* symfile.c (add_psymbol_with_dem_name_to_list): Remove.
[deliverable/binutils-gdb.git] / gdb / NEWS
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c906108c
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1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
3
6dd09645
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4*** Changes since GDB 6.6
5
6* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
7frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
8
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9* GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
1032-bit or 64-bit register values.
11
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12* Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
13
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14* GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
15target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
16a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
17
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18* Arrays of explicitly SIGNED or UNSIGNED CHARs are now printed as arrays
19 of numbers.
20
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21* Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
22for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
23only ARM).
24
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25* GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
26iWMMXt coprocessor.
fb1e4ffc 27
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28* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
29ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
30has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
31
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32* New commands
33
34set mem inaccessible-by-default
35show mem inaccessible-by-default
36 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
37 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
38 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
39 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
40 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
41
42set breakpoint auto-hw
43show breakpoint auto-hw
44 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
45 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
46 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
47 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
48 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
49 including "next" and "finish".
50
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51catch exception
52catch exception unhandled
53 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
54
55catch assert
56 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
57
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58set sysroot
59show sysroot
60 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
61 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
62 an alias to "set sysroot".
63
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64* New native configurations
65
66OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
67
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68set tdesc filename
69unset tdesc filename
70show tdesc filename
71 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
72 not query the target for its built-in description.
73
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74* New targets
75
54fe9172 76OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
c9bb8148 77MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
c077150c 78Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
c9bb8148 79
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80* New remote packets
81
82QPassSignals:
83 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
84 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
85
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86qXfer:features:read:
87 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
88 features.
6dd09645 89
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90* Removed targets
91
92Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
93
7ce59000 94d10v-*-*
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95hppa*-*-hiux*
96i[34567]86-ncr-*
97i[34567]86-*-dgux*
98i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
99i[34567]86-*-netware*
100i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
101i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
102i[34567]86-*-sco*
103i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
104i[34567]86-*-sysv4*
105i[34567]86-*-sysv5*
106i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
107i[34567]86-*-unixware*
108i[34567]86-*-sysv*
109i[34567]86-*-isc*
110m68*-cisco*-*
111m68*-tandem-*
ad527d2e 112mips*-*-pe
483367ee 113rs6000-*-lynxos*
ad527d2e 114sh*-*-pe
483367ee 115
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116* Other removed features
117
118target abug
119target cpu32bug
120target est
121target rom68k
122
123 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
124
125DWARF 1 support
126
127 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
128 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
129
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130Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
131
132 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
133 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
134 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
135 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
136
6dd09645 137*** Changes in GDB 6.6
e374b601 138
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139* New targets
140
141Xtensa xtensa-elf
9c309e77 142Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
ca3bf3bd 143
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144* GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
145(mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
146running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
147
148* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
149Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
150supported.
151
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152* The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
153broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
154
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155* The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
156stub provides the required support.
157
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158* Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
159longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
160
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161* New commands
162
163set substitute-path
164unset substitute-path
165show substitute-path
166 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
167 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
168 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
169 between compilation and debugging.
170
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171set trace-commands
172show trace-commands
173 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
174 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
175 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
176
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177* REMOVED features
178
179The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
180
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181Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
182an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
183
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184The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
185
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186* New remote packets
187
188qSupported:
189 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
190 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
191 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
192 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
193 target.
194
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195qXfer:auxv:read:
196 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
197 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
198
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199qXfer:memory-map:read:
200 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
201 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
202
203vFlashErase:
204vFlashWrite:
205vFlashDone:
206 Erase and program a flash memory device.
207
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208* Removed remote packets
209
210qPart:auxv:read:
211 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
212 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
213
e374b601 214*** Changes in GDB 6.5
53e5f3cf 215
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216* New targets
217
218Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
219
220Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
221
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222* New commands
223
224init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
225 only if it doesn't already have a value.
226
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227The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
228
229checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
230
231restart <n> Return the program state to a
232 previously saved state.
233
234info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
235
236delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
237
238set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
239 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
240
241info forks List forks of the user program that
242 are available to be debugged.
243
244fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
245 forks of the user program that are
246 available to be debugged.
247
248delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
249 that are available to be debugged (and
250 kill the forked process).
251
252detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
253 that are available to be debugged (and
254 allow the process to continue).
255
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256* New architecture
257
258Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
259
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260* Improved Windows host support
261
262GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
263native console support, and remote communications using either
264network sockets or serial ports.
265
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266* Improved Modula-2 language support
267
268GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
269basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
270pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
271printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
272written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
273GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
274
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275* REMOVED features
276
277The ARM rdi-share module.
278
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279The Netware NLM debug server.
280
53e5f3cf 281*** Changes in GDB 6.4
156a53ca 282
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283* New native configurations
284
02a677ac 285OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
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286OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
287
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288* New targets
289
290Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
291
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292* New command line options
293
294--batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
295--return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
296 the child (debugged) program exited with.
297--eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
298 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
299 specified multiple times and in conjunction
300 with the --command (-x) option.
301
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302* Deprecated commands removed
303
304The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
305removed:
306
307 Command Replacement
308 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
309 othernames set arm disassembler
310 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
311 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
312 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
313 regs info registers
314
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315* New BSD user-level threads support
316
317It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
318library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
319configurations are:
320
321FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
322FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
323OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
324
325Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
326are not yet supported.
327
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328* New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
329(Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
330
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331* REMOVED configurations and files
332
333VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
9445aa30 334Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
9445aa30 335National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
156a53ca 336
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337* New "set print array-indexes" command
338
339After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
340when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
341behavior.
342
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343* VAX floating point support
344
345GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
346
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347* User-defined command support
348
349In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
350to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
351section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
352
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353*** Changes in GDB 6.3:
354
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355* New command line option
356
357GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
358debugging.
359
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360* GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
361
362GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
363information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
364by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
365proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
366to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
860660cb 367
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368* Internationalization
369
370When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
371internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
372continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
373
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374* Ada
375
376Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
377implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
378into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
379
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380* New native configurations
381
382GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
383
384* Remote 'p' packet
385
386GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
387packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
388
389* END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
390
391GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
392The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
393features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
394i386 application).
395
396GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
397compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
398continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
399configurations:
400
401hppa-*-hpux
402ia64-*-aix
403mips-*-irix*
404*-*-lynx
405mips-*-linux-gnu
406sds protocol
407xdr protocol
408powerpc bdm protocol
409
410Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
411made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
412
413* OBSOLETE configurations and files
414
415Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
416been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
417configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
418permanently REMOVED.
419
420h8300-*-*
421mcore-*-*
422mn10300-*-*
423ns32k-*-*
424sh64-*-*
425v850-*-*
426
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427*** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
428
429* MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
430
431When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
432heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
433been fixed.
434
435* MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
436
437When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
438fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
439IRIX long double values).
440
441* VAX and "next"
442
443A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
444command. This problem has been fixed.
445
860660cb 446*** Changes in GDB 6.2:
faae5abe 447
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448* Fix for ``many threads''
449
450On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
451rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
452error message:
453
454 ptrace: No such process.
455 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
456
457This problem has been fixed.
458
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459* "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
460
461Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
462GDB to dump core).
463
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464* New ``start'' command.
465
466This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
467
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468* New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
469
470Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
471live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
472platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
473
474FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
475FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
476NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
477NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
478NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
479OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
480OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
481OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
482OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
483
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484* Signal trampoline code overhauled
485
486Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
487These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
488of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
489call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
490signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
491
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492Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
493features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
494include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
3c0b7db2 495
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496* Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
497
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498* New native configurations
499
97dc871c 500GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
0e56aeaf 501OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
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502OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
503OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
d195bc9f 504OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 505NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
9f076e7a 506OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 507
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508* END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
509
510GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
511The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
512including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
513migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
514compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
515work, was also included.
516
517GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
518module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
519
520h8300-*-*
521mcore-*-*
522mn10300-*-*
523ns32k-*-*
524sh64-*-*
525v850-*-*
526xstormy16-*-*
527
528Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
529made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
530
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531* REMOVED configurations and files
532
533Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
534Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
535Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
536Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
537Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
538AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
539Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
540decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
541riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
542sonymips mips-sony-*
543sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
544
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545*** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
546
547* TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
548
549The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
550GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
551command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
552program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
553with GDB".
554
555* Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
556
557Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
558libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
559cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
560GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
561shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
562the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
563are created.
564
565Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
566
567* Fixed ISO-C build problems
568
569The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
570non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
571compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
572
573* Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
574
575Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
576wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
577
578* Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
579
580The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
581permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
582systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
583
584* Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
585
586Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
587has been updated to use constant array sizes.
588
589* Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
590
591GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
592its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
593panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
594
595* Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
596
597When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
598by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
599not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
600
faae5abe 601*** Changes in GDB 6.1:
f2c06f52 602
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603* Removed --with-mmalloc
604
605Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
606conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
607
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608* Changes in AMD64 configurations
609
610The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
611the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
612and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
613you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
614
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615* Revised SPARC target
616
617The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
618FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
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619support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
620from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
621(Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
f0424ef6 622
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623* New C++ demangler
624
625GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
626names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
627with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
628programs.
629
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630* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
631
632GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
633arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
634encountered these.
635
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636* C++ nested types and namespaces
637
638GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
639improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
640is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
641Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
642namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
643"Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
644frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
645if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
646GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
647
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648* New native configurations
649
650NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
27d1e716 651OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2031c21a 652OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
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653OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
654OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
cced5e27 655
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656* New debugging protocols
657
658M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
659
7989c619
AC
660* "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
661
662The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
663and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
664tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
665
5994185b
AC
666* OBSOLETE configurations and files
667
668Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
669been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
670configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
671permanently REMOVED.
672
673Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
674Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
675Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
676Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
677Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
678AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
679Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
0748d941
AC
680decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
681riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
682sonymips mips-sony-*
683sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
5994185b 684
0ddabb4c
AC
685* REMOVED configurations and files
686
687SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
688SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4a8269c0
AC
689Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
690Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
691H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
692HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
693HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
694HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
695PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
cf7c5c23 696386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
4a8269c0
AC
697Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
698 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
699 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f0424ef6
MK
700SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
701SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
4a8269c0
AC
702Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
703Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
0ddabb4c 704
c7f1390e
DJ
705*** Changes in GDB 6.0:
706
1fe43d45
AC
707* Objective-C
708
709Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
710integrated into GDB.
711
e6beb428
AC
712* New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
713
714DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
715information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
716By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
717backtraces.
718
719The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
720have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
721DWARF 2 CFI support.
722
723* Hosted file I/O.
724
725GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
726file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
727remote protocol documentation for details.
728
729* All targets using the new architecture framework.
730
731All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
732architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
733to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
734ppc32 on ppc64).
735
736* GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
737
738GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
739per-thread variables.
740
741* GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
742
743GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
744GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
745
746* Separate debug info.
747
748GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
749automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
750of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
751system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
752and optional debug files.
753
754* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
755
756DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
757describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
758debugger.
759
760GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
761for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
762
763* Java
764
765A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
766Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
767considered "useable".
768
85f8f974
DJ
769* GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
770
771The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
772commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
773kernel.
774
0fac0b41
DJ
775* GDB supports logging output to a file
776
777There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
778used to capture GDB's output to a file.
f2c06f52 779
6ad8ae5c
DJ
780* The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
781
782The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
783disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
784command.
785
e286caf2 786* d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
5f601589
AC
787
788The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
789registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
790
d28f9cdf
DJ
791* Profiling support
792
793A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
794be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
795session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
796"--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
797data, for more informative profiling results.
798
da0f9dcd
AC
799* Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
800
801The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
802option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
b68767c1 803"mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
da0f9dcd
AC
804
805Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
806removed.
807
fb9b6b35
JJ
808Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
809Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
810Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
811 in a subsequent -var-update.
812
954a4db8
MK
813* New native configurations.
814
815FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
816
6760f9e6
JB
817* Multi-arched targets.
818
b4263afa 819HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
85a453d5 820Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
6760f9e6 821
1b831c93
AC
822* OBSOLETE configurations and files
823
824Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
825been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
826configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
827permanently REMOVED.
828
8b0e5691 829Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
67f16606 830Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
fd2299bd 831H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
56056df7
AC
832HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
833HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
834HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
78c43945 835PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2fbce691
AC
836Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
837 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
838 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f81824a9
AC
839Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
840Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
fd2299bd 841
5835abe7
NC
842* REMOVED configurations and files
843
844V850EA ISA
1b831c93
AC
845Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
846IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
847i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
848i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
849i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
850HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
851 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
852 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
853Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
854Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
855Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
856OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
857I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5835abe7 858
a094c6fb
AC
859* MIPS $fp behavior changed
860
861The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
862the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
863context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
864address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
865The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
866
299ffc64 867*** Changes in GDB 5.3:
37057839 868
46248966
AC
869* GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
870
871When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
872`/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
873in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
874library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
875shared libs like mad''.
876
b9d14705 877* ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
6da02953 878
b9d14705
DJ
879Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
880the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
881arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
882powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
6da02953 883
e0e9281e
JB
884* GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
885
886GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
887and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
888they expand.
889
dd73b9bb
AC
890The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
891invocations in expression, and shows the result.
892
893The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
894macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
895
e0e9281e
JB
896Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
897information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
898your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
899information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
900
2250ee0c
CV
901* Multi-arched targets.
902
6e3ba3b8
JT
903DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
904DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
2250ee0c 905NEC V850 v850-*-*
6e3ba3b8 906National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
a1789893
GS
907Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
908Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
2250ee0c 909
cd9bfe15 910* New targets.
e33ce519 911
456f8b9d
DB
912Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
913
e33ce519 914
da8ca43d
JT
915* New native configurations
916
917Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
029923d4 918SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
45888261 919MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
9ce5c36a 920UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
da8ca43d 921
cd9bfe15
AC
922* OBSOLETE configurations and files
923
924Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
925been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
926configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
927permanently REMOVED.
928
92eb23c5 929Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
a99a9e1b 930OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1c7cc583 931IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
7a3085c1 932Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
7fb623f7 933Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
eb4c54a2 934Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
d8ee244c
MK
935i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
936i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
937i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
822e978b
AC
938HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
939 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
940 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
4d210288 941I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
92eb23c5 942
db034ac5
AC
943* OBSOLETE languages
944
945CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
946
cd9bfe15
AC
947* REMOVED configurations and files
948
949AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
950A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
951AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
952AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
953AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
954
955testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
956
20f01a46
DH
957* New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
958
959This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
960commands. The default is 1024.
961
a5941fbf
MK
962* Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
963
964Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
965
89743e04
MS
966* New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
967
968These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
969to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
970from a file into memory (restore).
37057839 971
9fb14e79
JB
972* Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
973
974The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
975including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
976of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
977
2037aebb
AC
978*** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
979
980* New targets.
981
982Atmel AVR avr*-*-*
983
984* Bug fixes
985
986gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
987mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
988Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
989
990gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
991dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
992Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
993
994Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
995Surprisingly enough, it works now.
996By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
997
998i386 hardware watchpoint support:
999avoid misses on second run for some targets.
1000By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
1001
37057839 1002*** Changes in GDB 5.2:
eb7cedd9 1003
1a703748
MS
1004* New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
1005
1006This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
1007really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
1008In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
1009target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
1010This can be a significant performance improvement on some
1011(notably embedded) targets.
1012
cefd4ef5
MS
1013* New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
1014
55241689
AC
1015This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
1016process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
1017GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
1018hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
cefd4ef5 1019
352ed7b4
MS
1020* New command line option
1021
1022GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
1023
1024* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
1025
1026There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
1027command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
1028a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
1029be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
1030open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
1031issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
1032a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
1033it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
1034GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
1035is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
1036
fe419ffc
RE
1037* Changes in ARM configurations.
1038
1039Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
1040configuration is fully multi-arch.
1041
eb7cedd9
MK
1042* New native configurations
1043
fe419ffc 1044ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
eb7cedd9 1045x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
55241689 1046AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
768f0842 1047Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
eb7cedd9 1048
c9f63e6b
CV
1049* New targets
1050
1051Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
1052
9b4ff276
AC
1053* OBSOLETE configurations and files
1054
1055Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1056been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1057configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1058permanently REMOVED.
1059
1060AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1061A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1062AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1063AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1064AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1065
b4ceaee6 1066testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
9b4ff276 1067
e2caac18
AC
1068* REMOVED configurations and files
1069
1070TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
7bc65f05 1071WDC 65816 w65-*-*
7768dd6c
AC
1072PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1073PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1074PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
5e734e1f 1075Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1406caf7
AC
1076Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1077 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
7e24f0b1 1078SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
9b567150 1079Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
3680c638
AC
1080Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1081ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
a752853e 1082Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
e2caac18 1083
c2a727fa
TT
1084* Changes to command line processing
1085
1086The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
1087for the inferior from gdb's command line.
1088
467d8519
TT
1089* Changes to key bindings
1090
1091There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
1092
7072a954
AC
1093*** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
1094
1095Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
1096
1097Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
1098corrupted.
1099
1100Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
1101
1102Numerous documentation fixes.
1103
1104Numerous testsuite fixes.
1105
34f47bc4 1106*** Changes in GDB 5.1:
139760b7
MK
1107
1108* New native configurations
1109
1110Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
1111x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
55241689 1112MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
e23194cb
EZ
1113MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1114ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
55241689 1115s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
139760b7 1116
bf64bfd6
AC
1117* New targets
1118
def90278 1119Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
24be5c34 1120CRIS cris-axis
55241689 1121UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
def90278 1122
17e78a56 1123* OBSOLETE configurations and files
bf64bfd6
AC
1124
1125x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
9b9c068d 1126Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
bb19ff3b
AC
1127Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1128 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
76f4ea53
AC
1129TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1130WDC 65816 w65-*-*
4a1968f4 1131Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1b2b2c16
AC
1132PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1133PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1134PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
24f89b68 1135SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
514e603d
AC
1136Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1137ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
d036b4d9 1138Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
bf64bfd6 1139
17e78a56
AC
1140stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
1141kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
1142
7fcca85b
AC
1143Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1144been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1145configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1146permanently REMOVED.
1147
a196c81c 1148* REMOVED configurations and files
7fcca85b
AC
1149
1150Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1151Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
1152Pyramid pyramid-*-*
1153ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
1154Tahoe tahoe-*-*
a196c81c 1155ser-ocd.c *-*-*
bf64bfd6 1156
6d6b80e5 1157* GDB has been converted to ISO C.
e23194cb 1158
6d6b80e5 1159GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
e23194cb
EZ
1160sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
1161present.
1162
bf64bfd6
AC
1163* Other news:
1164
e23194cb
EZ
1165* "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
1166
1167* The MI enabled by default.
1168
1169The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
1170revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
1171engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
1172using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
1173which is now deprecated.
1174
1175* Support for debugging Pascal programs.
1176
1177GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
1178main features are supported:
1179
1180 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
1181
1182 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
1183 extension;
1184
1185 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
1186
1187 - a Pascal expression parser.
1188
1189However, some important features are not yet supported.
1190
1191 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
1192
1193 - there are some problems with boolean types;
1194
1195 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
1196 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
1197
1198 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
1199
1200 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
1201
1202* Changes in completion.
1203
1204Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
1205to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
1206users expect at the shell prompt.
1207
1208Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
1209`breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
1210program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
1211files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
1212be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
1213considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
1214name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
1215
1216`set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
1217
1218* New platform-independent commands:
1219
1220It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
1221hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
1222documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
1223
1224* Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
1225
d7275149
MK
1226Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
1227revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
1228many threads as your system allows you to have.
1229
e23194cb
EZ
1230Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
1231
d7275149
MK
1232Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
1233multi-threaded programs though.
e23194cb
EZ
1234
1235* Changes in MIPS configurations.
bf64bfd6
AC
1236
1237Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
1238
e23194cb
EZ
1239GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
1240debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
1241supported.)
1242
1243* Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
1244
1245Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
1246breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
1247implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
1248put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
1249and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
1250registers.
1251
1252The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
1253debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
1254watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
1255
1256* Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
1257
1258New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
1259the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
1260
1261New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
1262display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
1263IDT.
1264
1265New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
1266from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
1267New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
1268a given linear address.
1269
1270GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
1271program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
1272which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
1273
1274DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
1275
6c56c069
EZ
1276It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
1277
e23194cb
EZ
1278* Changes in documentation.
1279
1280All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
1281Documentation License.
1282
1283Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1284manual.
1285
1286TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
1287
1288Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1289manual.
1290
1291The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
1292documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
1293hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
1294
5d6640b1
AC
1295* GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
1296
1297The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
1298``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
1299contents of this file.
1300
1a1d8446
AC
1301* gdba.el deleted
1302
1303GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
139760b7 1304
9debab2f 1305*** Changes in GDB 5.0:
7a292a7a 1306
c63ce875
EZ
1307* Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
1308
1309Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
1310programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
1311displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
1312greater level of detail.
1313
1314* Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
1315
1316It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
1317bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
1318on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
1319written.
1320
1321* Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
1322
1323The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
1324necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
1325machines ``out of the box''.
1326
1327The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
1328possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
1329signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
1330would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
1331interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
1332
1333It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
1334standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
1335even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
1336and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
1337terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
1338
1339The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
1340enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
1341also works.
1342
1343DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
1344GDB.
1345
1346It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
1347directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
1348times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
1349breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
1350
ed9a39eb
JM
1351* New native configurations
1352
1353ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
afc05dd4 1354PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
ed9a39eb 1355
7a292a7a
SS
1356* New targets
1357
96baa820 1358Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
adf40b2e
JM
1359x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
1360PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
7a292a7a
SS
1361TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1362
085dd6e6
JM
1363* OBSOLETE configurations
1364
1365Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1366Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
9846de1b 1367Pyramid pyramid-*-*
ed9a39eb 1368ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
104c1213 1369Tahoe tahoe-*-*
7a292a7a 1370
9debab2f
AC
1371Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1372but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1373these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1374be permanently REMOVED.
1375
5330533d
SS
1376* Gould support removed
1377
1378Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
1379
bc9e5bbf
AC
1380* New features for SVR4
1381
1382On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
1383without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
1384load symbols from the running process's executable file.
1385
1386* Many C++ enhancements
1387
1388C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
1389in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
1390
adf40b2e
JM
1391* Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
1392
1393A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
1394sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
1395with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
1396``|<program> <args>'' vis:
1397
1398 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
1399 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
1400
43e526b9
JM
1401* MIPS 64 remote protocol
1402
1403A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
1404expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
1405instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
1406
1407The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
1408added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
1409
96baa820
JM
1410* ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
1411
1412The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
1413``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
1414include ``set remote P-packet''.
1415
11cf8741
JM
1416* Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
1417
1418The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
1419accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
1420``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
1421
7876dd43
DB
1422* ``apropos'' command added.
1423
1424The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
1425documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
1426try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
1427
bc9e5bbf
AC
1428* New MI interface
1429
1430A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
1431interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
7162c0ca
EZ
1432process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
1433"GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
1434enabled by configuring with:
bc9e5bbf
AC
1435
1436 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
1437
c906108c
SS
1438*** Changes in GDB-4.18:
1439
1440* New native configurations
1441
1442HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
1443HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
55241689 1444M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
c906108c
SS
1445
1446* New targets
1447
1448Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1449Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
1450Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1451
1452* OBSOLETE configurations
1453
1454Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
1455
1456Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1457but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1458these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1459be permanently REMOVED.
1460
1461* ANSI/ISO C
1462
1463As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
1464buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
1465containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
1466use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
1467available. If this is not true, please report the affected
1468configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
1469information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
1470already.
1471
1472* Readline 2.2
1473
1474GDB now uses readline 2.2.
1475
1476* set extension-language
1477
1478You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
1479languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
1480you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
1481 set extension-language .c c++
1482The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
1483and their associated languages.
1484
1485* Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
1486
1487When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
1488you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
1489PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
1490
1491 set processor NAME
1492
1493sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
1494following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
1495
1496 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
1497 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
1498 403 IBM PowerPC 403
1499 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
1500 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
1501 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
1502 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
1503 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
1504 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
1505 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
1506 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
1507
1508At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
1509special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
1510registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
1511only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
1512
1513* HP-UX support
1514
1515Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
1516more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
1517library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
1518support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
1519for xdb and dbx commands.
1520
1521* Catchpoints
1522
1523HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
1524generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
1525to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
1526
1527This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
1528argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
1529output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
1530
1531* Debugging across forks
1532
1533On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
1534in the inferior.
1535
1536* TUI
1537
1538HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
1539it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
1540configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
1541
1542* GDB remote protocol additions
1543
1544A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
1545Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
1546fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
1547allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
1548
1549For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
1550full 64-bit address. The command
1551
1552 set remoteaddresssize 32
1553
1554can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
1555the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
1556will be discarded.
1557
1558In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
1559command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
1560
1561 maint packet heythere
1562
1563sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
1564disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
1565time.
1566
1567The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
1568target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
1569downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
1570
1571* Tracing can collect general expressions
1572
1573You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
1574further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
1575doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
1576
1577* mask-address variable for Mips
1578
1579For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
1580a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
1581of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
1582
1583* Higher serial baud rates
1584
1585GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
1586230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
1587to achieve all of these rates.)
1588
1589* i960 simulator
1590
1591The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
1592builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
1593
1594
1595*** Changes in GDB-4.17:
1596
1597* New native configurations
1598
1599Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
1600Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
1601Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1602PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
1603PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1604Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
1605Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
1606
1607* New targets
1608
1609Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1610Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
1611Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1612Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
1613MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
1614MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
1615MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
1616Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
1617Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
1618Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1619NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
1620
1621* New debugging protocols
1622
1623ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
1624M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
1625DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
1626PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1627PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1628Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1629
1630* DWARF 2
1631
1632All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
1633format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
1634information.
1635
1636* Java frontend
1637
1638GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
1639only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
1640
1641* solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
1642
1643For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
1644loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
1645locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
1646
1647* Live range splitting
1648
1649GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
1650range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
1651more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
1652
1653* Hurd support
1654
1655GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
1656updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
1657
1658* ARM Thumb support
1659
1660GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
1661instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
1662instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
1663accordingly.
1664
1665* MIPS16 support
1666
1667GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
1668instruction set.
1669
1670* Overlay support
1671
1672GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
1673linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
1674will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
1675control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
1676additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
1677in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
1678
1679* info symbol
1680
1681The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
1682the symbol at the specified address.
1683
1684* Trace support
1685
1686The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
1687asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
1688extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
1689includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
1690file tracepoint.c for more details.
1691
1692* MIPS simulator
1693
1694Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
1695by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
1696of most MIPS variants.
1697
1698* Sparc simulator
1699
1700Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
1701by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
1702Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
1703
1704* set architecture
1705
1706For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
1707basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
1708architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
1709the possible architectures.
1710
1711*** Changes in GDB-4.16:
1712
1713* New native configurations
1714
1715Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
1716M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
1717PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
1718PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
1719PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1720RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
1721
1722* New targets
1723
1724ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
1725I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1726MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
1727MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
1728PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
1729Hitachi SH3 sh-*-*
1730Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1731
1732* PowerPC simulator
1733
1734The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
1735contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
1736PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
1737basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
1738performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
1739
1740* Solaris 2.5
1741
1742GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
1743
1744* Windows 95/NT native
1745
1746GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
1747To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
1748which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
1749Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
1750ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
1751
1752* dont-repeat command
1753
1754If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
1755command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
1756useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
1757extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
1758
1759* Send break instead of ^C
1760
1761The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
1762rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
1763GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
1764
1765* Remote protocol timeout
1766
1767The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
1768that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
1769to read from the target. The default value is 2.
1770
1771* Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
1772
1773By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
1774loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
1775stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
1776when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
1777in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
1778
1779Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
1780/usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
1781automatically on hpux10.
1782
1783* Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
1784
1785Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
1786
1787* Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
1788
1789When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
1790may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
1791the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
1792every character. The default value is 1050.
1793
1794* Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
1795
1796If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
1797a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
1798replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
1799details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
1800remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
1801to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
1802
1803* Speedups for remote debugging
1804
1805GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
1806the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
1807and more efficient S-record downloading.
1808
1809* Memory use reductions and statistics collection
1810
1811GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
1812Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
1813
1814*** Changes in GDB-4.15:
1815
1816* Psymtabs for XCOFF
1817
1818The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
1819can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
1820
1821* Remote targets use caching
1822
1823Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
1824remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
1825it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
1826debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
1827off' turns the the data cache off.
1828
1829* Remote targets may have threads
1830
1831The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
1832in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
1833gdb/remote.c for details.
1834
1835* NetROM support
1836
1837If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
1838support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
1839acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
1840write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
1841support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
1842another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
1843sequence is something like
1844
1845 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
1846 load <prog>
1847 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
1848
1849* Macintosh host
1850
1851GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
1852may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
1853it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
1854available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
1855device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
1856directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
1857scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
1858mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
1859
1860* Autoconf
1861
1862GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
1863but does simplify configuration and building.
1864
1865* hpux10
1866
1867GDB now supports hpux10.
1868
1869*** Changes in GDB-4.14:
1870
1871* New native configurations
1872
1873x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
1874x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
1875NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
1876Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
1877
1878* New targets
1879
1880A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1881HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
1882CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
1883PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
1884WDC 65816 w65-*-*
1885
1886* Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
1887
1888GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
1889possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
1890filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
1891the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
1892if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
1893
1894* Arguments to user-defined commands
1895
1896User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
1897Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
1898trivial example:
1899define adder
1900 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
1901
1902To execute the command use:
1903adder 1 2 3
1904
1905Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
1906Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
1907use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
1908
1909* New `if' and `while' commands
1910
1911This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
1912commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
1913expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
1914execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
1915terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
1916`else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
1917if the expression is zero.
1918
1919* Fortran source language mode
1920
1921GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
1922Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
1923variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
1924with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
1925Fortran compilers.
1926
1927* Better HPUX support
1928
1929Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
1930running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
1931processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
1932for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
1933that behavior do the following before running the program:
1934
1935 adb -w a.out
1936 __dld_flags?W 0x5
1937 control-d
1938
1939This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
1940To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
1941
1942 adb -w a.out
1943 __dld_flags?W 0x4
1944 control-d
1945
1946You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
1947the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
1948external linkage.
1949
1950GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
1951HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
1952
1953* Target byte order now dynamically selectable
1954
1955You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
1956commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
1957current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
1958"set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
1959associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
1960configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
1961
1962* New DOS host serial code
1963
1964This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
1965no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
1966a PC's serial port.
1967
1968*** Changes in GDB-4.13:
1969
1970* New "complete" command
1971
1972This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
1973were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
1974
1975* Trailing space optional in prompt
1976
1977"set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
1978allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
1979
1980* Breakpoint hit counts
1981
1982"info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
1983has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
1984can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
1985to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
1986less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
1987that breakpoint.
1988
1989* Ability to stop printing at NULL character
1990
1991"set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
1992an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
1993arrays actually contain only short strings.
1994
1995* Shared library breakpoints
1996
1997In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
1998breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
1999
2000* Hardware watchpoints
2001
2002There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
2003targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
2004
55241689 2005Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
c906108c
SS
2006
2007* Annotations
2008
2009Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
2010and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
2011
2012* Improved Irix 5 support
2013
2014GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
2015
2016* Improved HPPA support
2017
2018GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
2019
2020* New native configurations
2021
2022Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
2023HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2024Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
2025RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
2026
2027* New targets
2028
2029OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2030MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
2031Sparc64 sparc64-*-*
2032
2033* Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
2034
2035There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
2036This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
2037
2038* Fixes
2039
2040As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
2041and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
2042
2043*** Changes in GDB-4.12:
2044
2045* Irix 5 is now supported
2046
2047* HPPA support
2048
2049GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
2050to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
2051GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
2052of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
2053can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
2054
2055
2056*** Changes in GDB-4.11:
2057
2058* User visible changes:
2059
2060* Remote Debugging
2061
2062The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
2063target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
2064debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
2065integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
2066debugging info for the mips target).
2067
2068* DEC Alpha native support
2069
2070GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
2071debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
2072work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
2073Alpha-specific notes.
2074
2075* Preliminary thread implementation
2076
2077GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
2078
2079* LynxOS native and target support for 386
2080
2081This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
2082to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
2083for details).
2084
2085* Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
2086
2087This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
2088mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
2089call methods, ...etc.
2090
2091*** Changes in GDB-4.10:
2092
2093 * User visible changes:
2094
2095Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
2096supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
2097other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
2098somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
2099
2100Filename completion now works.
2101
2102When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
2103arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
2104addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
2105
2106All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
2107vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
2108should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
2109your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
2110to be on the far side of a thin network line.
2111
2112 * DEC alpha support
2113
2114This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
2115cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
2116
2117
2118*** Changes in GDB-4.9:
2119
2120 * Testsuite
2121
2122This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
2123The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
2124via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
2125
2126 * C++ demangling
2127
2128'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
2129emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
2130Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
2131disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
2132use gdb with AT&T cfront.
2133
2134 * Simulators
2135
2136GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
2137So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
2138Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
2139
2140 * New targets supported
2141
2142H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2143H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2144SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
2145Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2146IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
2147
2148Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
2149version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
2150GO32 memory extender.
2151
2152 * New remote protocols
2153
2154MIPS remote debugging protocol.
2155
2156 * New source languages supported
2157
2158This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
2159used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
2160into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
2161
2162
2163*** Changes in GDB-4.8:
2164
2165 * HP Precision Architecture supported
2166
2167GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
2168version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
2169University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
2170compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
2171format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
2172(as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
2173
2174Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
2175
2176 * Faster and better demangling
2177
2178We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
2179demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
2180character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
2181only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
2182This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
2183increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
2184symbol lookups.
2185
2186`Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
2187from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
2188compiler does not actually implement.
2189
2190 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
2191
2192In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
2193inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
2194recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
2195very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
2196The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
2197circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
2198fix.
2199
2200The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
2201release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
2202
2203 * Improved configure script
2204
2205The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
2206you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
2207host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
2208done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
2209
2210We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
2211version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
2212`--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
2213The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
2214only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
2215We hope to make this the default in a future release.
2216
2217 * Documentation improvements
2218
2219There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
2220produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
2221before submitting changes.
2222
2223The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
2224M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
2225`info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
2226you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
2227a future texinfo-X.Y release.
2228
2229*NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
2230We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
2231been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
2232or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
2233`texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
2234around this problem.
2235
2236 * New features
2237
2238GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
2239the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
2240`print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
2241the target program.
2242
2243The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
2244how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
2245
2246 * New native hosts supported
2247
2248HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
2249386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
2250
2251 * New targets supported
2252
2253AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
2254
2255 * New file formats supported
2256
2257BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
2258HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
2259
2260 * Major bug fixes
2261
2262Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
2263
2264We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
2265printf_filtered("%s") problems.
2266
2267We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
2268for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
2269release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
2270
2271You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
2272will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
2273
2274We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
2275for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
2276especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
2277libraries.
2278
2279The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
2280information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
2281command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
2282any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
2283when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
2284
2285 * Internal improvements
2286
2287GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
2288debugging of multiple languages in the future.
2289
2290GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
2291Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
2292symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
2293contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
2294shared code that handles any of them.
2295
2296 * New command line options
2297
2298We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
2299
2300 * Mmalloc licensing
2301
2302The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
2303General Public License.
2304
2305*** Changes in GDB-4.7:
2306
2307 * Host/native/target split
2308
2309GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
2310hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
2311target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
2312local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
2313ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
2314
2315The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
2316GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
2317is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
2318code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
2319any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
2320built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
2321handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
2322
2323GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
2324It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
2325plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
2326
2327 * New hosts supported
2328
2329HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
2330386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2331386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
2332
2333 * New targets supported
2334
2335Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
233668030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
2337
2338 * New native hosts supported
2339
2340386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2341 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
2342386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
2343
2344 * New file formats supported
2345
2346BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
2347supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
2348format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
2349
2350 * New commands
2351
2352`show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
2353`show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
2354These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
2355
2356`info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
2357
2358You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
2359scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
2360prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
2361executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
2362
2363 * C++ improvements
2364
2365We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
2366info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
2367symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
2368
2369Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
2370
2371 * Major bug fixes
2372
2373The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
2374fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
2375by the compiler.
2376
2377We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
2378support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
2379
2380John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
2381slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
2382that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
2383purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
2384the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
2385mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
2386
2387Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
2388about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
2389completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
2390we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
2391
2392 * AMD 29k support
2393
2394A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
2395specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
2396calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
2397usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
2398in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
2399
2400We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
2401Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
2402of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
2403resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
2404
2405 * Remote interfaces
2406
2407We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
2408with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
2409message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
2410This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
2411needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
2412breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
2413each instruction being stepped through.
2414
2415The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
2416registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
2417
2418There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
2419find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
2420Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
2421processor with a serial port.
2422
2423 * Configuration
2424
2425Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
2426`table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
2427supported, and what files each one uses.
2428
2429 * Library changes
2430
2431There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
2432disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
2433Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
2434disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
2435
2436The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
2437Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
2438can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
2439grants all the rights from the General Public License.
2440
2441 * Documentation
2442
2443The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
2444reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
2445as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
2446encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
2447system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
2448bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
2449
2450And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
2451
2452
2453*** Changes in GDB-4.6:
2454
2455 * Better support for C++ function names
2456
2457GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
2458names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
2459(using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
2460single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
2461Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
2462
2463GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
2464the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
2465You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
2466lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
2467for the list of formats.
2468
2469 * G++ symbol mangling problem
2470
2471Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
2472C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
2473directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
2474can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
2475usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
2476about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
2477this problem.)
2478
2479 * New 'maintenance' command
2480
2481All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
2482the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
2483can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
2484
2485 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
2486 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
2487 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
2488 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
2489 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
2490 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
2491
2492The following commands are new:
2493
2494 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
2495 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
2496 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
2497
2498 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
2499
2500We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
2501(e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
2502be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
2503read after argv processing.
2504
2505 * New hosts supported
2506
2507Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
2508
55241689 2509GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
c906108c
SS
2510
2511We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
2512is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
2513for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
2514masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
2515fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
2516It costs extra.
2517
2518 * New targets supported
2519
2520Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2521
2522 * More smarts about finding #include files
2523
2524GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
2525all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
2526greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
2527especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
2528the one that contains your sources.
2529
2530We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
2531breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
2532try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
2533
2534 * Interesting infernals change
2535
2536GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
2537section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
2538target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
2539stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
2540
2541 * Bug fixes (of course!)
2542
2543There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
2544 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
2545 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
2546
2547See the ChangeLog for details.
2548
2549*** Changes in GDB-4.5:
2550
2551 * New machines supported (host and target)
2552
2553IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
2554
2555SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
2556
2557 * New malloc package
2558
2559GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
2560Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
2561capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
2562This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
2563pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
2564more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
2565
2566 * info proc
2567
2568The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
2569'help info proc' for details.
2570
2571 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
2572
2573The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
2574Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
2575possible.
2576
2577 * File name changes for MS-DOS
2578
2579Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
2580support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
2581conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
2582environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
2583that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
2584in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
2585
2586 * Cross byte order fixes
2587
2588Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
2589targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
2590
2591 * New -mapped and -readnow options
2592
2593If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
2594system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
2595`symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
2596program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
2597called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
2598Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
2599and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
2600the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
2601option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
2602starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
2603
2604You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
2605the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
2606information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
2607slower, but makes future operations faster.
2608
2609The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
2610build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
2611A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
2612use is:
2613
2614 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
2615
2616The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
2617It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
2618shared across multiple host platforms.
2619
2620 * longjmp() handling
2621
2622GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
2623siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
2624all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
2625platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
2626
2627 * Solaris 2.0
2628
2629Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
2630this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
2631reading symbols.
2632
2633 * Bug fixes
2634
2635As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
2636People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
2637crashes and trashed symbol tables.
2638
2639*** Changes in GDB-4.4:
2640
2641 * New machines supported (host and target)
2642
2643SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2644 (except core files)
2645BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
2646Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
2647
2648 * New machines supported (target)
2649
2650AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2651
2652 * C++ support
2653
2654GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
2655The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
2656per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
2657
2658GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
2659`ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
2660extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
2661good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
2662will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
2663released.
2664
2665 * New features for SVR4
2666
2667GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
2668shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
2669only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
2670
2671The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
2672on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
2673it prints the address mappings of the process.
2674
2675If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
2676bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
2677
2678 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
2679
2680Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
2681now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
2682skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
2683make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
2684same code linked statically.
2685
2686 * New Getopt
2687
2688GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
2689version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
2690continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
2691Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
2692added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
2693future by other options that begin with the same letter.
2694
2695 * Bugs fixed
2696
2697The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
2698Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
2699See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
2700
2701
2702*** Changes in GDB-4.3:
2703
2704 * New machines supported (host and target)
2705
2706Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
2707NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
2708Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2709
2710 * Almost SCO Unix support
2711
2712We had hoped to support:
2713SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2714(except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
2715that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
2716about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
2717
2718 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
2719
2720GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
2721debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
2722is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
2723send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
2724reqired (if any).
2725
2726 * New Readline
2727
2728GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
2729is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
2730required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
2731
2732 * Bugs fixed
2733
2734The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
2735Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
2736See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
2737
2738 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
2739
2740GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
2741supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
2742symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
2743
2744Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
2745mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
2746debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
2747mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
2748version 2.
2749
2750Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
2751really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
2752line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
2753variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
2754situation somewhat.
2755
2756When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
2757However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
2758methods.
2759
2760We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
2761DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
2762encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
2763
2764
2765*** Changes in GDB-4.2:
2766
2767 * Improved configuration
2768
2769Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
2770Porting BFD is simpler.
2771
2772 * Stepping improved
2773
2774The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
2775of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
2776in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
2777function that has debugging information is called within the line.
2778
2779 * Bug fixing
2780
2781Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
2782
2783 * New host supported (not target)
2784
2785Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
2786
2787
2788*** Changes in GDB-4.1:
2789
2790 * Multiple source language support
2791
2792GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
2793It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
2794and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
2795language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
2796You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
2797`set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
2798
2799 * GDB and Modula-2
2800
2801GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
2802currently under development at the State University of New York at
2803Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
2804continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
2805
2806Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
2807debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
2808symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
2809
2810There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
2811in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
2812
2813 * set write on/off
2814
2815GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
2816a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
2817the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
2818by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
2819effect immediately.
2820
2821 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
2822
2823When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
2824shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
2825The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
2826examining core files.
2827
2828 * set listsize
2829
2830You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
2831The default is 10.
2832
2833 * New machines supported (host and target)
2834
2835SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
2836Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
2837Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
2838
2839 * New hosts supported (not targets)
2840
2841IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
2842
2843 * New targets supported (not hosts)
2844
2845AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2846AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2847Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
2848
2849 * New remote interfaces
2850
2851AMD 29000 Adapt
2852AMD 29000 Minimon
2853
2854
2855*** Changes in GDB-4.0:
2856
2857 * New Facilities
2858
2859Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
2860
2861Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
2862target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
2863is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
2864remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
2865remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
2866also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
2867using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
2868stub on the target system.
2869
2870New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
2871
2872GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
2873library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
2874object file types such as a.out and coff.
2875
2876There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
2877refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
2878
2879
2880 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
2881
2882All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
2883by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
2884
2885For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
2886``Show prompt'' produces the response:
2887Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
2888
2889What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
2890print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
2891will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
2892all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
2893
2894confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
2895 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
2896 it is already running. Default is ON.
2897
2898editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
2899 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
2900 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
2901 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
2902 Default is ON.
2903
2904history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
2905 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
2906 or the value of the environment variable
2907 GDBHISTFILE.
2908
2909history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
2910 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
2911 HISTSIZE.
2912
2913history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
2914 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
2915 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
2916
2917history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
2918 history expansion will be performed on
2919 command line input. The default is OFF.
2920
2921radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
2922 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
2923 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
2924
2925height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
2926 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
2927 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2928 variable TERM.
2929
2930width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
2931 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
2932 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2933 variable TERM.
2934
2935Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
2936``set width'' instead.
2937
2938print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
2939 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
2940 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
2941 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
2942
2943print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
2944 is OFF.
2945
2946print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
2947 "raw" form if off.
2948
2949print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
2950 like instructions.
2951
2952print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
2953
2954
2955 * Support for Epoch Environment.
2956
2957The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
2958new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
2959are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
2960window.
2961
2962
2963 * Support for Shared Libraries
2964
2965GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
2966Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
2967before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
2968happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
2969At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
2970from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
2971shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
2972It can be abbreviated ``share''.
2973
2974sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
2975 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
2976 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
2977
2978info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
2979
2980
2981 * Watchpoints
2982
2983A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
2984expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
2985tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
2986quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
2987problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
2988more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
2989
2990watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
2991
2992info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
2993
2994delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2995disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2996enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2997
2998
2999 * C++ multiple inheritance
3000
3001When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
3002for C++ programs.
3003
3004 * C++ exception handling
3005
3006Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
3007ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
3008the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
3009handler's context).
3010
3011catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
3012 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
3013 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
3014
3015info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
3016 current stack frame.
3017
3018
3019 * Minor command changes
3020
3021The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
3022command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
3023is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
3024
3025The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
3026at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
3027frames without printing.
3028
3029 * New directory command
3030
3031'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
3032The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
3033about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
3034with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
3035find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
3036
3037 * Configuring GDB for compilation
3038
3039For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
3040for more details.
3041
3042GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
3043two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
3044Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
3045where the program that you are debugging will run.
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