2009-07-01 Paul Brook <paul@codesourcery.com>
[deliverable/binutils-gdb.git] / gdb / NEWS
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1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
3
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4*** Changes since GDB 6.8
5
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6* Process record and replay
7
8 In a architecture environment that supports ``process record and
9 replay'', ``process record and replay'' target can record a log of
10 the process execution, and replay it with both forward and reverse
11 execute commands.
12
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13* Reverse debugging: GDB now has new commands reverse-continue, reverse-
14step, reverse-next, reverse-finish, reverse-stepi, reverse-nexti, and
15set execution-direction {forward|reverse}, for targets that support
16reverse execution.
17
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18* GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on MIPS/Linux systems. This
19feature is available with a native GDB running on kernel version
202.6.28 or later.
21
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22* GDB now has support for multi-byte and wide character sets on the
23target. Strings whose character type is wchar_t, char16_t, or
24char32_t are now correctly printed. GDB supports wide- and unicode-
25literals in C, that is, L'x', L"string", u'x', u"string", U'x', and
26U"string" syntax. And, GDB allows the "%ls" and "%lc" formats in
27`printf'. This feature requires iconv to work properly; if your
28system does not have a working iconv, GDB can use GNU libiconv. See
29the installation instructions for more information.
30
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31* GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
32remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
33with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
34the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
35
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36* Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
37now complete on file names.
38
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39* When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
40completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
41For instance, consider:
42
43 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
44 # struct example variable;
45 (gdb) p variable.
46
47If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
48completions will be "f1" and "f2".
49
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50* Inlined functions are now supported. They show up in backtraces, and
51the "step", "next", and "finish" commands handle them automatically.
52
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53* GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
54operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
55macros.
56
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57* GDB now supports inspecting extra signal information, exported by
58 the new $_siginfo convenience variable. The feature is currently
59 implemented on linux ARM, i386 and amd64.
60
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61* New remote packets
62
63qSearch:memory:
64 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
65
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66QStartNoAckMode
67 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
68 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
69 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
70
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71vKill
72 Kill the process with the specified process ID. Use this in preference
73 to `k' when multiprocess protocol extensions are supported.
74
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75qXfer:osdata:read
76 Obtains additional operating system information
77
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78qXfer:siginfo:read
79qXfer:siginfo:write
80 Read or write additional signal information.
81
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82* Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
83
84 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
85 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
86 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
87
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88* The "disassemble" command now supports an optional /m modifier to print mixed
89source+assembly.
90
c055b101 91* GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
a0ef4274 92DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
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93
94* The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
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95and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
96`set/show sh calling-convention'.
c055b101 97
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98* GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
99with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
100
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101* 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
102
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103* Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
104
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105* Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
106which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
107
1fddbabb 108* The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
31fffb02 109list of section offsets.
1fddbabb 110
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111* On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
112conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
113have also been fixed.
114
bfb8797a 115* GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
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116From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
117are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
bfb8797a 118
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119* GDB now parses C++ symbol and type names more flexibly. For
120example, given:
121
122 template<typename T> class C { };
123 C<char const *> c;
124
125GDB will now correctly handle all of:
126
127 ptype C<char const *>
128 ptype C<char const*>
129 ptype C<const char *>
130 ptype C<const char*>
131
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132* New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
133
134 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
135 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
136
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137 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
138 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
139 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
140
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141 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
142 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
143
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144 - Support for the sparc64-linux-gnu target is now included in
145 gdbserver.
146
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147* Python scripting
148
149 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
150 available is determined at configure time.
151
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152 New GDB commands can now be written in Python.
153
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154* Ada tasking support
155
156 Ada tasks can now be inspected in GDB. The following commands have
157 been introduced:
158
159 info tasks
160 Print the list of Ada tasks.
161 info task N
162 Print detailed information about task number N.
163 task
164 Print the task number of the current task.
165 task N
166 Switch the context of debugging to task number N.
167
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168* Support for user-defined prefixed commands. The "define" command can
169add new commands to existing prefixes, e.g. "target".
170
d7713ae0 171* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
75feb17d 172
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173find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
174 val1 [, val2, ...]
175 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
176
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177maint set python print-stack
178maint show python print-stack
179 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
180
181python [CODE]
182 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
183
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184macro define
185macro list
186macro undef
187 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
188 interactively.
189
190info os processes
191 Show operating system information about processes.
192
193* New options
194
195set sh calling-convention
196show sh calling-convention
197 Control the calling convention used when calling SH target functions.
198
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199set print symbol-loading
200show print symbol-loading
201 Control printing of symbol loading messages.
202
e0a3ce09 203set debug timestamp
75feb17d 204show debug timestamp
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205 Control display of timestamps with GDB debugging output.
206
207set disassemble-next-line
208show disassemble-next-line
209 Control display of disassembled source lines or instructions when
210 the debuggee stops.
211
212set remote noack-packet
213show remote noack-packet
214 Set/show the use of remote protocol QStartNoAckMode packet. See above
215 under "New remote packets."
216
217set remote query-attached-packet
218show remote query-attached-packet
219 Control use of remote protocol `qAttached' (query-attached) packet.
220
221set remote read-siginfo-object
222show remote read-siginfo-object
223 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:read' (read-siginfo-object)
224 packet.
225
226set remote write-siginfo-object
227show remote write-siginfo-object
228 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:write' (write-siginfo-object)
229 packet.
230
231set displaced-stepping
232show displaced-stepping
233 Control displaced stepping mode. Displaced stepping is a way to
234 single-step over breakpoints without removing them from the debuggee.
235 Also known as "out-of-line single-stepping".
236
237set debug displaced
238show debug displaced
239 Control display of debugging info for displaced stepping.
240
241maint set internal-error
242maint show internal-error
243 Control what GDB does when an internal error is detected.
244
245maint set internal-warning
246maint show internal-warning
247 Control what GDB does when an internal warning is detected.
75feb17d 248
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249set exec-wrapper
250show exec-wrapper
251unset exec-wrapper
252 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
fa4727a6 253
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254set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
255show multiple-symbols
256 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
257 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
258 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
259
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260set breakpoint always-inserted
261show breakpoint always-inserted
262 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
263 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
264 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
265
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266set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
267show arm fallback-mode
268set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
269show arm force-mode
270 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
271 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
272 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
273 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
274
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275set disable-randomization
276show disable-randomization
277 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
278 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
279 multiple debugging sessions.
280
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281set non-stop
282show non-stop
283 Control whether other threads are stopped or not when some thread hits
284 a breakpoint.
285
b3eb342c 286set target-async
d7713ae0 287show target-async
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288 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
289 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
290 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
291 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
292
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293set target-wide-charset
294show target-wide-charset
295 The target-wide-charset is the name of the character set that GDB
296 uses when printing characters whose type is wchar_t.
297
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298set tcp auto-retry (on|off)
299show tcp auto-retry
300set tcp connect-timeout
301show tcp connect-timeout
302 These commands allow GDB to retry failed TCP connections to a remote stub
303 with a specified timeout period; this is useful if the stub is launched
304 in parallel with GDB but may not be ready to accept connections immediately.
305
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306set libthread-db-search-path
307show libthread-db-search-path
308 Control list of directories which GDB will search for appropriate
309 libthread_db.
310
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311set schedule-multiple (on|off)
312show schedule-multiple
313 Allow GDB to resume all threads of all processes or only threads of
314 the current process.
315
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316* New native configurations
317
318x86/x86_64 Darwin i[34567]86-*-darwin*
319
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320x86_64 MinGW x86_64-*-mingw*
321
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322* New targets
323
c28c63d8 324Lattice Mico32 lm32-*
75a2d5e7 325x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
4c1d2973 326x86_64 DICOS x86_64-*-dicos*
75a2d5e7 327
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328* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports x86 Windows CE
329 (mingw32ce) debugging.
330
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331* Removed commands
332
333catch load
334catch unload
335 These commands were actually not implemented on any target.
336
75feb17d 337*** Changes in GDB 6.8
f9ed52be 338
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339* New native configurations
340
341NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
94a0e877 342Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
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343
344* New targets
345
346NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
94a0e877 347Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
af5ca30d 348
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349* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
350
351 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
352 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
353 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
354 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
355
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356* GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
357(mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
358
fe6fbf8b 359* Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
8d5f9c6f 360is resolved.
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361
362* GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
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363including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
364and in inlined functions.
fe6fbf8b 365
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366* GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
367accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
368more than one contiguous range of addresses.
369
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370* Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
371
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372* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
373registers on PowerPC targets.
374
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375* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
376targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
377
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378* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
379commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
380
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381* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
382extended-remote mode.
383
24a836bd 384* hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
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385The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
386error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
387The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
24a836bd 388
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389* GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
390building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
391target architectures.
392
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393* GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
394Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
395now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
396stored in two consecutive float registers.
397
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398* The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
399breakpoints now.
400
b93b6ca7 401* Improved support for debugging Ada
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402Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
403include:
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404 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
405 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
406 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
407 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
408 of an assignment
409 - Improved command completion in Ada
410 - Several bug fixes
411
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412* GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
413process.
414
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415* New commands
416
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417set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
418show print frame-arguments
419 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
420 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
421
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422remote put
423remote get
424remote delete
425 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
426
427* New MI commands
428
429-target-file-put
430-target-file-get
431-target-file-delete
432 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
433
434* New remote packets
435
436vFile:open:
437vFile:close:
438vFile:pread:
439vFile:pwrite:
440vFile:unlink:
441 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
d0c678e6 442
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443vAttach
444 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
445 mode.
446
447vRun
448 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
449
8d5f9c6f 450*** Changes in GDB 6.7
6dd09645 451
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452* Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
453bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
454Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
455
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456* When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
457symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
458-Bsymbolic linker option.
459
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460* When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
461recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
462is not supported.
463
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464* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
465frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
466
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467* GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
46832-bit or 64-bit register values.
469
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470* Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
471
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472* GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
473target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
474a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
475
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476* Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
477automatically displayed as character or string data.
478
479* The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
480arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
481as strings.
e1f48ead 482
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483* Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
484for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
8d5f9c6f 485only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
123dc839 486
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487* GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
488iWMMXt coprocessor.
fb1e4ffc 489
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490* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
491ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
492has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
493
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494* GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
495
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496* GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
497
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498* The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
499layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
500segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
501
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502* The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
503immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
504
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505* The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
506"library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
507packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
508where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
509Windows and SymbianOS).
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510
511* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
512(DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
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513
514* GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
515according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
cfa9d6d9 516
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517* New commands
518
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519set remoteflow
520show remoteflow
521 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
522 when debugging using remote targets.
523
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524set mem inaccessible-by-default
525show mem inaccessible-by-default
526 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
527 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
528 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
529 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
530 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
531
532set breakpoint auto-hw
533show breakpoint auto-hw
534 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
535 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
536 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
537 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
538 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
539 including "next" and "finish".
540
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541catch exception
542catch exception unhandled
543 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
544
545catch assert
546 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
547
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548set sysroot
549show sysroot
550 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
551 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
552 an alias to "set sysroot".
553
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554info spu
555 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
556 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
557 architecture.
558
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559* New native configurations
560
561OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
562
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563set tdesc filename
564unset tdesc filename
565show tdesc filename
566 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
567 not query the target for its built-in description.
568
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569* New targets
570
54fe9172 571OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
c9bb8148 572MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
c077150c 573Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
c9bb8148 574
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575* New remote packets
576
577QPassSignals:
578 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
579 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
580
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581qXfer:features:read:
582 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
583 features.
6dd09645 584
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585qXfer:spu:read:
586qXfer:spu:write:
587 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
588 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
589
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590qXfer:libraries:read:
591 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
592 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
593 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
594 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
595
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596* Removed targets
597
598Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
599
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600alpha*-*-osf1*
601alpha*-*-osf2*
7ce59000 602d10v-*-*
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603hppa*-*-hiux*
604i[34567]86-ncr-*
605i[34567]86-*-dgux*
606i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
607i[34567]86-*-netware*
608i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
609i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
610i[34567]86-*-sco*
611i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
612i[34567]86-*-sysv4*
613i[34567]86-*-sysv5*
614i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
615i[34567]86-*-unixware*
616i[34567]86-*-sysv*
617i[34567]86-*-isc*
618m68*-cisco*-*
619m68*-tandem-*
ad527d2e 620mips*-*-pe
483367ee 621rs6000-*-lynxos*
ad527d2e 622sh*-*-pe
483367ee 623
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624* Other removed features
625
626target abug
627target cpu32bug
628target est
629target rom68k
630
631 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
632
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633target hms
634target e7000
635target sh3
636target sh3e
637
638 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
639 H8/300.
640
641target ocd
642
643 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
644 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
645 interfaces.
646
7ce59000
DJ
647DWARF 1 support
648
649 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
650 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
651
54d61198
DJ
652Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
653
654 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
655 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
656 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
657 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
658
ea35711c
DJ
659MIPS ".pdr" sections
660
661 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
662 in debugging information.
663
664Scheme support
665
666 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
667 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
668
1a69e1e4
DJ
669set mips stack-arg-size
670set mips saved-gpreg-size
671
672 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
673
6dd09645 674*** Changes in GDB 6.6
e374b601 675
ca3bf3bd
DJ
676* New targets
677
678Xtensa xtensa-elf
9c309e77 679Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
ca3bf3bd 680
6aec2e11
DJ
681* GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
682(mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
683running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
684
685* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
686Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
687supported.
688
17218d91
DJ
689* The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
690broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
691
9ebce043
DJ
692* The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
693stub provides the required support.
694
7d3d3ece
DJ
695* Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
696longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
697
4f8253f3
JB
698* New commands
699
700set substitute-path
701unset substitute-path
702show substitute-path
703 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
704 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
705 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
706 between compilation and debugging.
707
9fa66fd7
AS
708set trace-commands
709show trace-commands
710 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
711 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
712 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
713
1f5befc1
DJ
714* REMOVED features
715
716The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
717
2ec3381a
DJ
718Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
719an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
720
3d00d119
DJ
721The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
722
be2a5f71
DJ
723* New remote packets
724
725qSupported:
726 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
727 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
728 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
729 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
730 target.
731
0876f84a
DJ
732qXfer:auxv:read:
733 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
734 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
735
9ebce043
DJ
736qXfer:memory-map:read:
737 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
738 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
739
740vFlashErase:
741vFlashWrite:
742vFlashDone:
743 Erase and program a flash memory device.
744
0876f84a
DJ
745* Removed remote packets
746
747qPart:auxv:read:
748 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
749 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
750
e374b601 751*** Changes in GDB 6.5
53e5f3cf 752
96309189
MS
753* New targets
754
755Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
756
757Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
758
53e5f3cf
AS
759* New commands
760
761init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
762 only if it doesn't already have a value.
763
ac264b3b
MS
764The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
765
766checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
767
768restart <n> Return the program state to a
769 previously saved state.
770
771info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
772
773delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
774
775set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
776 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
777
778info forks List forks of the user program that
779 are available to be debugged.
780
781fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
782 forks of the user program that are
783 available to be debugged.
784
785delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
786 that are available to be debugged (and
787 kill the forked process).
788
789detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
790 that are available to be debugged (and
791 allow the process to continue).
792
3950dc3f
NS
793* New architecture
794
795Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
796
0ea3f30e
DJ
797* Improved Windows host support
798
799GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
800native console support, and remote communications using either
801network sockets or serial ports.
802
f79daebb
GM
803* Improved Modula-2 language support
804
805GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
806basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
807pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
808printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
809written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
810GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
811
acab6ab2
MM
812* REMOVED features
813
814The ARM rdi-share module.
815
f4267320
DJ
816The Netware NLM debug server.
817
53e5f3cf 818*** Changes in GDB 6.4
156a53ca 819
e0ecbda1
MK
820* New native configurations
821
02a677ac 822OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
e0ecbda1
MK
823OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
824
d64a6579
KB
825* New targets
826
827Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
828
b33a6190
AS
829* New command line options
830
831--batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
832--return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
833 the child (debugged) program exited with.
834--eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
835 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
836 specified multiple times and in conjunction
837 with the --command (-x) option.
838
11dced61
AC
839* Deprecated commands removed
840
841The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
842removed:
843
844 Command Replacement
845 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
846 othernames set arm disassembler
847 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
848 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
849 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
850 regs info registers
851
6fe85783
MK
852* New BSD user-level threads support
853
854It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
855library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
856configurations are:
857
858FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
859FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
860OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
861
862Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
863are not yet supported.
864
5260ca71
MS
865* New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
866(Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
867
e84ecc99
AC
868* REMOVED configurations and files
869
870VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
9445aa30 871Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
9445aa30 872National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
156a53ca 873
31e35378
JB
874* New "set print array-indexes" command
875
876After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
877when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
878behavior.
879
e85e5c83
MK
880* VAX floating point support
881
882GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
883
d91e9901
AS
884* User-defined command support
885
886In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
887to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
888section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
889
f2cb65ca
MC
890*** Changes in GDB 6.3:
891
f47b1503
AS
892* New command line option
893
894GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
895debugging.
896
f2cb65ca
MC
897* GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
898
899GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
900information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
901by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
902proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
903to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
860660cb 904
d08c0230
AC
905* Internationalization
906
907When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
908internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
909continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
910
117ea3cf
PH
911* Ada
912
913Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
914implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
915into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
916
d08c0230
AC
917* New native configurations
918
919GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
920
921* Remote 'p' packet
922
923GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
924packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
925
926* END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
927
928GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
929The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
930features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
931i386 application).
932
933GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
934compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
935continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
936configurations:
937
938hppa-*-hpux
939ia64-*-aix
940mips-*-irix*
941*-*-lynx
942mips-*-linux-gnu
943sds protocol
944xdr protocol
945powerpc bdm protocol
946
947Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
948made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
949
950* OBSOLETE configurations and files
951
952Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
953been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
954configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
955permanently REMOVED.
956
957h8300-*-*
958mcore-*-*
959mn10300-*-*
960ns32k-*-*
961sh64-*-*
962v850-*-*
963
ebb7c577
AC
964*** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
965
966* MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
967
968When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
969heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
970been fixed.
971
972* MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
973
974When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
975fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
976IRIX long double values).
977
978* VAX and "next"
979
980A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
981command. This problem has been fixed.
982
860660cb 983*** Changes in GDB 6.2:
faae5abe 984
0dea2468
AC
985* Fix for ``many threads''
986
987On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
988rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
989error message:
990
991 ptrace: No such process.
992 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
993
994This problem has been fixed.
995
2c07db7a
AC
996* "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
997
998Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
999GDB to dump core).
1000
c23968a2
JB
1001* New ``start'' command.
1002
1003This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
1004
71009278
MK
1005* New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
1006
1007Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
1008live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
1009platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
1010
1011FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1012FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
1013NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
1014NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
1015NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
1016OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
1017OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
1018OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
1019OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
1020
3c0b7db2
AC
1021* Signal trampoline code overhauled
1022
1023Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
1024These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
1025of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
1026call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
1027signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
1028
73cc75f3
AC
1029Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
1030features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
1031include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
3c0b7db2 1032
7243600a
BF
1033* Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
1034
6f606e1c
MK
1035* New native configurations
1036
97dc871c 1037GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
0e56aeaf 1038OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
bf2ca189
MK
1039OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
1040OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
d195bc9f 1041OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 1042NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
9f076e7a 1043OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 1044
a1b461bf
AC
1045* END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
1046
1047GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
1048The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
1049including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
1050migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
1051compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
1052work, was also included.
1053
1054GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
1055module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
1056
1057h8300-*-*
1058mcore-*-*
1059mn10300-*-*
1060ns32k-*-*
1061sh64-*-*
1062v850-*-*
1063xstormy16-*-*
1064
1065Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
1066made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
1067
3c7012f5
AC
1068* REMOVED configurations and files
1069
1070Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
1071Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
1072Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
1073Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
1074Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
1075AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
1076Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
1077decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
1078riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
1079sonymips mips-sony-*
1080sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
1081
e5fe55f7
AC
1082*** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
1083
1084* TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
1085
1086The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
1087GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
1088command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
1089program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
1090with GDB".
1091
1092* Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
1093
1094Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
1095libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
1096cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
1097GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
1098shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
1099the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
1100are created.
1101
1102Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
1103
1104* Fixed ISO-C build problems
1105
1106The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
1107non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
1108compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
1109
1110* Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
1111
1112Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
1113wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
1114
1115* Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
1116
1117The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
1118permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
1119systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
1120
1121* Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
1122
1123Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
1124has been updated to use constant array sizes.
1125
1126* Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
1127
1128GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
1129its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
1130panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
1131
1132* Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
1133
1134When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
1135by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
1136not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
1137
faae5abe 1138*** Changes in GDB 6.1:
f2c06f52 1139
9175c9a3
MC
1140* Removed --with-mmalloc
1141
1142Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
1143conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
1144
3cc87ec0
MK
1145* Changes in AMD64 configurations
1146
1147The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
1148the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
1149and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
1150you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
1151
f0424ef6
MK
1152* Revised SPARC target
1153
1154The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
1155FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
03cebad2
MK
1156support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
1157from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
1158(Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
f0424ef6 1159
59659be2
ILT
1160* New C++ demangler
1161
1162GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
1163names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
1164with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
1165programs.
1166
9e08b29b
DJ
1167* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
1168
1169GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
1170arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
1171encountered these.
1172
8dfe8985
DC
1173* C++ nested types and namespaces
1174
1175GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
1176improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
1177is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
1178Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
1179namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
1180"Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
1181frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
1182if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
1183GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
1184
cced5e27
MK
1185* New native configurations
1186
1187NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
27d1e716 1188OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2031c21a 1189OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
f2cab569
MK
1190OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
1191OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
cced5e27 1192
b4b4b794
KI
1193* New debugging protocols
1194
1195M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
1196
7989c619
AC
1197* "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
1198
1199The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
1200and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
1201tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
1202
5994185b
AC
1203* OBSOLETE configurations and files
1204
1205Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1206been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1207configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1208permanently REMOVED.
1209
1210Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
1211Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
1212Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
1213Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
1214Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
1215AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
1216Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
0748d941
AC
1217decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
1218riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
1219sonymips mips-sony-*
1220sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
5994185b 1221
0ddabb4c
AC
1222* REMOVED configurations and files
1223
1224SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
1225SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4a8269c0
AC
1226Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1227Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1228H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1229HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
1230HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1231HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
1232PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
cf7c5c23 1233386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
4a8269c0
AC
1234Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
1235 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
1236 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f0424ef6
MK
1237SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
1238SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
4a8269c0
AC
1239Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1240Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
0ddabb4c 1241
c7f1390e
DJ
1242*** Changes in GDB 6.0:
1243
1fe43d45
AC
1244* Objective-C
1245
1246Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
1247integrated into GDB.
1248
e6beb428
AC
1249* New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
1250
1251DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
1252information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
1253By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
1254backtraces.
1255
1256The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
1257have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
1258DWARF 2 CFI support.
1259
1260* Hosted file I/O.
1261
1262GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
1263file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
1264remote protocol documentation for details.
1265
1266* All targets using the new architecture framework.
1267
1268All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
1269architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
1270to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
1271ppc32 on ppc64).
1272
1273* GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
1274
1275GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
1276per-thread variables.
1277
1278* GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
1279
1280GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
1281GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
1282
1283* Separate debug info.
1284
1285GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
1286automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
1287of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
1288system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
1289and optional debug files.
1290
1291* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
1292
1293DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
1294describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
1295debugger.
1296
1297GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
1298for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
1299
1300* Java
1301
1302A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
1303Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
1304considered "useable".
1305
85f8f974
DJ
1306* GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
1307
1308The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
1309commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
1310kernel.
1311
0fac0b41
DJ
1312* GDB supports logging output to a file
1313
1314There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
1315used to capture GDB's output to a file.
f2c06f52 1316
6ad8ae5c
DJ
1317* The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
1318
1319The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
1320disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
1321command.
1322
e286caf2 1323* d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
5f601589
AC
1324
1325The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
1326registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
1327
d28f9cdf
DJ
1328* Profiling support
1329
1330A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
1331be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
1332session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
1333"--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
1334data, for more informative profiling results.
1335
da0f9dcd
AC
1336* Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
1337
1338The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
1339option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
b68767c1 1340"mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
da0f9dcd
AC
1341
1342Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
1343removed.
1344
fb9b6b35
JJ
1345Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
1346Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
1347Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
1348 in a subsequent -var-update.
1349
954a4db8
MK
1350* New native configurations.
1351
1352FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1353
6760f9e6
JB
1354* Multi-arched targets.
1355
b4263afa 1356HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
85a453d5 1357Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
6760f9e6 1358
1b831c93
AC
1359* OBSOLETE configurations and files
1360
1361Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1362been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1363configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1364permanently REMOVED.
1365
8b0e5691 1366Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
67f16606 1367Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
fd2299bd 1368H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
56056df7
AC
1369HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
1370HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1371HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
78c43945 1372PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2fbce691
AC
1373Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
1374 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
1375 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f81824a9
AC
1376Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1377Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
fd2299bd 1378
5835abe7
NC
1379* REMOVED configurations and files
1380
1381V850EA ISA
1b831c93
AC
1382Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1383IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
1384i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1385i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1386i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
1387HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1388 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
1389 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
1390Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1391Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1392Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1393OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1394I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5835abe7 1395
a094c6fb
AC
1396* MIPS $fp behavior changed
1397
1398The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
1399the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
1400context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
1401address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
1402The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
1403
299ffc64 1404*** Changes in GDB 5.3:
37057839 1405
46248966
AC
1406* GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
1407
1408When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
1409`/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
1410in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
1411library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
1412shared libs like mad''.
1413
b9d14705 1414* ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
6da02953 1415
b9d14705
DJ
1416Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
1417the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
1418arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
1419powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
6da02953 1420
e0e9281e
JB
1421* GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
1422
1423GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
1424and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
1425they expand.
1426
dd73b9bb
AC
1427The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
1428invocations in expression, and shows the result.
1429
1430The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
1431macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
1432
e0e9281e
JB
1433Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
1434information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
1435your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
1436information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
1437
2250ee0c
CV
1438* Multi-arched targets.
1439
6e3ba3b8
JT
1440DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
1441DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
2250ee0c 1442NEC V850 v850-*-*
6e3ba3b8 1443National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
a1789893
GS
1444Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
1445Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
2250ee0c 1446
cd9bfe15 1447* New targets.
e33ce519 1448
456f8b9d
DB
1449Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
1450
e33ce519 1451
da8ca43d
JT
1452* New native configurations
1453
1454Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
029923d4 1455SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
45888261 1456MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
9ce5c36a 1457UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
da8ca43d 1458
cd9bfe15
AC
1459* OBSOLETE configurations and files
1460
1461Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1462been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1463configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1464permanently REMOVED.
1465
92eb23c5 1466Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
a99a9e1b 1467OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1c7cc583 1468IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
7a3085c1 1469Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
7fb623f7 1470Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
eb4c54a2 1471Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
d8ee244c
MK
1472i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1473i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1474i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
822e978b
AC
1475HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1476 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
1477 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
4d210288 1478I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
92eb23c5 1479
db034ac5
AC
1480* OBSOLETE languages
1481
1482CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
1483
cd9bfe15
AC
1484* REMOVED configurations and files
1485
1486AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1487A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1488AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1489AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1490AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1491
1492testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
1493
20f01a46
DH
1494* New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
1495
1496This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
1497commands. The default is 1024.
1498
a5941fbf
MK
1499* Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
1500
1501Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
1502
89743e04
MS
1503* New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
1504
1505These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
1506to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
1507from a file into memory (restore).
37057839 1508
9fb14e79
JB
1509* Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
1510
1511The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
1512including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
1513of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
1514
2037aebb
AC
1515*** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
1516
1517* New targets.
1518
1519Atmel AVR avr*-*-*
1520
1521* Bug fixes
1522
1523gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
1524mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
1525Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
1526
1527gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
1528dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
1529Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
1530
1531Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
1532Surprisingly enough, it works now.
1533By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
1534
1535i386 hardware watchpoint support:
1536avoid misses on second run for some targets.
1537By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
1538
37057839 1539*** Changes in GDB 5.2:
eb7cedd9 1540
1a703748
MS
1541* New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
1542
1543This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
1544really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
1545In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
1546target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
1547This can be a significant performance improvement on some
1548(notably embedded) targets.
1549
cefd4ef5
MS
1550* New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
1551
55241689
AC
1552This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
1553process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
1554GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
1555hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
cefd4ef5 1556
352ed7b4
MS
1557* New command line option
1558
1559GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
1560
1561* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
1562
1563There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
1564command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
1565a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
1566be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
1567open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
1568issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
1569a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
1570it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
1571GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
1572is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
1573
fe419ffc
RE
1574* Changes in ARM configurations.
1575
1576Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
1577configuration is fully multi-arch.
1578
eb7cedd9
MK
1579* New native configurations
1580
fe419ffc 1581ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
eb7cedd9 1582x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
55241689 1583AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
768f0842 1584Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
eb7cedd9 1585
c9f63e6b
CV
1586* New targets
1587
1588Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
1589
9b4ff276
AC
1590* OBSOLETE configurations and files
1591
1592Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1593been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1594configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1595permanently REMOVED.
1596
1597AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1598A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1599AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1600AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1601AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1602
b4ceaee6 1603testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
9b4ff276 1604
e2caac18
AC
1605* REMOVED configurations and files
1606
1607TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
7bc65f05 1608WDC 65816 w65-*-*
7768dd6c
AC
1609PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1610PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1611PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
5e734e1f 1612Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1406caf7
AC
1613Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1614 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
7e24f0b1 1615SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
9b567150 1616Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
3680c638
AC
1617Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1618ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
a752853e 1619Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
e2caac18 1620
c2a727fa
TT
1621* Changes to command line processing
1622
1623The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
1624for the inferior from gdb's command line.
1625
467d8519
TT
1626* Changes to key bindings
1627
1628There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
1629
7072a954
AC
1630*** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
1631
1632Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
1633
1634Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
1635corrupted.
1636
1637Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
1638
1639Numerous documentation fixes.
1640
1641Numerous testsuite fixes.
1642
34f47bc4 1643*** Changes in GDB 5.1:
139760b7
MK
1644
1645* New native configurations
1646
1647Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
1648x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
55241689 1649MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
e23194cb
EZ
1650MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1651ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
55241689 1652s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
139760b7 1653
bf64bfd6
AC
1654* New targets
1655
def90278 1656Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
24be5c34 1657CRIS cris-axis
55241689 1658UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
def90278 1659
17e78a56 1660* OBSOLETE configurations and files
bf64bfd6
AC
1661
1662x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
9b9c068d 1663Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
bb19ff3b
AC
1664Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1665 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
76f4ea53
AC
1666TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1667WDC 65816 w65-*-*
4a1968f4 1668Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1b2b2c16
AC
1669PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1670PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1671PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
24f89b68 1672SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
514e603d
AC
1673Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1674ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
d036b4d9 1675Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
bf64bfd6 1676
17e78a56
AC
1677stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
1678kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
1679
7fcca85b
AC
1680Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1681been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1682configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1683permanently REMOVED.
1684
a196c81c 1685* REMOVED configurations and files
7fcca85b
AC
1686
1687Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1688Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
1689Pyramid pyramid-*-*
1690ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
1691Tahoe tahoe-*-*
a196c81c 1692ser-ocd.c *-*-*
bf64bfd6 1693
6d6b80e5 1694* GDB has been converted to ISO C.
e23194cb 1695
6d6b80e5 1696GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
e23194cb
EZ
1697sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
1698present.
1699
bf64bfd6
AC
1700* Other news:
1701
e23194cb
EZ
1702* "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
1703
1704* The MI enabled by default.
1705
1706The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
1707revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
1708engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
1709using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
1710which is now deprecated.
1711
1712* Support for debugging Pascal programs.
1713
1714GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
1715main features are supported:
1716
1717 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
1718
1719 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
1720 extension;
1721
1722 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
1723
1724 - a Pascal expression parser.
1725
1726However, some important features are not yet supported.
1727
1728 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
1729
1730 - there are some problems with boolean types;
1731
1732 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
1733 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
1734
1735 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
1736
1737 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
1738
1739* Changes in completion.
1740
1741Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
1742to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
1743users expect at the shell prompt.
1744
1745Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
1746`breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
1747program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
1748files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
1749be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
1750considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
1751name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
1752
1753`set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
1754
1755* New platform-independent commands:
1756
1757It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
1758hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
1759documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
1760
1761* Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
1762
d7275149
MK
1763Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
1764revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
1765many threads as your system allows you to have.
1766
e23194cb
EZ
1767Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
1768
d7275149
MK
1769Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
1770multi-threaded programs though.
e23194cb
EZ
1771
1772* Changes in MIPS configurations.
bf64bfd6
AC
1773
1774Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
1775
e23194cb
EZ
1776GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
1777debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
1778supported.)
1779
1780* Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
1781
1782Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
1783breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
1784implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
1785put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
1786and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
1787registers.
1788
1789The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
1790debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
1791watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
1792
1793* Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
1794
1795New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
1796the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
1797
1798New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
1799display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
1800IDT.
1801
1802New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
1803from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
1804New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
1805a given linear address.
1806
1807GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
1808program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
1809which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
1810
1811DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
1812
6c56c069
EZ
1813It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
1814
e23194cb
EZ
1815* Changes in documentation.
1816
1817All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
1818Documentation License.
1819
1820Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1821manual.
1822
1823TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
1824
1825Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1826manual.
1827
1828The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
1829documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
1830hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
1831
5d6640b1
AC
1832* GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
1833
1834The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
1835``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
1836contents of this file.
1837
1a1d8446
AC
1838* gdba.el deleted
1839
1840GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
139760b7 1841
9debab2f 1842*** Changes in GDB 5.0:
7a292a7a 1843
c63ce875
EZ
1844* Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
1845
1846Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
1847programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
1848displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
1849greater level of detail.
1850
1851* Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
1852
1853It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
1854bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
1855on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
1856written.
1857
1858* Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
1859
1860The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
1861necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
1862machines ``out of the box''.
1863
1864The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
1865possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
1866signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
1867would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
1868interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
1869
1870It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
1871standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
1872even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
1873and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
1874terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
1875
1876The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
1877enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
1878also works.
1879
1880DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
1881GDB.
1882
1883It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
1884directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
1885times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
1886breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
1887
ed9a39eb
JM
1888* New native configurations
1889
1890ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
afc05dd4 1891PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
ed9a39eb 1892
7a292a7a
SS
1893* New targets
1894
96baa820 1895Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
adf40b2e
JM
1896x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
1897PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
7a292a7a
SS
1898TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1899
085dd6e6
JM
1900* OBSOLETE configurations
1901
1902Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1903Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
9846de1b 1904Pyramid pyramid-*-*
ed9a39eb 1905ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
104c1213 1906Tahoe tahoe-*-*
7a292a7a 1907
9debab2f
AC
1908Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1909but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1910these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1911be permanently REMOVED.
1912
5330533d
SS
1913* Gould support removed
1914
1915Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
1916
bc9e5bbf
AC
1917* New features for SVR4
1918
1919On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
1920without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
1921load symbols from the running process's executable file.
1922
1923* Many C++ enhancements
1924
1925C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
1926in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
1927
adf40b2e
JM
1928* Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
1929
1930A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
1931sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
1932with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
1933``|<program> <args>'' vis:
1934
1935 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
1936 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
1937
43e526b9
JM
1938* MIPS 64 remote protocol
1939
1940A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
1941expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
1942instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
1943
1944The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
1945added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
1946
96baa820
JM
1947* ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
1948
1949The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
1950``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
1951include ``set remote P-packet''.
1952
11cf8741
JM
1953* Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
1954
1955The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
1956accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
1957``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
1958
7876dd43
DB
1959* ``apropos'' command added.
1960
1961The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
1962documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
1963try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
1964
bc9e5bbf
AC
1965* New MI interface
1966
1967A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
1968interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
7162c0ca
EZ
1969process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
1970"GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
1971enabled by configuring with:
bc9e5bbf
AC
1972
1973 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
1974
c906108c
SS
1975*** Changes in GDB-4.18:
1976
1977* New native configurations
1978
1979HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
1980HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
55241689 1981M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
c906108c
SS
1982
1983* New targets
1984
1985Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1986Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
1987Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1988
1989* OBSOLETE configurations
1990
1991Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
1992
1993Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1994but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1995these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1996be permanently REMOVED.
1997
1998* ANSI/ISO C
1999
2000As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
2001buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
2002containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
2003use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
2004available. If this is not true, please report the affected
2005configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
2006information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
2007already.
2008
2009* Readline 2.2
2010
2011GDB now uses readline 2.2.
2012
2013* set extension-language
2014
2015You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
2016languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
2017you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
2018 set extension-language .c c++
2019The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
2020and their associated languages.
2021
2022* Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
2023
2024When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
2025you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
2026PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
2027
2028 set processor NAME
2029
2030sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
2031following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
2032
2033 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
2034 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
2035 403 IBM PowerPC 403
2036 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
2037 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
2038 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
2039 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
2040 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
2041 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
2042 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
2043 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
2044
2045At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
2046special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
2047registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
2048only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
2049
2050* HP-UX support
2051
2052Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
2053more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
2054library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
2055support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
2056for xdb and dbx commands.
2057
2058* Catchpoints
2059
2060HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
2061generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
2062to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
2063
2064This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
2065argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
2066output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
2067
2068* Debugging across forks
2069
2070On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
2071in the inferior.
2072
2073* TUI
2074
2075HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
2076it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
2077configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
2078
2079* GDB remote protocol additions
2080
2081A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
2082Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
2083fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
2084allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
2085
2086For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
2087full 64-bit address. The command
2088
2089 set remoteaddresssize 32
2090
2091can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
2092the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
2093will be discarded.
2094
2095In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
2096command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
2097
2098 maint packet heythere
2099
2100sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
2101disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
2102time.
2103
2104The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
2105target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
2106downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
2107
2108* Tracing can collect general expressions
2109
2110You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
2111further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
2112doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
2113
2114* mask-address variable for Mips
2115
2116For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
2117a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
2118of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
2119
2120* Higher serial baud rates
2121
2122GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
2123230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
2124to achieve all of these rates.)
2125
2126* i960 simulator
2127
2128The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
2129builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
2130
2131
2132*** Changes in GDB-4.17:
2133
2134* New native configurations
2135
2136Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
2137Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
2138Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
2139PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
2140PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2141Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
2142Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
2143
2144* New targets
2145
2146Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
2147Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
2148Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
2149Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
2150MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
2151MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
2152MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
2153Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
2154Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
2155Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2156NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
2157
2158* New debugging protocols
2159
2160ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
2161M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
2162DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
2163PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
2164PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
2165Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
2166
2167* DWARF 2
2168
2169All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
2170format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
2171information.
2172
2173* Java frontend
2174
2175GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
2176only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
2177
2178* solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
2179
2180For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
2181loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
2182locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
2183
2184* Live range splitting
2185
2186GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
2187range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
2188more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
2189
2190* Hurd support
2191
2192GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
2193updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
2194
2195* ARM Thumb support
2196
2197GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
2198instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
2199instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
2200accordingly.
2201
2202* MIPS16 support
2203
2204GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
2205instruction set.
2206
2207* Overlay support
2208
2209GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
2210linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
2211will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
2212control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
2213additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
2214in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
2215
2216* info symbol
2217
2218The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
2219the symbol at the specified address.
2220
2221* Trace support
2222
2223The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
2224asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
2225extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
2226includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
2227file tracepoint.c for more details.
2228
2229* MIPS simulator
2230
2231Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
2232by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
2233of most MIPS variants.
2234
2235* Sparc simulator
2236
2237Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
2238by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
2239Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
2240
2241* set architecture
2242
2243For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
2244basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
2245architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
2246the possible architectures.
2247
2248*** Changes in GDB-4.16:
2249
2250* New native configurations
2251
2252Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
2253M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
2254PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
2255PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
2256PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2257RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
2258
2259* New targets
2260
2261ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
2262I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
2263MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
2264MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
2265PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
2266Hitachi SH3 sh-*-*
2267Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2268
2269* PowerPC simulator
2270
2271The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
2272contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
2273PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
2274basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
2275performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
2276
2277* Solaris 2.5
2278
2279GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
2280
2281* Windows 95/NT native
2282
2283GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
2284To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
2285which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
2286Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
2287ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
2288
2289* dont-repeat command
2290
2291If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
2292command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
2293useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
2294extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
2295
2296* Send break instead of ^C
2297
2298The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
2299rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
2300GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
2301
2302* Remote protocol timeout
2303
2304The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
2305that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
2306to read from the target. The default value is 2.
2307
2308* Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
2309
2310By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
2311loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
2312stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
2313when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
2314in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
2315
2316Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
2317/usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
2318automatically on hpux10.
2319
2320* Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
2321
2322Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
2323
2324* Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
2325
2326When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
2327may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
2328the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
2329every character. The default value is 1050.
2330
2331* Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
2332
2333If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
2334a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
2335replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
2336details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
2337remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
2338to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
2339
2340* Speedups for remote debugging
2341
2342GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
2343the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
2344and more efficient S-record downloading.
2345
2346* Memory use reductions and statistics collection
2347
2348GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
2349Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
2350
2351*** Changes in GDB-4.15:
2352
2353* Psymtabs for XCOFF
2354
2355The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
2356can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
2357
2358* Remote targets use caching
2359
2360Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
2361remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
2362it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
2363debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
2364off' turns the the data cache off.
2365
2366* Remote targets may have threads
2367
2368The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
2369in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
2370gdb/remote.c for details.
2371
2372* NetROM support
2373
2374If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
2375support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
2376acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
2377write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
2378support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
2379another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
2380sequence is something like
2381
2382 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
2383 load <prog>
2384 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
2385
2386* Macintosh host
2387
2388GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
2389may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
2390it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
2391available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
2392device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
2393directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
2394scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
2395mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
2396
2397* Autoconf
2398
2399GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
2400but does simplify configuration and building.
2401
2402* hpux10
2403
2404GDB now supports hpux10.
2405
2406*** Changes in GDB-4.14:
2407
2408* New native configurations
2409
2410x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
2411x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
2412NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
2413Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
2414
2415* New targets
2416
2417A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2418HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
2419CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
2420PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
2421WDC 65816 w65-*-*
2422
2423* Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
2424
2425GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
2426possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
2427filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
2428the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
2429if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
2430
2431* Arguments to user-defined commands
2432
2433User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
2434Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
2435trivial example:
2436define adder
2437 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
2438
2439To execute the command use:
2440adder 1 2 3
2441
2442Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
2443Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
2444use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
2445
2446* New `if' and `while' commands
2447
2448This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
2449commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
2450expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
2451execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
2452terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
2453`else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
2454if the expression is zero.
2455
2456* Fortran source language mode
2457
2458GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
2459Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
2460variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
2461with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
2462Fortran compilers.
2463
2464* Better HPUX support
2465
2466Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
2467running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
2468processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
2469for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
2470that behavior do the following before running the program:
2471
2472 adb -w a.out
2473 __dld_flags?W 0x5
2474 control-d
2475
2476This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
2477To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
2478
2479 adb -w a.out
2480 __dld_flags?W 0x4
2481 control-d
2482
2483You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
2484the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
2485external linkage.
2486
2487GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
2488HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
2489
2490* Target byte order now dynamically selectable
2491
2492You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
2493commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
2494current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
2495"set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
2496associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
2497configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
2498
2499* New DOS host serial code
2500
2501This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
2502no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
2503a PC's serial port.
2504
2505*** Changes in GDB-4.13:
2506
2507* New "complete" command
2508
2509This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
2510were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
2511
2512* Trailing space optional in prompt
2513
2514"set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
2515allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
2516
2517* Breakpoint hit counts
2518
2519"info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
2520has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
2521can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
2522to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
2523less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
2524that breakpoint.
2525
2526* Ability to stop printing at NULL character
2527
2528"set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
2529an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
2530arrays actually contain only short strings.
2531
2532* Shared library breakpoints
2533
2534In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
2535breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
2536
2537* Hardware watchpoints
2538
2539There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
2540targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
2541
55241689 2542Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
c906108c
SS
2543
2544* Annotations
2545
2546Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
2547and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
2548
2549* Improved Irix 5 support
2550
2551GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
2552
2553* Improved HPPA support
2554
2555GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
2556
2557* New native configurations
2558
2559Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
2560HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2561Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
2562RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
2563
2564* New targets
2565
2566OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2567MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
2568Sparc64 sparc64-*-*
2569
2570* Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
2571
2572There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
2573This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
2574
2575* Fixes
2576
2577As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
2578and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
2579
2580*** Changes in GDB-4.12:
2581
2582* Irix 5 is now supported
2583
2584* HPPA support
2585
2586GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
2587to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
2588GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
2589of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
2590can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
2591
2592
2593*** Changes in GDB-4.11:
2594
2595* User visible changes:
2596
2597* Remote Debugging
2598
2599The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
2600target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
2601debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
2602integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
2603debugging info for the mips target).
2604
2605* DEC Alpha native support
2606
2607GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
2608debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
2609work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
2610Alpha-specific notes.
2611
2612* Preliminary thread implementation
2613
2614GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
2615
2616* LynxOS native and target support for 386
2617
2618This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
2619to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
2620for details).
2621
2622* Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
2623
2624This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
2625mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
2626call methods, ...etc.
2627
2628*** Changes in GDB-4.10:
2629
2630 * User visible changes:
2631
2632Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
2633supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
2634other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
2635somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
2636
2637Filename completion now works.
2638
2639When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
2640arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
2641addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
2642
2643All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
2644vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
2645should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
2646your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
2647to be on the far side of a thin network line.
2648
2649 * DEC alpha support
2650
2651This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
2652cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
2653
2654
2655*** Changes in GDB-4.9:
2656
2657 * Testsuite
2658
2659This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
2660The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
2661via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
2662
2663 * C++ demangling
2664
2665'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
2666emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
2667Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
2668disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
2669use gdb with AT&T cfront.
2670
2671 * Simulators
2672
2673GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
2674So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
2675Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
2676
2677 * New targets supported
2678
2679H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2680H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2681SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
2682Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2683IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
2684
2685Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
2686version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
2687GO32 memory extender.
2688
2689 * New remote protocols
2690
2691MIPS remote debugging protocol.
2692
2693 * New source languages supported
2694
2695This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
2696used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
2697into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
2698
2699
2700*** Changes in GDB-4.8:
2701
2702 * HP Precision Architecture supported
2703
2704GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
2705version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
2706University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
2707compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
2708format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
2709(as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
2710
2711Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
2712
2713 * Faster and better demangling
2714
2715We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
2716demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
2717character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
2718only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
2719This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
2720increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
2721symbol lookups.
2722
2723`Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
2724from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
2725compiler does not actually implement.
2726
2727 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
2728
2729In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
2730inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
2731recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
2732very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
2733The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
2734circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
2735fix.
2736
2737The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
2738release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
2739
2740 * Improved configure script
2741
2742The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
2743you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
2744host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
2745done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
2746
2747We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
2748version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
2749`--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
2750The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
2751only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
2752We hope to make this the default in a future release.
2753
2754 * Documentation improvements
2755
2756There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
2757produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
2758before submitting changes.
2759
2760The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
2761M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
2762`info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
2763you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
2764a future texinfo-X.Y release.
2765
2766*NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
2767We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
2768been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
2769or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
2770`texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
2771around this problem.
2772
2773 * New features
2774
2775GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
2776the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
2777`print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
2778the target program.
2779
2780The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
2781how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
2782
2783 * New native hosts supported
2784
2785HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
2786386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
2787
2788 * New targets supported
2789
2790AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
2791
2792 * New file formats supported
2793
2794BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
2795HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
2796
2797 * Major bug fixes
2798
2799Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
2800
2801We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
2802printf_filtered("%s") problems.
2803
2804We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
2805for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
2806release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
2807
2808You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
2809will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
2810
2811We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
2812for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
2813especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
2814libraries.
2815
2816The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
2817information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
2818command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
2819any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
2820when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
2821
2822 * Internal improvements
2823
2824GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
2825debugging of multiple languages in the future.
2826
2827GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
2828Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
2829symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
2830contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
2831shared code that handles any of them.
2832
2833 * New command line options
2834
2835We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
2836
2837 * Mmalloc licensing
2838
2839The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
2840General Public License.
2841
2842*** Changes in GDB-4.7:
2843
2844 * Host/native/target split
2845
2846GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
2847hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
2848target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
2849local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
2850ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
2851
2852The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
2853GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
2854is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
2855code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
2856any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
2857built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
2858handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
2859
2860GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
2861It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
2862plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
2863
2864 * New hosts supported
2865
2866HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
2867386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2868386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
2869
2870 * New targets supported
2871
2872Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
287368030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
2874
2875 * New native hosts supported
2876
2877386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2878 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
2879386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
2880
2881 * New file formats supported
2882
2883BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
2884supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
2885format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
2886
2887 * New commands
2888
2889`show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
2890`show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
2891These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
2892
2893`info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
2894
2895You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
2896scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
2897prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
2898executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
2899
2900 * C++ improvements
2901
2902We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
2903info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
2904symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
2905
2906Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
2907
2908 * Major bug fixes
2909
2910The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
2911fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
2912by the compiler.
2913
2914We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
2915support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
2916
2917John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
2918slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
2919that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
2920purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
2921the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
2922mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
2923
2924Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
2925about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
2926completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
2927we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
2928
2929 * AMD 29k support
2930
2931A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
2932specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
2933calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
2934usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
2935in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
2936
2937We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
2938Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
2939of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
2940resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
2941
2942 * Remote interfaces
2943
2944We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
2945with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
2946message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
2947This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
2948needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
2949breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
2950each instruction being stepped through.
2951
2952The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
2953registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
2954
2955There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
2956find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
2957Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
2958processor with a serial port.
2959
2960 * Configuration
2961
2962Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
2963`table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
2964supported, and what files each one uses.
2965
2966 * Library changes
2967
2968There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
2969disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
2970Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
2971disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
2972
2973The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
2974Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
2975can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
2976grants all the rights from the General Public License.
2977
2978 * Documentation
2979
2980The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
2981reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
2982as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
2983encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
2984system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
2985bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
2986
2987And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
2988
2989
2990*** Changes in GDB-4.6:
2991
2992 * Better support for C++ function names
2993
2994GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
2995names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
2996(using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
2997single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
2998Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
2999
3000GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
3001the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
3002You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
3003lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
3004for the list of formats.
3005
3006 * G++ symbol mangling problem
3007
3008Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
3009C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
3010directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
3011can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
3012usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
3013about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
3014this problem.)
3015
3016 * New 'maintenance' command
3017
3018All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
3019the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
3020can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
3021
3022 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
3023 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
3024 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
3025 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
3026 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
3027 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
3028
3029The following commands are new:
3030
3031 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
3032 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
3033 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
3034
3035 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
3036
3037We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
3038(e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
3039be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
3040read after argv processing.
3041
3042 * New hosts supported
3043
3044Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
3045
55241689 3046GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
c906108c
SS
3047
3048We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
3049is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
3050for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
3051masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
3052fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
3053It costs extra.
3054
3055 * New targets supported
3056
3057Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
3058
3059 * More smarts about finding #include files
3060
3061GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
3062all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
3063greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
3064especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
3065the one that contains your sources.
3066
3067We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
3068breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
3069try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
3070
3071 * Interesting infernals change
3072
3073GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
3074section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
3075target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
3076stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
3077
3078 * Bug fixes (of course!)
3079
3080There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
3081 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
3082 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
3083
3084See the ChangeLog for details.
3085
3086*** Changes in GDB-4.5:
3087
3088 * New machines supported (host and target)
3089
3090IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
3091
3092SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
3093
3094 * New malloc package
3095
3096GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
3097Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
3098capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
3099This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
3100pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
3101more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
3102
3103 * info proc
3104
3105The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
3106'help info proc' for details.
3107
3108 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
3109
3110The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
3111Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
3112possible.
3113
3114 * File name changes for MS-DOS
3115
3116Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
3117support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
3118conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
3119environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
3120that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
3121in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
3122
3123 * Cross byte order fixes
3124
3125Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
3126targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
3127
3128 * New -mapped and -readnow options
3129
3130If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
3131system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
3132`symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
3133program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
3134called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
3135Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
3136and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
3137the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
3138option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
3139starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
3140
3141You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
3142the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
3143information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
3144slower, but makes future operations faster.
3145
3146The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
3147build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
3148A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
3149use is:
3150
3151 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
3152
3153The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
3154It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
3155shared across multiple host platforms.
3156
3157 * longjmp() handling
3158
3159GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
3160siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
3161all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
3162platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
3163
3164 * Solaris 2.0
3165
3166Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
3167this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
3168reading symbols.
3169
3170 * Bug fixes
3171
3172As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
3173People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
3174crashes and trashed symbol tables.
3175
3176*** Changes in GDB-4.4:
3177
3178 * New machines supported (host and target)
3179
3180SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
3181 (except core files)
3182BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
3183Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
3184
3185 * New machines supported (target)
3186
3187AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
3188
3189 * C++ support
3190
3191GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
3192The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
3193per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
3194
3195GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
3196`ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
3197extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
3198good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
3199will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
3200released.
3201
3202 * New features for SVR4
3203
3204GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
3205shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
3206only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
3207
3208The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
3209on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
3210it prints the address mappings of the process.
3211
3212If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
3213bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
3214
3215 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
3216
3217Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
3218now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
3219skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
3220make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
3221same code linked statically.
3222
3223 * New Getopt
3224
3225GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
3226version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
3227continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
3228Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
3229added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
3230future by other options that begin with the same letter.
3231
3232 * Bugs fixed
3233
3234The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
3235Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
3236See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
3237
3238
3239*** Changes in GDB-4.3:
3240
3241 * New machines supported (host and target)
3242
3243Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
3244NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
3245Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
3246
3247 * Almost SCO Unix support
3248
3249We had hoped to support:
3250SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
3251(except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
3252that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
3253about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
3254
3255 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
3256
3257GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
3258debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
3259is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
3260send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
3261reqired (if any).
3262
3263 * New Readline
3264
3265GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
3266is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
3267required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
3268
3269 * Bugs fixed
3270
3271The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
3272Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
3273See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
3274
3275 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
3276
3277GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
3278supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
3279symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
3280
3281Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
3282mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
3283debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
3284mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
3285version 2.
3286
3287Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
3288really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
3289line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
3290variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
3291situation somewhat.
3292
3293When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
3294However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
3295methods.
3296
3297We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
3298DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
3299encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
3300
3301
3302*** Changes in GDB-4.2:
3303
3304 * Improved configuration
3305
3306Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
3307Porting BFD is simpler.
3308
3309 * Stepping improved
3310
3311The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
3312of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
3313in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
3314function that has debugging information is called within the line.
3315
3316 * Bug fixing
3317
3318Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
3319
3320 * New host supported (not target)
3321
3322Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
3323
3324
3325*** Changes in GDB-4.1:
3326
3327 * Multiple source language support
3328
3329GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
3330It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
3331and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
3332language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
3333You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
3334`set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
3335
3336 * GDB and Modula-2
3337
3338GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
3339currently under development at the State University of New York at
3340Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
3341continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
3342
3343Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
3344debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
3345symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
3346
3347There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
3348in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
3349
3350 * set write on/off
3351
3352GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
3353a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
3354the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
3355by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
3356effect immediately.
3357
3358 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
3359
3360When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
3361shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
3362The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
3363examining core files.
3364
3365 * set listsize
3366
3367You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
3368The default is 10.
3369
3370 * New machines supported (host and target)
3371
3372SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
3373Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
3374Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
3375
3376 * New hosts supported (not targets)
3377
3378IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
3379
3380 * New targets supported (not hosts)
3381
3382AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
3383AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
3384Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
3385
3386 * New remote interfaces
3387
3388AMD 29000 Adapt
3389AMD 29000 Minimon
3390
3391
3392*** Changes in GDB-4.0:
3393
3394 * New Facilities
3395
3396Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
3397
3398Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
3399target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
3400is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
3401remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
3402remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
3403also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
3404using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
3405stub on the target system.
3406
3407New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
3408
3409GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
3410library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
3411object file types such as a.out and coff.
3412
3413There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
3414refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
3415
3416
3417 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
3418
3419All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
3420by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
3421
3422For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
3423``Show prompt'' produces the response:
3424Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
3425
3426What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
3427print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
3428will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
3429all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
3430
3431confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
3432 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
3433 it is already running. Default is ON.
3434
3435editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
3436 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
3437 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
3438 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
3439 Default is ON.
3440
3441history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
3442 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
3443 or the value of the environment variable
3444 GDBHISTFILE.
3445
3446history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
3447 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
3448 HISTSIZE.
3449
3450history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
3451 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
3452 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
3453
3454history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
3455 history expansion will be performed on
3456 command line input. The default is OFF.
3457
3458radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
3459 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
3460 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
3461
3462height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
3463 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
3464 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3465 variable TERM.
3466
3467width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
3468 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
3469 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3470 variable TERM.
3471
3472Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
3473``set width'' instead.
3474
3475print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
3476 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
3477 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
3478 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
3479
3480print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
3481 is OFF.
3482
3483print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
3484 "raw" form if off.
3485
3486print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
3487 like instructions.
3488
3489print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
3490
3491
3492 * Support for Epoch Environment.
3493
3494The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
3495new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
3496are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
3497window.
3498
3499
3500 * Support for Shared Libraries
3501
3502GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
3503Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
3504before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
3505happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
3506At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
3507from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
3508shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
3509It can be abbreviated ``share''.
3510
3511sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
3512 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
3513 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
3514
3515info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
3516
3517
3518 * Watchpoints
3519
3520A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
3521expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
3522tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
3523quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
3524problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
3525more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
3526
3527watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
3528
3529info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
3530
3531delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3532disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3533enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3534
3535
3536 * C++ multiple inheritance
3537
3538When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
3539for C++ programs.
3540
3541 * C++ exception handling
3542
3543Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
3544ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
3545the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
3546handler's context).
3547
3548catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
3549 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
3550 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
3551
3552info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
3553 current stack frame.
3554
3555
3556 * Minor command changes
3557
3558The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
3559command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
3560is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
3561
3562The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
3563at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
3564frames without printing.
3565
3566 * New directory command
3567
3568'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
3569The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
3570about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
3571with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
3572find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
3573
3574 * Configuring GDB for compilation
3575
3576For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
3577for more details.
3578
3579GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
3580two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
3581Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
3582where the program that you are debugging will run.
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