instead of ^C
6303
6304 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
6305 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
6306 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
6307
6308 * Remote protocol timeout
6309
6310 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
6311 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
6312 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
6313
6314 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
6315
6316 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
6317 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
6318 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
6319 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
6320 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
6321
6322 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
6323 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
6324 automatically on hpux10.
6325
6326 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
6327
6328 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
6329
6330 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
6331
6332 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
6333 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
6334 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
6335 every character. The default value is 1050.
6336
6337 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
6338
6339 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
6340 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
6341 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
6342 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
6343 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
6344 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
6345
6346 * Speedups for remote debugging
6347
6348 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
6349 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
6350 and more efficient S-record downloading.
6351
6352 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
6353
6354 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
6355 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
6356
6357 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
6358
6359 * Psymtabs for XCOFF
6360
6361 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
6362 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
6363
6364 * Remote targets use caching
6365
6366 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
6367 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
6368 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
6369 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
6370 off' turns the the data cache off.
6371
6372 * Remote targets may have threads
6373
6374 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
6375 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
6376 gdb/remote.c for details.
6377
6378 * NetROM support
6379
6380 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
6381 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
6382 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
6383 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
6384 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
6385 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
6386 sequence is something like
6387
6388 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
6389 load <prog>
6390 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
6391
6392 * Macintosh host
6393
6394 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
6395 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
6396 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
6397 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
6398 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
6399 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
6400 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
6401 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
6402
6403 * Autoconf
6404
6405 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
6406 but does simplify configuration and building.
6407
6408 * hpux10
6409
6410 GDB now supports hpux10.
6411
6412 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
6413
6414 * New native configurations
6415
6416 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
6417 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
6418 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
6419 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
6420
6421 * New targets
6422
6423 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
6424 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
6425 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
6426 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
6427 WDC 65816 w65-*-*
6428
6429 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
6430
6431 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
6432 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
6433 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
6434 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
6435 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
6436
6437 * Arguments to user-defined commands
6438
6439 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
6440 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
6441 trivial example:
6442 define adder
6443 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
6444
6445 To execute the command use:
6446 adder 1 2 3
6447
6448 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
6449 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
6450 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
6451
6452 * New `if' and `while' commands
6453
6454 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
6455 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
6456 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
6457 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
6458 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
6459 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
6460 if the expression is zero.
6461
6462 * Fortran source language mode
6463
6464 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
6465 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
6466 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
6467 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
6468 Fortran compilers.
6469
6470 * Better HPUX support
6471
6472 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
6473 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
6474 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
6475 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
6476 that behavior do the following before running the program:
6477
6478 adb -w a.out
6479 __dld_flags?W 0x5
6480 control-d
6481
6482 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
6483 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
6484
6485 adb -w a.out
6486 __dld_flags?W 0x4
6487 control-d
6488
6489 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
6490 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
6491 external linkage.
6492
6493 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
6494 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
6495
6496 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
6497
6498 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
6499 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
6500 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
6501 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
6502 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
6503 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
6504
6505 * New DOS host serial code
6506
6507 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
6508 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
6509 a PC's serial port.
6510
6511 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
6512
6513 * New "complete" command
6514
6515 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
6516 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
6517
6518 * Trailing space optional in prompt
6519
6520 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
6521 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
6522
6523 * Breakpoint hit counts
6524
6525 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
6526 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
6527 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
6528 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
6529 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
6530 that breakpoint.
6531
6532 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
6533
6534 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
6535 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
6536 arrays actually contain only short strings.
6537
6538 * Shared library breakpoints
6539
6540 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
6541 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
6542
6543 * Hardware watchpoints
6544
6545 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
6546 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
6547
6548 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
6549
6550 * Annotations
6551
6552 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
6553 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
6554
6555 * Improved Irix 5 support
6556
6557 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
6558
6559 * Improved HPPA support
6560
6561 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
6562
6563 * New native configurations
6564
6565 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
6566 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
6567 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
6568 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
6569
6570 * New targets
6571
6572 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
6573 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
6574 Sparc64 sparc64-*-*
6575
6576 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
6577
6578 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
6579 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
6580
6581 * Fixes
6582
6583 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
6584 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
6585
6586 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
6587
6588 * Irix 5 is now supported
6589
6590 * HPPA support
6591
6592 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
6593 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
6594 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
6595 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
6596 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
6597
6598
6599 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
6600
6601 * User visible changes:
6602
6603 * Remote Debugging
6604
6605 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
6606 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
6607 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
6608 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
6609 debugging info for the mips target).
6610
6611 * DEC Alpha native support
6612
6613 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
6614 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
6615 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
6616 Alpha-specific notes.
6617
6618 * Preliminary thread implementation
6619
6620 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
6621
6622 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
6623
6624 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
6625 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
6626 for details).
6627
6628 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
6629
6630 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
6631 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
6632 call methods, ...etc.
6633
6634 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
6635
6636 * User visible changes:
6637
6638 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
6639 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
6640 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
6641 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
6642
6643 Filename completion now works.
6644
6645 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
6646 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
6647 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
6648
6649 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
6650 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
6651 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
6652 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
6653 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
6654
6655 * DEC alpha support
6656
6657 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
6658 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
6659
6660
6661 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
6662
6663 * Testsuite
6664
6665 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
6666 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
6667 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
6668
6669 * C++ demangling
6670
6671 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
6672 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
6673 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
6674 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
6675 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
6676
6677 * Simulators
6678
6679 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
6680 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
6681 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
6682
6683 * New targets supported
6684
6685 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
6686 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
6687 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
6688 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
6689 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
6690
6691 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
6692 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
6693 GO32 memory extender.
6694
6695 * New remote protocols
6696
6697 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
6698
6699 * New source languages supported
6700
6701 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
6702 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
6703 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
6704
6705
6706 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
6707
6708 * HP Precision Architecture supported
6709
6710 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
6711 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
6712 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
6713 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
6714 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
6715 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
6716
6717 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
6718
6719 * Faster and better demangling
6720
6721 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
6722 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
6723 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
6724 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
6725 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
6726 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
6727 symbol lookups.
6728
6729 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
6730 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
6731 compiler does not actually implement.
6732
6733 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
6734
6735 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
6736 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
6737 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
6738 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
6739 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
6740 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
6741 fix.
6742
6743 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
6744 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
6745
6746 * Improved configure script
6747
6748 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
6749 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
6750 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
6751 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
6752
6753 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
6754 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
6755 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
6756 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
6757 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
6758 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
6759
6760 * Documentation improvements
6761
6762 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
6763 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
6764 before submitting changes.
6765
6766 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
6767 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
6768 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
6769 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
6770 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
6771
6772 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
6773 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
6774 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
6775 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
6776 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
6777 around this problem.
6778
6779 * New features
6780
6781 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
6782 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
6783 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
6784 the target program.
6785
6786 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
6787 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
6788
6789 * New native hosts supported
6790
6791 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
6792 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
6793
6794 * New targets supported
6795
6796 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
6797
6798 * New file formats supported
6799
6800 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
6801 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
6802
6803 * Major bug fixes
6804
6805 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
6806
6807 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
6808 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
6809
6810 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
6811 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
6812 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
6813
6814 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
6815 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
6816
6817 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
6818 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
6819 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
6820 libraries.
6821
6822 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
6823 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
6824 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
6825 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
6826 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
6827
6828 * Internal improvements
6829
6830 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
6831 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
6832
6833 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
6834 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
6835 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
6836 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
6837 shared code that handles any of them.
6838
6839 * New command line options
6840
6841 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
6842
6843 * Mmalloc licensing
6844
6845 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
6846 General Public License.
6847
6848 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
6849
6850 * Host/native/target split
6851
6852 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
6853 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
6854 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
6855 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
6856 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
6857
6858 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
6859 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
6860 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
6861 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
6862 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
6863 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
6864 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
6865
6866 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
6867 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
6868 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
6869
6870 * New hosts supported
6871
6872 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
6873 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
6874 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
6875
6876 * New targets supported
6877
6878 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
6879 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
6880
6881 * New native hosts supported
6882
6883 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
6884 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
6885 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
6886
6887 * New file formats supported
6888
6889 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
6890 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
6891 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
6892
6893 * New commands
6894
6895 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
6896 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
6897 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
6898
6899 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
6900
6901 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
6902 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
6903 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
6904 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
6905
6906 * C++ improvements
6907
6908 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
6909 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
6910 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
6911
6912 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
6913
6914 * Major bug fixes
6915
6916 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
6917 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
6918 by the compiler.
6919
6920 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
6921 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
6922
6923 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
6924 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
6925 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
6926 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
6927 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
6928 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
6929
6930 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
6931 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
6932 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
6933 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
6934
6935 * AMD 29k support
6936
6937 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
6938 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
6939 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
6940 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
6941 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
6942
6943 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
6944 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
6945 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
6946 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
6947
6948 * Remote interfaces
6949
6950 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
6951 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
6952 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
6953 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
6954 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
6955 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
6956 each instruction being stepped through.
6957
6958 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
6959 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
6960
6961 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
6962 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
6963 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
6964 processor with a serial port.
6965
6966 * Configuration
6967
6968 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
6969 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
6970 supported, and what files each one uses.
6971
6972 * Library changes
6973
6974 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
6975 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
6976 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
6977 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
6978
6979 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
6980 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
6981 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
6982 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
6983
6984 * Documentation
6985
6986 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
6987 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
6988 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
6989 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
6990 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
6991 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
6992
6993 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
6994
6995
6996 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
6997
6998 * Better support for C++ function names
6999
7000 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
7001 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
7002 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
7003 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
7004 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
7005
7006 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
7007 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
7008 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
7009 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
7010 for the list of formats.
7011
7012 * G++ symbol mangling problem
7013
7014 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
7015 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
7016 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
7017 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
7018 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
7019 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
7020 this problem.)
7021
7022 * New 'maintenance' command
7023
7024 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
7025 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
7026 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
7027
7028 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
7029 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
7030 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
7031 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
7032 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
7033 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
7034
7035 The following commands are new:
7036
7037 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
7038 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
7039 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
7040
7041 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
7042
7043 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
7044 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
7045 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
7046 read after argv processing.
7047
7048 * New hosts supported
7049
7050 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
7051
7052 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
7053
7054 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
7055 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
7056 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
7057 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
7058 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
7059 It costs extra.
7060
7061 * New targets supported
7062
7063 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
7064
7065 * More smarts about finding #include files
7066
7067 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
7068 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
7069 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
7070 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
7071 the one that contains your sources.
7072
7073 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
7074 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
7075 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
7076
7077 * Interesting infernals change
7078
7079 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
7080 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
7081 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
7082 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
7083
7084 * Bug fixes (of course!)
7085
7086 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
7087 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
7088 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
7089
7090 See the ChangeLog for details.
7091
7092 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
7093
7094 * New machines supported (host and target)
7095
7096 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
7097
7098 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
7099
7100 * New malloc package
7101
7102 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
7103 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
7104 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
7105 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
7106 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
7107 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
7108
7109 * info proc
7110
7111 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
7112 'help info proc' for details.
7113
7114 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
7115
7116 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
7117 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
7118 possible.
7119
7120 * File name changes for MS-DOS
7121
7122 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
7123 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
7124 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
7125 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
7126 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
7127 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
7128
7129 * Cross byte order fixes
7130
7131 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
7132 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
7133
7134 * New -mapped and -readnow options
7135
7136 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
7137 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
7138 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
7139 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
7140 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
7141 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
7142 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
7143 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
7144 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
7145 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
7146
7147 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
7148 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
7149 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
7150 slower, but makes future operations faster.
7151
7152 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
7153 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
7154 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
7155 use is:
7156
7157 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
7158
7159 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
7160 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
7161 shared across multiple host platforms.
7162
7163 * longjmp() handling
7164
7165 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
7166 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
7167 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
7168 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
7169
7170 * Solaris 2.0
7171
7172 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
7173 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
7174 reading symbols.
7175
7176 * Bug fixes
7177
7178 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
7179 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
7180 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
7181
7182 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
7183
7184 * New machines supported (host and target)
7185
7186 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
7187 (except core files)
7188 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
7189 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
7190
7191 * New machines supported (target)
7192
7193 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
7194
7195 * C++ support
7196
7197 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
7198 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
7199 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
7200
7201 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
7202 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
7203 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
7204 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
7205 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
7206 released.
7207
7208 * New features for SVR4
7209
7210 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
7211 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
7212 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
7213
7214 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
7215 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
7216 it prints the address mappings of the process.
7217
7218 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
7219 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
7220
7221 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
7222
7223 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
7224 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
7225 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
7226 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
7227 same code linked statically.
7228
7229 * New Getopt
7230
7231 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
7232 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
7233 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
7234 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
7235 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
7236 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
7237
7238 * Bugs fixed
7239
7240 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
7241 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
7242 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
7243
7244
7245 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
7246
7247 * New machines supported (host and target)
7248
7249 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
7250 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
7251 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
7252
7253 * Almost SCO Unix support
7254
7255 We had hoped to support:
7256 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
7257 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
7258 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
7259 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
7260
7261 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
7262
7263 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
7264 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
7265 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
7266 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
7267 reqired (if any).
7268
7269 * New Readline
7270
7271 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
7272 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
7273 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
7274
7275 * Bugs fixed
7276
7277 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
7278 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
7279 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
7280
7281 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
7282
7283 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
7284 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
7285 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
7286
7287 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
7288 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
7289 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
7290 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
7291 version 2.
7292
7293 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
7294 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
7295 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
7296 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
7297 situation somewhat.
7298
7299 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
7300 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
7301 methods.
7302
7303 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
7304 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
7305 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
7306
7307
7308 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
7309
7310 * Improved configuration
7311
7312 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
7313 Porting BFD is simpler.
7314
7315 * Stepping improved
7316
7317 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
7318 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
7319 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
7320 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
7321
7322 * Bug fixing
7323
7324 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
7325
7326 * New host supported (not target)
7327
7328 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
7329
7330
7331 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
7332
7333 * Multiple source language support
7334
7335 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
7336 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
7337 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
7338 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
7339 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
7340 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
7341
7342 * GDB and Modula-2
7343
7344 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
7345 currently under development at the State University of New York at
7346 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
7347 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
7348
7349 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
7350 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
7351 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
7352
7353 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
7354 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
7355
7356 * set write on/off
7357
7358 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
7359 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
7360 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
7361 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
7362 effect immediately.
7363
7364 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
7365
7366 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
7367 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
7368 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
7369 examining core files.
7370
7371 * set listsize
7372
7373 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
7374 The default is 10.
7375
7376 * New machines supported (host and target)
7377
7378 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
7379 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
7380 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
7381
7382 * New hosts supported (not targets)
7383
7384 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
7385
7386 * New targets supported (not hosts)
7387
7388 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
7389 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
7390 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
7391
7392 * New remote interfaces
7393
7394 AMD 29000 Adapt
7395 AMD 29000 Minimon
7396
7397
7398 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
7399
7400 * New Facilities
7401
7402 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
7403
7404 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
7405 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
7406 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
7407 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
7408 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
7409 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
7410 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
7411 stub on the target system.
7412
7413 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
7414
7415 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
7416 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
7417 object file types such as a.out and coff.
7418
7419 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
7420 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
7421
7422
7423 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
7424
7425 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
7426 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
7427
7428 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
7429 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
7430 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
7431
7432 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
7433 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
7434 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
7435 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
7436
7437 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
7438 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
7439 it is already running. Default is ON.
7440
7441 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
7442 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
7443 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
7444 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
7445 Default is ON.
7446
7447 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
7448 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
7449 or the value of the environment variable
7450 GDBHISTFILE.
7451
7452 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
7453 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
7454 HISTSIZE.
7455
7456 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
7457 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
7458 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
7459
7460 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
7461 history expansion will be performed on
7462 command line input. The default is OFF.
7463
7464 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
7465 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
7466 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
7467
7468 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
7469 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
7470 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
7471 variable TERM.
7472
7473 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
7474 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
7475 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
7476 variable TERM.
7477
7478 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
7479 ``set width'' instead.
7480
7481 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
7482 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
7483 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
7484 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
7485
7486 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
7487 is OFF.
7488
7489 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
7490 "raw" form if off.
7491
7492 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
7493 like instructions.
7494
7495 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
7496
7497
7498 * Support for Epoch Environment.
7499
7500 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
7501 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
7502 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
7503 window.
7504
7505
7506 * Support for Shared Libraries
7507
7508 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
7509 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
7510 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
7511 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
7512 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
7513 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
7514 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
7515 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
7516
7517 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
7518 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
7519 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
7520
7521 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
7522
7523
7524 * Watchpoints
7525
7526 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
7527 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
7528 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
7529 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
7530 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
7531 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
7532
7533 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
7534
7535 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
7536
7537 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
7538 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
7539 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
7540
7541
7542 * C++ multiple inheritance
7543
7544 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
7545 for C++ programs.
7546
7547 * C++ exception handling
7548
7549 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
7550 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
7551 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
7552 handler's context).
7553
7554 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
7555 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
7556 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
7557
7558 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
7559 current stack frame.
7560
7561
7562 * Minor command changes
7563
7564 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
7565 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
7566 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
7567
7568 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
7569 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
7570 frames without printing.
7571
7572 * New directory command
7573
7574 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
7575 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
7576 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
7577 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
7578 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
7579
7580 * Configuring GDB for compilation
7581
7582 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
7583 for more details.
7584
7585 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
7586 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
7587 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
7588 where the program that you are debugging will run.
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