Function for reading the Aarch64 SVE vector length
[deliverable/binutils-gdb.git] / gdb / NEWS
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1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
3
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4*** Changes since GDB 8.1
5
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6* The commands 'info variables/functions/types' now show the source line
7 numbers of symbol definitions when available.
8
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9* 'info proc' now works on running processes on FreeBSD systems and core
10 files created on FreeBSD systems.
11
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12* C expressions can now use _Alignof, and C++ expressions can now use
13 alignof.
14
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15* New commands
16
17set debug fbsd-nat
18show debug fbsd-nat
19 Control display of debugging info regarding the FreeBSD native target.
20
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21set|show varsize-limit
22 This new setting allows the user to control the maximum size of Ada
23 objects being printed when those objects have a variable type,
24 instead of that maximum size being hardcoded to 65536 bytes.
25
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26set|show record btrace cpu
27 Controls the processor to be used for enabling errata workarounds for
28 branch trace decode.
29
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30* Python API
31
32 ** Type alignment is now exposed via the "align" attribute of a gdb.Type.
33
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34 ** The commands attached to a breakpoint can be set by assigning to
35 the breakpoint's "commands" field.
36
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37 ** gdb.execute can now execute multi-line gdb commands.
38
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39* New targets
40
41RiscV ELF riscv*-*-elf
42
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43* Removed targets and native configurations
44
45m88k running OpenBSD m88*-*-openbsd*
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46SH-5/SH64 ELF sh64-*-elf*, SH-5/SH64 support in sh*
47SH-5/SH64 running GNU/Linux SH-5/SH64 support in sh*-*-linux*
48SH-5/SH64 running OpenBSD SH-5/SH64 support in sh*-*-openbsd*
a2a79012 49
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50* Aarch64/Linux hardware watchpoints improvements
51
52 Hardware watchpoints on unaligned addresses are now properly
53 supported when running Linux kernel 4.10 or higher: read and access
54 watchpoints are no longer spuriously missed, and all watchpoints
55 lengths between 1 and 8 bytes are supported. On older kernels,
56 watchpoints set on unaligned addresses are no longer missed, with
57 the tradeoff that there is a possibility of false hits being
58 reported.
59
cd385f94 60*** Changes in GDB 8.1
305d16a9 61
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62* GDB now supports dynamically creating arbitrary register groups specified
63 in XML target descriptions. This allows for finer grain grouping of
64 registers on systems with a large amount of registers.
65
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66* The 'ptype' command now accepts a '/o' flag, which prints the
67 offsets and sizes of fields in a struct, like the pahole(1) tool.
68
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69* New "--readnever" command line option instructs GDB to not read each
70 symbol file's symbolic debug information. This makes startup faster
71 but at the expense of not being able to perform symbolic debugging.
72 This option is intended for use cases where symbolic debugging will
73 not be used, e.g., when you only need to dump the debuggee's core.
74
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75* GDB now uses the GNU MPFR library, if available, to emulate target
76 floating-point arithmetic during expression evaluation when the target
77 uses different floating-point formats than the host. At least version
78 3.1 of GNU MPFR is required.
79
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80* GDB now supports access to the guarded-storage-control registers and the
81 software-based guarded-storage broadcast control registers on IBM z14.
82
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83* On Unix systems, GDB now supports transmitting environment variables
84 that are to be set or unset to GDBserver. These variables will
85 affect the environment to be passed to the remote inferior.
86
87 To inform GDB of environment variables that are to be transmitted to
88 GDBserver, use the "set environment" command. Only user set
89 environment variables are sent to GDBserver.
90
91 To inform GDB of environment variables that are to be unset before
92 the remote inferior is started by the GDBserver, use the "unset
93 environment" command.
94
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95* Completion improvements
96
97 ** GDB can now complete function parameters in linespecs and
98 explicit locations without quoting. When setting breakpoints,
99 quoting around functions names to help with TAB-completion is
100 generally no longer necessary. For example, this now completes
101 correctly:
102
103 (gdb) b function(in[TAB]
104 (gdb) b function(int)
105
106 Related, GDB is no longer confused with completing functions in
107 C++ anonymous namespaces:
108
109 (gdb) b (anon[TAB]
110 (gdb) b (anonymous namespace)::[TAB][TAB]
111 (anonymous namespace)::a_function()
112 (anonymous namespace)::b_function()
113
114 ** GDB now has much improved linespec and explicit locations TAB
115 completion support, that better understands what you're
116 completing and offers better suggestions. For example, GDB no
117 longer offers data symbols as possible completions when you're
118 setting a breakpoint.
119
120 ** GDB now TAB-completes label symbol names.
121
122 ** The "complete" command now mimics TAB completion accurately.
123
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124* New command line options (gcore)
125
126-a
127 Dump all memory mappings.
128
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129* Breakpoints on C++ functions are now set on all scopes by default
130
131 By default, breakpoints on functions/methods are now interpreted as
132 specifying all functions with the given name ignoring missing
133 leading scopes (namespaces and classes).
134
135 For example, assuming a C++ program with symbols named:
136
137 A::B::func()
138 B::func()
139
140 both commands "break func()" and "break B::func()" set a breakpoint
141 on both symbols.
142
143 You can use the new flag "-qualified" to override this. This makes
144 GDB interpret the specified function name as a complete
145 fully-qualified name instead. For example, using the same C++
146 program, the "break -q B::func" command sets a breakpoint on
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147 "B::func", only. A parameter has been added to the Python
148 gdb.Breakpoint constructor to achieve the same result when creating
149 a breakpoint from Python.
a20714ff 150
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151* Breakpoints on functions marked with C++ ABI tags
152
153 GDB can now set breakpoints on functions marked with C++ ABI tags
154 (e.g., [abi:cxx11]). See here for a description of ABI tags:
155 https://developers.redhat.com/blog/2015/02/05/gcc5-and-the-c11-abi/
156
157 Functions with a C++11 abi tag are demangled/displayed like this:
158
159 function[abi:cxx11](int)
160 ^^^^^^^^^^^
161
162 You can now set a breakpoint on such functions simply as if they had
163 no tag, like:
164
165 (gdb) b function(int)
166
167 Or if you need to disambiguate between tags, like:
168
169 (gdb) b function[abi:other_tag](int)
170
171 Tab completion was adjusted accordingly as well.
172
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173* Python Scripting
174
175 ** New events gdb.new_inferior, gdb.inferior_deleted, and
176 gdb.new_thread are emitted. See the manual for further
177 description of these.
178
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179 ** A new function, "gdb.rbreak" has been added to the Python API.
180 This function allows the setting of a large number of breakpoints
181 via a regex pattern in Python. See the manual for further details.
d8ae99a7 182
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183 ** Python breakpoints can now accept explicit locations. See the
184 manual for a further description of this feature.
185
186
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187* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
188
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189 ** GDBserver is now able to start inferior processes with a
190 specified initial working directory.
191
192 The user can set the desired working directory to be used from
193 GDB using the new "set cwd" command.
194
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195 ** New "--selftest" command line option runs some GDBserver self
196 tests. These self tests are disabled in releases.
197
198 ** On Unix systems, GDBserver now does globbing expansion and variable
199 substitution in inferior command line arguments.
200
201 This is done by starting inferiors using a shell, like GDB does.
202 See "set startup-with-shell" in the user manual for how to disable
203 this from GDB when using "target extended-remote". When using
204 "target remote", you can disable the startup with shell by using the
205 new "--no-startup-with-shell" GDBserver command line option.
aefd8b33 206
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207 ** On Unix systems, GDBserver now supports receiving environment
208 variables that are to be set or unset from GDB. These variables
209 will affect the environment to be passed to the inferior.
210
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211* When catching an Ada exception raised with a message, GDB now prints
212 the message in the catchpoint hit notification. In GDB/MI mode, that
213 information is provided as an extra field named "exception-message"
214 in the *stopped notification.
215
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216* Trait objects can now be inspected When debugging Rust code. This
217 requires compiler support which will appear in Rust 1.24.
218
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219* New remote packets
220
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221QEnvironmentHexEncoded
222 Inform GDBserver of an environment variable that is to be passed to
223 the inferior when starting it.
224
225QEnvironmentUnset
226 Inform GDBserver of an environment variable that is to be unset
227 before starting the remote inferior.
228
229QEnvironmentReset
230 Inform GDBserver that the environment should be reset (i.e.,
231 user-set environment variables should be unset).
232
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233QStartupWithShell
234 Indicates whether the inferior must be started with a shell or not.
235
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236QSetWorkingDir
237 Tell GDBserver that the inferior to be started should use a specific
238 working directory.
239
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240* The "maintenance print c-tdesc" command now takes an optional
241 argument which is the file name of XML target description.
242
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243* The "maintenance selftest" command now takes an optional argument to
244 filter the tests to be run.
245
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246* The "enable", and "disable" commands now accept a range of
247 breakpoint locations, e.g. "enable 1.3-5".
248
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249* New commands
250
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251set|show cwd
252 Set and show the current working directory for the inferior.
253
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254set|show compile-gcc
255 Set and show compilation command used for compiling and injecting code
256 with the 'compile' commands.
257
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258set debug separate-debug-file
259show debug separate-debug-file
260 Control the display of debug output about separate debug file search.
261
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262set dump-excluded-mappings
263show dump-excluded-mappings
264 Control whether mappings marked with the VM_DONTDUMP flag should be
265 dumped when generating a core file.
266
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267maint info selftests
268 List the registered selftests.
269
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270starti
271 Start the debugged program stopping at the first instruction.
272
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273set|show debug or1k
274 Control display of debugging messages related to OpenRISC targets.
275
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276set|show print type nested-type-limit
277 Set and show the limit of nesting level for nested types that the
278 type printer will show.
279
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280* TUI Single-Key mode now supports two new shortcut keys: `i' for stepi and
281 `o' for nexti.
282
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283* Safer/improved support for debugging with no debug info
284
285 GDB no longer assumes functions with no debug information return
286 'int'.
287
288 This means that GDB now refuses to call such functions unless you
289 tell it the function's type, by either casting the call to the
290 declared return type, or by casting the function to a function
291 pointer of the right type, and calling that:
292
293 (gdb) p getenv ("PATH")
294 'getenv' has unknown return type; cast the call to its declared return type
295 (gdb) p (char *) getenv ("PATH")
296 $1 = 0x7fffffffe "/usr/local/bin:/"...
297 (gdb) p ((char * (*) (const char *)) getenv) ("PATH")
298 $2 = 0x7fffffffe "/usr/local/bin:/"...
299
300 Similarly, GDB no longer assumes that global variables with no debug
301 info have type 'int', and refuses to print the variable's value
302 unless you tell it the variable's type:
303
304 (gdb) p var
305 'var' has unknown type; cast it to its declared type
306 (gdb) p (float) var
307 $3 = 3.14
308
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309* New native configurations
310
311FreeBSD/aarch64 aarch64*-*-freebsd*
4f9d9906 312FreeBSD/arm arm*-*-freebsd*
351787dd 313
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314* New targets
315
316FreeBSD/aarch64 aarch64*-*-freebsd*
7176dfd2 317FreeBSD/arm arm*-*-freebsd*
b282f0f2 318OpenRISC ELF or1k*-*-elf
c0f84956 319
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320* Removed targets and native configurations
321
322Solaris 2.0-9 i?86-*-solaris2.[0-9], sparc*-*-solaris2.[0-9]
323
305d16a9 324*** Changes in GDB 8.0
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325
326* GDB now supports access to the PKU register on GNU/Linux. The register is
327 added by the Memory Protection Keys for Userspace feature which will be
328 available in future Intel CPUs.
751b375e 329
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330* GDB now supports C++11 rvalue references.
331
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332* Python Scripting
333
334 ** New functions to start, stop and access a running btrace recording.
c0f55cc6 335 ** Rvalue references are now supported in gdb.Type.
0a0faf9f 336
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337* GDB now supports recording and replaying rdrand and rdseed Intel 64
338 instructions.
339
e6485aaf 340* Building GDB and GDBserver now requires a C++11 compiler.
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341
342 For example, GCC 4.8 or later.
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343
344 It is no longer possible to build GDB or GDBserver with a C
345 compiler. The --disable-build-with-cxx configure option has been
346 removed.
347
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348* Building GDB and GDBserver now requires GNU make >= 3.81.
349
350 It is no longer supported to build GDB or GDBserver with another
351 implementation of the make program or an earlier version of GNU make.
352
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353* Native debugging on MS-Windows supports command-line redirection
354
355 Command-line arguments used for starting programs on MS-Windows can
356 now include redirection symbols supported by native Windows shells,
357 such as '<', '>', '>>', '2>&1', etc. This affects GDB commands such
358 as "run", "start", and "set args", as well as the corresponding MI
359 features.
360
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361* Support for thread names on MS-Windows.
362
363 GDB now catches and handles the special exception that programs
364 running on MS-Windows use to assign names to threads in the
365 debugger.
366
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367* Support for Java programs compiled with gcj has been removed.
368
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369* User commands now accept an unlimited number of arguments.
370 Previously, only up to 10 was accepted.
371
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372* The "eval" command now expands user-defined command arguments.
373
374 This makes it easier to process a variable number of arguments:
375
376 define mycommand
377 set $i = 0
378 while $i < $argc
379 eval "print $arg%d", $i
380 set $i = $i + 1
381 end
382 end
383
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384* Target descriptions can now describe registers for sparc32 and sparc64.
385
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386* GDB now supports DWARF version 5 (debug information format).
387 Its .debug_names index is not yet supported.
388
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389* New native configurations
390
391FreeBSD/mips mips*-*-freebsd
392
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393* New targets
394
395Synopsys ARC arc*-*-elf32
387360da 396FreeBSD/mips mips*-*-freebsd
ad0a504f 397
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398* Removed targets and native configurations
399
400Alpha running FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
401Alpha running GNU/kFreeBSD alpha*-*-kfreebsd*-gnu
402
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403* New commands
404
405flash-erase
406 Erases all the flash memory regions reported by the target.
407
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408maint print arc arc-instruction address
409 Print internal disassembler information about instruction at a given address.
51457a05 410
db6be0d5 411* New options
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412
413set disassembler-options
414show disassembler-options
415 Controls the passing of target specific information to the disassembler.
416 If it is necessary to specify more than one disassembler option then
417 multiple options can be placed together into a comma separated list.
418 The default value is the empty string. Currently, the only supported
419 targets are ARM, PowerPC and S/390.
420
db6be0d5 421* New MI commands
eea78757 422
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423-target-flash-erase
424 Erases all the flash memory regions reported by the target. This is
425 equivalent to the CLI command flash-erase.
1e1a8bef 426
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427-file-list-shared-libraries
428 List the shared libraries in the program. This is
429 equivalent to the CLI command "info shared".
1e1a8bef 430
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431-catch-handlers
432 Catchpoints stopping the program when Ada exceptions are
433 handled. This is equivalent to the CLI command "catch handlers".
434
751b375e 435*** Changes in GDB 7.12
1233c0ba 436
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437* GDB and GDBserver now build with a C++ compiler by default.
438
439 The --enable-build-with-cxx configure option is now enabled by
440 default. One must now explicitly configure with
441 --disable-build-with-cxx in order to build with a C compiler. This
442 option will be removed in a future release.
443
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444* GDBserver now supports recording btrace without maintaining an active
445 GDB connection.
446
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447* GDB now supports a negative repeat count in the 'x' command to examine
448 memory backward from the given address. For example:
449
450 (gdb) bt
451 #0 Func1 (n=42, p=0x40061c "hogehoge") at main.cpp:4
452 #1 0x400580 in main (argc=1, argv=0x7fffffffe5c8) at main.cpp:8
453 (gdb) x/-5i 0x0000000000400580
454 0x40056a <main(int, char**)+8>: mov %edi,-0x4(%rbp)
455 0x40056d <main(int, char**)+11>: mov %rsi,-0x10(%rbp)
456 0x400571 <main(int, char**)+15>: mov $0x40061c,%esi
457 0x400576 <main(int, char**)+20>: mov $0x2a,%edi
458 0x40057b <main(int, char**)+25>:
459 callq 0x400536 <Func1(int, char const*)>
460
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461* Fortran: Support structures with fields of dynamic types and
462 arrays of dynamic types.
463
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464* The symbol dumping maintenance commands have new syntax.
465maint print symbols [-pc address] [--] [filename]
466maint print symbols [-objfile objfile] [-source source] [--] [filename]
467maint print psymbols [-objfile objfile] [-pc address] [--] [filename]
468maint print psymbols [-objfile objfile] [-source source] [--] [filename]
469maint print msymbols [-objfile objfile] [--] [filename]
470
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471* GDB now supports multibit bitfields and enums in target register
472 descriptions.
473
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474* New Python-based convenience function $_as_string(val), which returns
475 the textual representation of a value. This function is especially
476 useful to obtain the text label of an enum value.
477
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478* Intel MPX bound violation handling.
479
480 Segmentation faults caused by a Intel MPX boundary violation
481 now display the kind of violation (upper or lower), the memory
482 address accessed and the memory bounds, along with the usual
483 signal received and code location.
484
485 For example:
486
487 Program received signal SIGSEGV, Segmentation fault
488 Upper bound violation while accessing address 0x7fffffffc3b3
489 Bounds: [lower = 0x7fffffffc390, upper = 0x7fffffffc3a3]
490 0x0000000000400d7c in upper () at i386-mpx-sigsegv.c:68
491
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492* Rust language support.
493 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the Rust programming
494 language. See https://www.rust-lang.org/ for more information about
495 Rust.
496
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497* Support for running interpreters on specified input/output devices
498
499 GDB now supports a new mechanism that allows frontends to provide
500 fully featured GDB console views, as a better alternative to
501 building such views on top of the "-interpreter-exec console"
502 command. See the new "new-ui" command below. With that command,
503 frontends can now start GDB in the traditional command-line mode
504 running in an embedded terminal emulator widget, and create a
505 separate MI interpreter running on a specified i/o device. In this
506 way, GDB handles line editing, history, tab completion, etc. in the
507 console all by itself, and the GUI uses the separate MI interpreter
508 for its own control and synchronization, invisible to the command
509 line.
510
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511* The "catch syscall" command catches groups of related syscalls.
512
513 The "catch syscall" command now supports catching a group of related
514 syscalls using the 'group:' or 'g:' prefix.
515
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516* New commands
517
518skip -file file
519skip -gfile file-glob-pattern
520skip -function function
521skip -rfunction regular-expression
522 A generalized form of the skip command, with new support for
523 glob-style file names and regular expressions for function names.
524 Additionally, a file spec and a function spec may now be combined.
525
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526maint info line-table REGEXP
527 Display the contents of GDB's internal line table data struture.
528
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529maint selftest
530 Run any GDB unit tests that were compiled in.
531
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532new-ui INTERP TTY
533 Start a new user interface instance running INTERP as interpreter,
534 using the TTY file for input/output.
535
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536* Python Scripting
537
538 ** gdb.Breakpoint objects have a new attribute "pending", which
539 indicates whether the breakpoint is pending.
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540 ** Three new breakpoint-related events have been added:
541 gdb.breakpoint_created, gdb.breakpoint_modified, and
542 gdb.breakpoint_deleted.
93daf339 543
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544signal-event EVENTID
545 Signal ("set") the given MS-Windows event object. This is used in
546 conjunction with the Windows JIT debugging (AeDebug) support, where
547 the OS suspends a crashing process until a debugger can attach to
548 it. Resuming the crashing process, in order to debug it, is done by
549 signalling an event.
550
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551* Support for tracepoints and fast tracepoints on s390-linux and s390x-linux
552 was added in GDBserver, including JIT compiling fast tracepoint's
553 conditional expression bytecode into native code.
554
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555* Support for various remote target protocols and ROM monitors has
556 been removed:
557
558 target m32rsdi Remote M32R debugging over SDI
559 target mips MIPS remote debugging protocol
560 target pmon PMON ROM monitor
561 target ddb NEC's DDB variant of PMON for Vr4300
562 target rockhopper NEC RockHopper variant of PMON
563 target lsi LSI variant of PMO
564
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565* Support for tracepoints and fast tracepoints on powerpc-linux,
566 powerpc64-linux, and powerpc64le-linux was added in GDBserver,
567 including JIT compiling fast tracepoint's conditional expression
568 bytecode into native code.
569
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570* MI async record =record-started now includes the method and format used for
571 recording. For example:
572
573 =record-started,thread-group="i1",method="btrace",format="bts"
574
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575* MI async record =thread-selected now includes the frame field. For example:
576
577 =thread-selected,id="3",frame={level="0",addr="0x00000000004007c0"}
578
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579* New targets
580
581Andes NDS32 nds32*-*-elf
582
1233c0ba 583*** Changes in GDB 7.11
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585* GDB now supports debugging kernel-based threads on FreeBSD.
586
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587* Per-inferior thread numbers
588
589 Thread numbers are now per inferior instead of global. If you're
590 debugging multiple inferiors, GDB displays thread IDs using a
591 qualified INF_NUM.THR_NUM form. For example:
592
593 (gdb) info threads
594 Id Target Id Frame
595 1.1 Thread 0x7ffff7fc2740 (LWP 8155) (running)
596 1.2 Thread 0x7ffff7fc1700 (LWP 8168) (running)
597 * 2.1 Thread 0x7ffff7fc2740 (LWP 8157) (running)
598 2.2 Thread 0x7ffff7fc1700 (LWP 8190) (running)
599
600 As consequence, thread numbers as visible in the $_thread
601 convenience variable and in Python's InferiorThread.num attribute
602 are no longer unique between inferiors.
603
604 GDB now maintains a second thread ID per thread, referred to as the
605 global thread ID, which is the new equivalent of thread numbers in
663f6d42 606 previous releases. See also $_gthread below.
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607
608 For backwards compatibility, MI's thread IDs always refer to global
609 IDs.
610
611* Commands that accept thread IDs now accept the qualified
612 INF_NUM.THR_NUM form as well. For example:
613
614 (gdb) thread 2.1
615 [Switching to thread 2.1 (Thread 0x7ffff7fc2740 (LWP 8157))] (running)
616 (gdb)
617
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618* In commands that accept a list of thread IDs, you can now refer to
619 all threads of an inferior using a star wildcard. GDB accepts
620 "INF_NUM.*", to refer to all threads of inferior INF_NUM, and "*" to
621 refer to all threads of the current inferior. For example, "info
622 threads 2.*".
623
c84f6bbf
PA
624* You can use "info threads -gid" to display the global thread ID of
625 all threads.
626
663f6d42
PA
627* The new convenience variable $_gthread holds the global number of
628 the current thread.
629
e3940304
PA
630* The new convenience variable $_inferior holds the number of the
631 current inferior.
632
f303dbd6
PA
633* GDB now displays the ID and name of the thread that hit a breakpoint
634 or received a signal, if your program is multi-threaded. For
635 example:
636
637 Thread 3 "bar" hit Breakpoint 1 at 0x40087a: file program.c, line 20.
638 Thread 1 "main" received signal SIGINT, Interrupt.
639
cbb55fa7
MM
640* Record btrace now supports non-stop mode.
641
58d2eda5
PL
642* Support for tracepoints on aarch64-linux was added in GDBserver.
643
da8c46d2 644* The 'record instruction-history' command now indicates speculative execution
bc504a31 645 when using the Intel Processor Trace recording format.
da8c46d2 646
629500fa
KS
647* GDB now allows users to specify explicit locations, bypassing
648 the linespec parser. This feature is also available to GDB/MI
649 clients.
650
02f024f9
YQ
651* Multi-architecture debugging is supported on AArch64 GNU/Linux.
652 GDB now is able to debug both AArch64 applications and ARM applications
653 at the same time.
654
4d9d419e
PL
655* Support for fast tracepoints on aarch64-linux was added in GDBserver,
656 including JIT compiling fast tracepoint's conditional expression bytecode
657 into native code.
658
eda14cf2
YQ
659* GDB now supports displaced stepping on AArch64 GNU/Linux.
660
be81798b
PA
661* "info threads", "info inferiors", "info display", "info checkpoints"
662 and "maint info program-spaces" now list the corresponding items in
663 ascending ID order, for consistency with all other "info" commands.
664
3685b09f
PMR
665* In Ada, the overloads selection menu has been enhanced to display the
666 parameter types and the return types for the matching overloaded subprograms.
667
fbea99ea
PA
668* New commands
669
670maint set target-non-stop (on|off|auto)
671maint show target-non-stop
672 Control whether GDB targets always operate in non-stop mode even if
673 "set non-stop" is "off". The default is "auto", meaning non-stop
674 mode is enabled if supported by the target.
675
18989b3c
AB
676maint set bfd-sharing
677maint show bfd-sharing
678 Control the reuse of bfd objects.
679
566f5e3b
AB
680set debug bfd-cache
681show debug bfd-cache
682 Control display of debugging info regarding bfd caching.
683
6e9567fe
JB
684set debug fbsd-lwp
685show debug fbsd-lwp
686 Control display of debugging info regarding FreeBSD threads.
687
73b8c1fd
PA
688set remote multiprocess-extensions-packet
689show remote multiprocess-extensions-packet
690 Set/show the use of the remote protocol multiprocess extensions.
691
65706a29
PA
692set remote thread-events
693show remote thread-events
694 Set/show the use of thread create/exit events.
695
3685b09f
PMR
696set ada print-signatures on|off
697show ada print-signatures"
698 Control whether parameter types and return types are displayed in overloads
699 selection menus. It is activaled (@code{on}) by default.
700
5fdf6324
AB
701set max-value-size
702show max-value-size
703 Controls the maximum size of memory, in bytes, that GDB will
704 allocate for value contents. Prevents incorrect programs from
705 causing GDB to allocate overly large buffers. Default is 64k.
706
6ff0ba5f
DE
707* The "disassemble" command accepts a new modifier: /s.
708 It prints mixed source+disassembly like /m with two differences:
709 - disassembled instructions are now printed in program order, and
710 - and source for all relevant files is now printed.
711 The "/m" option is now considered deprecated: its "source-centric"
712 output hasn't proved useful in practice.
713
0c532a29
MM
714* The "record instruction-history" command accepts a new modifier: /s.
715 It behaves exactly like /m and prints mixed source+disassembly.
716
f2665db5
MM
717* The "set scheduler-locking" command supports a new mode "replay".
718 It behaves like "off" in record mode and like "on" in replay mode.
719
40e0b271
PA
720* Support for various ROM monitors has been removed:
721
722 target dbug dBUG ROM monitor for Motorola ColdFire
723 target picobug Motorola picobug monitor
724 target dink32 DINK32 ROM monitor for PowerPC
725 target m32r Renesas M32R/D ROM monitor
726 target mon2000 mon2000 ROM monitor
727 target ppcbug PPCBUG ROM monitor for PowerPC
728
fd2ae5d6 729* Support for reading/writing memory and extracting values on architectures
d63dd61e 730 whose memory is addressable in units of any integral multiple of 8 bits.
fd2ae5d6 731
9f757bf7
XR
732catch handlers
733 Allows to break when an Ada exception is handled.
734
b459a59b
DB
735* New remote packets
736
737exec stop reason
738 Indicates that an exec system call was executed.
739
740exec-events feature in qSupported
741 The qSupported packet allows GDB to request support for exec
742 events using the new 'gdbfeature' exec-event, and the qSupported
743 response can contain the corresponding 'stubfeature'. Set and
744 show commands can be used to display whether these features are enabled.
745
de979965
PA
746vCtrlC
747 Equivalent to interrupting with the ^C character, but works in
748 non-stop mode.
749
65706a29
PA
750thread created stop reason (T05 create:...)
751 Indicates that the thread was just created and is stopped at entry.
752
753thread exit stop reply (w exitcode;tid)
754 Indicates that the thread has terminated.
755
756QThreadEvents
757 Enables/disables thread create and exit event reporting. For
758 example, this is used in non-stop mode when GDB stops a set of
759 threads and synchronously waits for the their corresponding stop
760 replies. Without exit events, if one of the threads exits, GDB
761 would hang forever not knowing that it should no longer expect a
762 stop for that same thread.
763
f2faf941 764N stop reply
f2faf941
PA
765 Indicates that there are no resumed threads left in the target (all
766 threads are stopped). The remote stub reports support for this stop
767 reply to GDB's qSupported query.
768
aab3c527
JK
769QCatchSyscalls
770 Enables/disables catching syscalls from the inferior process.
771 The remote stub reports support for this packet to GDB's qSupported query.
82075af2
JS
772
773syscall_entry stop reason
774 Indicates that a syscall was just called.
775
776syscall_return stop reason
777 Indicates that a syscall just returned.
778
b459a59b
DB
779* Extended-remote exec events
780
781 ** GDB now has support for exec events on extended-remote Linux targets.
782 For such targets with Linux kernels 2.5.46 and later, this enables
783 follow-exec-mode and exec catchpoints.
784
785set remote exec-event-feature-packet
786show remote exec-event-feature-packet
787 Set/show the use of the remote exec event feature.
788
79efa585
SM
789 * Thread names in remote protocol
790
791 The reply to qXfer:threads:read may now include a name attribute for each
792 thread.
793
19d9d4ef
DB
794* Target remote mode fork and exec events
795
796 ** GDB now has support for fork and exec events on target remote mode
797 Linux targets. For such targets with Linux kernels 2.5.46 and later,
798 this enables follow-fork-mode, detach-on-fork, follow-exec-mode, and
799 fork and exec catchpoints.
800
82075af2
JS
801* Remote syscall events
802
803 ** GDB now has support for catch syscall on remote Linux targets,
804 currently enabled on x86/x86_64 architectures.
805
806set remote catch-syscall-packet
807show remote catch-syscall-packet
808 Set/show the use of the remote catch syscall feature.
809
1c35a88f
LM
810* MI changes
811
812 ** The -var-set-format command now accepts the zero-hexadecimal
813 format. It outputs data in hexadecimal format with zero-padding on the
814 left.
815
84654457
PA
816* Python Scripting
817
22a02324
PA
818 ** gdb.InferiorThread objects have a new attribute "global_num",
819 which refers to the thread's global thread ID. The existing
820 "num" attribute now refers to the thread's per-inferior number.
821 See "Per-inferior thread numbers" above.
84654457
PA
822 ** gdb.InferiorThread objects have a new attribute "inferior", which
823 is the Inferior object the thread belongs to.
824
7c79d316 825*** Changes in GDB 7.10
df8411da 826
c16a3f52
OJ
827* Support for process record-replay and reverse debugging on aarch64*-linux*
828 targets has been added. GDB now supports recording of A64 instruction set
829 including advance SIMD instructions.
830
18a94d75
DE
831* Support for Sun's version of the "stabs" debug file format has been removed.
832
df8411da
SDJ
833* GDB now honors the content of the file /proc/PID/coredump_filter
834 (PID is the process ID) on GNU/Linux systems. This file can be used
835 to specify the types of memory mappings that will be included in a
836 corefile. For more information, please refer to the manual page of
837 "core(5)". GDB also has a new command: "set use-coredump-filter
838 on|off". It allows to set whether GDB will read the content of the
839 /proc/PID/coredump_filter file when generating a corefile.
3b2f13ff 840
d33279b3
AT
841* The "info os" command on GNU/Linux can now display information on
842 cpu information :
843 "info os cpus" Listing of all cpus/cores on the system
844
236af5e3
YG
845* GDB has two new commands: "set serial parity odd|even|none" and
846 "show serial parity". These allows to set or show parity for the
847 remote serial I/O.
848
b6577aab
DE
849* The "info source" command now displays the producer string if it was
850 present in the debug info. This typically includes the compiler version
851 and may include things like its command line arguments.
852
b30a0bc3
JB
853* The "info dll", an alias of the "info sharedlibrary" command,
854 is now available on all platforms.
855
599bd15c
GB
856* Directory names supplied to the "set sysroot" commands may be
857 prefixed with "target:" to tell GDB to access shared libraries from
858 the target system, be it local or remote. This replaces the prefix
859 "remote:". The default sysroot has been changed from "" to
860 "target:". "remote:" is automatically converted to "target:" for
861 backward compatibility.
862
a9a5a3d1
GB
863* The system root specified by "set sysroot" will be prepended to the
864 filename of the main executable (if reported to GDB as absolute by
865 the operating system) when starting processes remotely, and when
866 attaching to already-running local or remote processes.
867
1b6e6f5c
GB
868* GDB now supports automatic location and retrieval of executable
869 files from remote targets. Remote debugging can now be initiated
870 using only a "target remote" or "target extended-remote" command
871 (no "set sysroot" or "file" commands are required). See "New remote
872 packets" below.
873
cf75d6c3
AB
874* The "dump" command now supports verilog hex format.
875
417c80f9
AA
876* GDB now supports the vector ABI on S/390 GNU/Linux targets.
877
51aad7cc
GB
878* On GNU/Linux, GDB and gdbserver are now able to access executable
879 and shared library files without a "set sysroot" command when
880 attaching to processes running in different mount namespaces from
881 the debugger. This makes it possible to attach to processes in
882 containers as simply as "gdb -p PID" or "gdbserver --attach PID".
883 See "New remote packets" below.
884
51f0e40d
AB
885* The "tui reg" command now provides completion for all of the
886 available register groups, including target specific groups.
887
b58c513b
PP
888* The HISTSIZE environment variable is no longer read when determining
889 the size of GDB's command history. GDB now instead reads the dedicated
bc460514
PP
890 GDBHISTSIZE environment variable. Setting GDBHISTSIZE to "-1" or to "" now
891 disables truncation of command history. Non-numeric values of GDBHISTSIZE
892 are ignored.
b58c513b 893
37442ce1
DE
894* Guile Scripting
895
896 ** Memory ports can now be unbuffered.
897
3a8b707a
DE
898* Python Scripting
899
900 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "username",
901 which is the name of the objfile as specified by the user,
902 without, for example, resolving symlinks.
d11916aa 903 ** You can now write frame unwinders in Python.
59fb7612
SS
904 ** gdb.Type objects have a new method "optimized_out",
905 returning optimized out gdb.Value instance of this type.
4c082a81
SC
906 ** gdb.Value objects have new methods "reference_value" and
907 "const_value" which return a reference to the value and a
908 "const" version of the value respectively.
3a8b707a 909
f57d2163
DE
910* New commands
911
912maint print symbol-cache
913 Print the contents of the symbol cache.
914
915maint print symbol-cache-statistics
916 Print statistics of symbol cache usage.
917
918maint flush-symbol-cache
919 Flush the contents of the symbol cache.
920
f4abbc16
MM
921record btrace bts
922record bts
923 Start branch trace recording using Branch Trace Store (BTS) format.
924
36de76f9
JK
925compile print
926 Evaluate expression by using the compiler and print result.
927
a4ea0946
AB
928tui enable
929tui disable
930 Explicit commands for enabling and disabling tui mode.
931
29c1c244
WT
932show mpx bound
933set mpx bound on i386 and amd64
bc504a31 934 Support for bound table investigation on Intel MPX enabled applications.
29c1c244 935
b20a6524
MM
936record btrace pt
937record pt
bc504a31 938 Start branch trace recording using Intel Processor Trace format.
b20a6524 939
b0627500
MM
940maint info btrace
941 Print information about branch tracing internals.
942
943maint btrace packet-history
944 Print the raw branch tracing data.
945
946maint btrace clear-packet-history
947 Discard the stored raw branch tracing data.
948
949maint btrace clear
950 Discard all branch tracing data. It will be fetched and processed
951 anew by the next "record" command.
952
253828f1
JK
953* New options
954
b4f54984
DE
955set debug dwarf-die
956 Renamed from "set debug dwarf2-die".
957show debug dwarf-die
958 Renamed from "show debug dwarf2-die".
959
960set debug dwarf-read
961 Renamed from "set debug dwarf2-read".
962show debug dwarf-read
963 Renamed from "show debug dwarf2-read".
964
965maint set dwarf always-disassemble
966 Renamed from "maint set dwarf2 always-disassemble".
967maint show dwarf always-disassemble
968 Renamed from "maint show dwarf2 always-disassemble".
969
970maint set dwarf max-cache-age
971 Renamed from "maint set dwarf2 max-cache-age".
972maint show dwarf max-cache-age
973 Renamed from "maint show dwarf2 max-cache-age".
974
27e0867f
DE
975set debug dwarf-line
976show debug dwarf-line
977 Control display of debugging info regarding DWARF line processing.
978
ef0b411a
GB
979set max-completions
980show max-completions
981 Set the maximum number of candidates to be considered during
982 completion. The default value is 200. This limit allows GDB
983 to avoid generating large completion lists, the computation of
984 which can cause the debugger to become temporarily unresponsive.
985
fc637f04
PP
986set history remove-duplicates
987show history remove-duplicates
988 Control the removal of duplicate history entries.
989
f57d2163
DE
990maint set symbol-cache-size
991maint show symbol-cache-size
992 Control the size of the symbol cache.
993
d33501a5
MM
994set|show record btrace bts buffer-size
995 Set and show the size of the ring buffer used for branch tracing in
996 BTS format.
997 The obtained size may differ from the requested size. Use "info
998 record" to see the obtained buffer size.
999
7a6a1731
GB
1000set debug linux-namespaces
1001show debug linux-namespaces
1002 Control display of debugging info regarding Linux namespaces.
1003
b20a6524
MM
1004set|show record btrace pt buffer-size
1005 Set and show the size of the ring buffer used for branch tracing in
bc504a31 1006 Intel Processor Trace format.
b20a6524
MM
1007 The obtained size may differ from the requested size. Use "info
1008 record" to see the obtained buffer size.
1009
b0627500
MM
1010maint set|show btrace pt skip-pad
1011 Set and show whether PAD packets are skipped when computing the
1012 packet history.
1013
253828f1
JK
1014* The command 'thread apply all' can now support new option '-ascending'
1015 to call its specified command for all threads in ascending order.
1016
9f050062
DE
1017* Python/Guile scripting
1018
1019 ** GDB now supports auto-loading of Python/Guile scripts contained in the
1020 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts'.
1021
f4abbc16
MM
1022* New remote packets
1023
1024qXfer:btrace-conf:read
1025 Return the branch trace configuration for the current thread.
1026
d33501a5
MM
1027Qbtrace-conf:bts:size
1028 Set the requested ring buffer size for branch tracing in BTS format.
1029
b20a6524 1030Qbtrace:pt
bc504a31 1031 Enable Intel Procesor Trace-based branch tracing for the current
b20a6524
MM
1032 process. The remote stub reports support for this packet to GDB's
1033 qSupported query.
1034
1035Qbtrace-conf:pt:size
bc504a31 1036 Set the requested ring buffer size for branch tracing in Intel Processor
b20a6524
MM
1037 Trace format.
1038
f7e6eed5
PA
1039swbreak stop reason
1040 Indicates a memory breakpoint instruction was executed, irrespective
1041 of whether it was GDB that planted the breakpoint or the breakpoint
1042 is hardcoded in the program. This is required for correct non-stop
1043 mode operation.
1044
1045hwbreak stop reason
1046 Indicates the target stopped for a hardware breakpoint. This is
1047 required for correct non-stop mode operation.
1048
0a93529c
GB
1049vFile:fstat:
1050 Return information about files on the remote system.
1051
c78fa86a
GB
1052qXfer:exec-file:read
1053 Return the full absolute name of the file that was executed to
1054 create a process running on the remote system.
1055
15a201c8
GB
1056vFile:setfs:
1057 Select the filesystem on which vFile: operations with filename
1058 arguments will operate. This is required for GDB to be able to
1059 access files on remote targets where the remote stub does not
1060 share a common filesystem with the inferior(s).
1061
0d71eef5
DB
1062fork stop reason
1063 Indicates that a fork system call was executed.
1064
1065vfork stop reason
1066 Indicates that a vfork system call was executed.
1067
1068vforkdone stop reason
1069 Indicates that a vfork child of the specified process has executed
1070 an exec or exit, allowing the vfork parent to resume execution.
1071
1072fork-events and vfork-events features in qSupported
1073 The qSupported packet allows GDB to request support for fork and
1074 vfork events using new 'gdbfeatures' fork-events and vfork-events,
1075 and the qSupported response can contain the corresponding
1076 'stubfeatures'. Set and show commands can be used to display
1077 whether these features are enabled.
1078
1079* Extended-remote fork events
1080
1081 ** GDB now has support for fork events on extended-remote Linux
1082 targets. For targets with Linux kernels 2.5.60 and later, this
1083 enables follow-fork-mode and detach-on-fork for both fork and
1084 vfork, as well as fork and vfork catchpoints.
1085
d33501a5
MM
1086* The info record command now shows the recording format and the
1087 branch tracing configuration for the current thread when using
1088 the btrace record target.
1089 For the BTS format, it shows the ring buffer size.
1090
b05e3b0d
JM
1091* GDB now has support for DTrace USDT (Userland Static Defined
1092 Tracing) probes. The supported targets are x86_64-*-linux-gnu.
1093
550bdf96
AA
1094* GDB now supports access to vector registers on S/390 GNU/Linux
1095 targets.
1096
4f45d445
JK
1097* Removed command line options
1098
1099-xdb HP-UX XDB compatibility mode.
1100
0800b440
JK
1101* Removed targets and native configurations
1102
1103HP/PA running HP-UX hppa*-*-hpux*
1104Itanium running HP-UX ia64-*-hpux*
1105
58bfce93
MM
1106* New configure options
1107
1108--with-intel-pt
1109 This configure option allows the user to build GDB with support for
bc504a31 1110 Intel Processor Trace (default: auto). This requires libipt.
58bfce93
MM
1111
1112--with-libipt-prefix=PATH
1113 Specify the path to the version of libipt that GDB should use.
1114 $PATH/include should contain the intel-pt.h header and
1115 $PATH/lib should contain the libipt.so library.
1116
f5f85ab9
JB
1117*** Changes in GDB 7.9.1
1118
1119* Python Scripting
1120
1121 ** Xmethods can now specify a result type.
1122
3b2f13ff 1123*** Changes in GDB 7.9
919b9a93 1124
05db5edd
ST
1125* GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on x86 GNU Hurd.
1126
5f3b99cf 1127* Python Scripting
2b4fd423
DE
1128
1129 ** You can now access frame registers from Python scripts.
1130 ** New attribute 'producer' for gdb.Symtab objects.
d096d8c1
DE
1131 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "progspace",
1132 which is the gdb.Progspace object of the containing program space.
a0be3e44 1133 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "owner".
7c50a931
DE
1134 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "build_id",
1135 which is the build ID generated when the file was built.
86e4ed39 1136 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new method "add_separate_debug_file".
4ffbba72
DE
1137 ** A new event "gdb.clear_objfiles" has been added, triggered when
1138 selecting a new file to debug.
02be9a71 1139 ** You can now add attributes to gdb.Objfile and gdb.Progspace objects.
6dddd6a5 1140 ** New function gdb.lookup_objfile.
5f3b99cf 1141
8fda9068
YQ
1142 New events which are triggered when GDB modifies the state of the
1143 inferior.
1144
1145 ** gdb.events.inferior_call_pre: Function call is about to be made.
1146 ** gdb.events.inferior_call_post: Function call has just been made.
1147 ** gdb.events.memory_changed: A memory location has been altered.
1148 ** gdb.events.register_changed: A register has been altered.
1149
faa42425
DE
1150* New Python-based convenience functions:
1151
1152 ** $_caller_is(name [, number_of_frames])
1153 ** $_caller_matches(regexp [, number_of_frames])
1154 ** $_any_caller_is(name [, number_of_frames])
1155 ** $_any_caller_matches(regexp [, number_of_frames])
1156
bb2ec1b3
TT
1157* GDB now supports the compilation and injection of source code into
1158 the inferior. GDB will use GCC 5.0 or higher built with libcc1.so
1159 to compile the source code to object code, and if successful, inject
1160 and execute that code within the current context of the inferior.
1161 Currently the C language is supported. The commands used to
1162 interface with this new feature are:
1163
1164 compile code [-raw|-r] [--] [source code]
1165 compile file [-raw|-r] filename
1166
81219e53
DE
1167* New commands
1168
439250fb
DE
1169demangle [-l language] [--] name
1170 Demangle "name" in the specified language, or the current language
1171 if elided. This command is renamed from the "maint demangle" command.
1172 The latter is kept as a no-op to avoid "maint demangle" being interpreted
1173 as "maint demangler-warning".
1174
81219e53
DE
1175queue-signal signal-name-or-number
1176 Queue a signal to be delivered to the thread when it is resumed.
1177
f10c5b19
JK
1178add-auto-load-scripts-directory directory
1179 Add entries to the list of directories from which to load auto-loaded
1180 scripts.
1181
f5b95c01
AA
1182maint print user-registers
1183 List all currently available "user" registers.
1184
bb2ec1b3
TT
1185compile code [-r|-raw] [--] [source code]
1186 Compile, inject, and execute in the inferior the executable object
1187 code produced by compiling the provided source code.
1188
1189compile file [-r|-raw] filename
1190 Compile and inject into the inferior the executable object code
1191 produced by compiling the source code stored in the filename
1192 provided.
1193
70509625
PA
1194* On resume, GDB now always passes the signal the program had stopped
1195 for to the thread the signal was sent to, even if the user changed
1196 threads before resuming. Previously GDB would often (but not
1197 always) deliver the signal to the thread that happens to be current
1198 at resume time.
1199
1200* Conversely, the "signal" command now consistently delivers the
1201 requested signal to the current thread. GDB now asks for
1202 confirmation if the program had stopped for a signal and the user
1203 switched threads meanwhile.
1204
a25a5a45
PA
1205* "breakpoint always-inserted" modes "off" and "auto" merged.
1206
1207 Now, when 'breakpoint always-inserted mode' is set to "off", GDB
1208 won't remove breakpoints from the target until all threads stop,
1209 even in non-stop mode. The "auto" mode has been removed, and "off"
1210 is now the default mode.
1211
cc485e62
DE
1212* New options
1213
1214set debug symbol-lookup
1215show debug symbol-lookup
1216 Control display of debugging info regarding symbol lookup.
1217
2ddf4301
SM
1218* MI changes
1219
1220 ** The -list-thread-groups command outputs an exit-code field for
1221 inferiors that have exited.
1222
bb7e3f4d
YQ
1223* New targets
1224
1225MIPS SDE mips*-sde*-elf*
1226
3831839c
PA
1227* Removed targets
1228
1229Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
1230
5ab806de
PA
1231Alpha running OSF/1 (or Tru64) alpha*-*-osf*
1232SGI Irix-5.x mips-*-irix5*
1233SGI Irix-6.x mips-*-irix6*
09dd9a69
PA
1234VAX running (4.2 - 4.3 Reno) BSD vax-*-bsd*
1235VAX running Ultrix vax-*-ultrix*
3831839c 1236
6bf6fd09
JB
1237* The "dll-symbols" command, and its two aliases ("add-shared-symbol-files"
1238 and "assf"), have been removed. Use the "sharedlibrary" command, or
1239 its alias "share", instead.
1240
919b9a93 1241*** Changes in GDB 7.8
e9475ead 1242
8d551b02
DE
1243* New command line options
1244
1245-D data-directory
1246 This is an alias for the --data-directory option.
1247
e9475ead
SA
1248* GDB supports printing and modifying of variable length automatic arrays
1249 as specified in ISO C99.
1250
a75fef0e
NC
1251* The ARM simulator now supports instruction level tracing
1252 with or without disassembly.
b7bba001 1253
ed3ef339
DE
1254* Guile scripting
1255
1256 GDB now has support for scripting using Guile. Whether this is
1257 available is determined at configure time.
1258 Guile version 2.0 or greater is required.
1259 Guile version 2.0.9 is well tested, earlier 2.0 versions are not.
1260
1261* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
1262
1263guile [code]
1264gu [code]
1265 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Guile interpreter.
1266
1267guile-repl
1268gr
1269 Start a Guile interactive prompt (or "repl" for "read-eval-print loop").
1270
1271info auto-load guile-scripts [regexp]
1272 Print the list of automatically loaded Guile scripts.
1273
1274* The source command is now capable of sourcing Guile scripts.
1275 This feature is dependent on the debugger being built with Guile support.
1276
c6044dd1
JB
1277* New options
1278
770e7fc7
DE
1279set print symbol-loading (off|brief|full)
1280show print symbol-loading
1281 Control whether to print informational messages when loading symbol
1282 information for a file. The default is "full", but when debugging
1283 programs with large numbers of shared libraries the amount of output
1284 becomes less useful.
1285
ed3ef339
DE
1286set guile print-stack (none|message|full)
1287show guile print-stack
1288 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Guile script.
1289
1290set auto-load guile-scripts (on|off)
1291show auto-load guile-scripts
1292 Control auto-loading of Guile script files.
1293
c6044dd1
JB
1294maint ada set ignore-descriptive-types (on|off)
1295maint ada show ignore-descriptive-types
1296 Control whether the debugger should ignore descriptive types in Ada
1297 programs. The default is not to ignore the descriptive types. See
1298 the user manual for more details on descriptive types and the intended
1299 usage of this option.
1300
6a3cb8e8
PA
1301set auto-connect-native-target
1302
1303 Control whether GDB is allowed to automatically connect to the
1304 native target for the run, attach, etc. commands when not connected
1305 to any target yet. See also "target native" below.
1306
67b5c0c1
MM
1307set record btrace replay-memory-access (read-only|read-write)
1308show record btrace replay-memory-access
1309 Control what memory accesses are allowed during replay.
1310
329ea579
PA
1311maint set target-async (on|off)
1312maint show target-async
5784b3ca
JK
1313 This controls whether GDB targets operate in synchronous or
1314 asynchronous mode. Normally the default is asynchronous, if it is
329ea579 1315 available; but this can be changed to more easily debug problems
5784b3ca 1316 occurring only in synchronous mode.
329ea579
PA
1317
1318set mi-async (on|off)
1319show mi-async
1320 Control whether MI asynchronous mode is preferred. This supersedes
1321 "set target-async" of previous GDB versions.
1322
1323* "set target-async" is deprecated as a CLI option and is now an alias
1324 for "set mi-async" (only puts MI into async mode).
1325
1326* Background execution commands (e.g., "c&", "s&", etc.) are now
1327 possible ``out of the box'' if the target supports them. Previously
1328 the user would need to explicitly enable the possibility with the
1329 "set target-async on" command.
1330
87ce2a04
DE
1331* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
1332
1333 ** New option --debug-format=option1[,option2,...] allows one to add
1334 additional text to each output. At present only timestamps
1335 are supported: --debug-format=timestamps.
1336 Timestamps can also be turned on with the
1337 "monitor set debug-format timestamps" command from GDB.
1338
5de9129b
MM
1339* The 'record instruction-history' command now starts counting instructions
1340 at one. This also affects the instruction ranges reported by the
1341 'record function-call-history' command when given the /i modifier.
1342
8710b709
MM
1343* The command 'record function-call-history' supports a new modifier '/c' to
1344 indent the function names based on their call stack depth.
1345 The fields for the '/i' and '/l' modifier have been reordered.
1346 The source line range is now prefixed with 'at'.
1347 The instruction range is now prefixed with 'inst'.
1348 Both ranges are now printed as '<from>, <to>' to allow copy&paste to the
1349 "record instruction-history" and "list" commands.
1350
0688d04e
MM
1351* The ranges given as arguments to the 'record function-call-history' and
1352 'record instruction-history' commands are now inclusive.
1353
066ce621 1354* The btrace record target now supports the 'record goto' command.
0b722aec
MM
1355 For locations inside the execution trace, the back trace is computed
1356 based on the information stored in the execution trace.
066ce621 1357
52834460
MM
1358* The btrace record target supports limited reverse execution and replay.
1359 The target does not record data and therefore does not allow reading
1360 memory or registers.
1361
237b092b
AA
1362* The "catch syscall" command now works on s390*-linux* targets.
1363
936d2992
PA
1364* The "compare-sections" command is no longer specific to target
1365 remote. It now works with all targets.
1366
930ee1b1
PA
1367* All native targets are now consistently called "native".
1368 Consequently, the "target child", "target GNU", "target djgpp",
1369 "target procfs" (Solaris/Irix/OSF/AIX) and "target darwin-child"
1370 commands have been replaced with "target native". The QNX/NTO port
1371 leaves the "procfs" target in place and adds a "native" target for
1372 consistency with other ports. The impact on users should be minimal
1373 as these commands previously either throwed an error, or were
1374 no-ops. The target's name is visible in the output of the following
1375 commands: "help target", "info target", "info files", "maint print
1376 target-stack".
1377
6a3cb8e8
PA
1378* The "target native" command now connects to the native target. This
1379 can be used to launch native programs even when "set
1380 auto-connect-native-target" is set to off.
1381
bc504a31 1382* GDB now supports access to Intel MPX registers on GNU/Linux.
dc304a94 1383
bc504a31
PA
1384* Support for Intel AVX-512 registers on GNU/Linux.
1385 Support displaying and modifying Intel AVX-512 registers
dc304a94
JK
1386 $zmm0 - $zmm31 and $k0 - $k7 on GNU/Linux.
1387
969c39fb
MM
1388* New remote packets
1389
1390qXfer:btrace:read's annex
1391 The qXfer:btrace:read packet supports a new annex 'delta' to read
1392 branch trace incrementally.
1393
f7bd0f78
SC
1394* Python Scripting
1395
1396 ** Valid Python operations on gdb.Value objects representing
1397 structs/classes invoke the corresponding overloaded operators if
1398 available.
0c6e92a5
SC
1399 ** New `Xmethods' feature in the Python API. Xmethods are
1400 additional methods or replacements for existing methods of a C++
1401 class. This feature is useful for those cases where a method
1402 defined in C++ source code could be inlined or optimized out by
1403 the compiler, making it unavailable to GDB.
f7bd0f78 1404
36c24d95
UW
1405* New targets
1406PowerPC64 GNU/Linux little-endian powerpc64le-*-linux*
1407
95060284
JB
1408* The "dll-symbols" command, and its two aliases ("add-shared-symbol-files"
1409 and "assf"), have been deprecated. Use the "sharedlibrary" command, or
1410 its alias "share", instead.
1411
7f3c0343
JB
1412* The commands "set remotebaud" and "show remotebaud" are no longer
1413 supported. Use "set serial baud" and "show serial baud" (respectively)
1414 instead.
1415
329ea579
PA
1416* MI changes
1417
1418 ** A new option "-gdb-set mi-async" replaces "-gdb-set
1419 target-async". The latter is left as a deprecated alias of the
1420 former for backward compatibility. If the target supports it,
1421 CLI background execution commands are now always possible by
1422 default, independently of whether the frontend stated a
1423 preference for asynchronous execution with "-gdb-set mi-async".
1424 Previously "-gdb-set target-async off" affected both MI execution
1425 commands and CLI execution commands.
1426
b7bba001 1427*** Changes in GDB 7.7
2d450646 1428
33a97bbe
OJ
1429* Improved support for process record-replay and reverse debugging on
1430 arm*-linux* targets. Support for thumb32 and syscall instruction
1431 recording has been added.
1432
08248ca9
SDJ
1433* GDB now supports SystemTap SDT probes on AArch64 GNU/Linux.
1434
73869dc2
DE
1435* GDB now supports Fission DWP file format version 2.
1436 http://gcc.gnu.org/wiki/DebugFission
1437
a280dbd1
SDJ
1438* New convenience function "$_isvoid", to check whether an expression
1439 is void. A void expression is an expression where the type of the
1440 result is "void". For example, some convenience variables may be
1441 "void" when evaluated (e.g., "$_exitcode" before the execution of
1442 the program being debugged; or an undefined convenience variable).
1443 Another example, when calling a function whose return type is
1444 "void".
1445
52e260a3
DE
1446* The "maintenance print objfiles" command now takes an optional regexp.
1447
9f948660
SDJ
1448* The "catch syscall" command now works on arm*-linux* targets.
1449
901461f8
PA
1450* GDB now consistently shows "<not saved>" when printing values of
1451 registers the debug info indicates have not been saved in the frame
1452 and there's nowhere to retrieve them from
1453 (callee-saved/call-clobbered registers):
1454
1455 (gdb) p $rax
1456 $1 = <not saved>
1457
1458 (gdb) info registers rax
1459 rax <not saved>
1460
1461 Before, the former would print "<optimized out>", and the latter
1462 "*value not available*".
1463
caf26be9
SB
1464* New script contrib/gdb-add-index.sh for adding .gdb_index sections
1465 to binaries.
1466
1e611234
PM
1467* Python scripting
1468
1469 ** Frame filters and frame decorators have been added.
f76c27b5 1470 ** Temporary breakpoints are now supported.
bc79de95 1471 ** Line tables representation has been added.
a16b0e22
SC
1472 ** New attribute 'parent_type' for gdb.Field objects.
1473 ** gdb.Field objects can be used as subscripts on gdb.Value objects.
c0d48811 1474 ** New attribute 'name' for gdb.Type objects.
1e611234 1475
a1217d97
SL
1476* New targets
1477
1478Nios II ELF nios2*-*-elf
1479Nios II GNU/Linux nios2*-*-linux
42059f0e 1480Texas Instruments MSP430 msp430*-*-elf
a1217d97 1481
2659903b
JK
1482* Removed native configurations
1483
1484Support for these a.out NetBSD and OpenBSD obsolete configurations has
1485been removed. ELF variants of these configurations are kept supported.
1486
1487arm*-*-netbsd* but arm*-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
1488i[34567]86-*-netbsd* but i[34567]86-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
1489i[34567]86-*-openbsd[0-2].* but i[34567]86-*-openbsd* is kept supported.
1490i[34567]86-*-openbsd3.[0-3]
1491m68*-*-netbsd* but m68*-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
1492sparc-*-netbsd* but sparc-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
1493vax-*-netbsd* but vax-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
1494
bd712aed 1495* New commands:
b340913d
TT
1496catch rethrow
1497 Like "catch throw", but catches a re-thrown exception.
7d0c9981
DE
1498maint check-psymtabs
1499 Renamed from old "maint check-symtabs".
1500maint check-symtabs
1501 Perform consistency checks on symtabs.
1502maint expand-symtabs
1503 Expand symtabs matching an optional regexp.
b340913d 1504
dccca75d
EZ
1505show configuration
1506 Display the details of GDB configure-time options.
1507
bd712aed
DE
1508maint set|show per-command
1509maint set|show per-command space
1510maint set|show per-command time
1511maint set|show per-command symtab
1512 Enable display of per-command gdb resource usage.
1513
98297bf6
NB
1514remove-symbol-file FILENAME
1515remove-symbol-file -a ADDRESS
1516 Remove a symbol file added via add-symbol-file. The file to remove
1517 can be identified by its filename or by an address that lies within
1518 the boundaries of this symbol file in memory.
1519
58d06528
JB
1520info exceptions
1521info exceptions REGEXP
1522 Display the list of Ada exceptions defined in the program being
1523 debugged. If provided, only the exceptions whose names match REGEXP
1524 are listed.
1525
bd3eecc3
PA
1526* New options
1527
8fb8eb5c
DE
1528set debug symfile off|on
1529show debug symfile
1530 Control display of debugging info regarding reading symbol files and
1531 symbol tables within those files
1532
e7045703
DE
1533set print raw frame-arguments
1534show print raw frame-arguments
1535 Set/show whether to print frame arguments in raw mode,
1536 disregarding any defined pretty-printers.
1537
bd3eecc3
PA
1538set remote trace-status-packet
1539show remote trace-status-packet
1540 Set/show the use of remote protocol qTStatus packet.
1541
a1217d97
SL
1542set debug nios2
1543show debug nios2
1544 Control display of debugging messages related to Nios II targets.
1545
c1e36e3e
PA
1546set range-stepping
1547show range-stepping
1548 Control whether target-assisted range stepping is enabled.
1549
98882a26
PA
1550set startup-with-shell
1551show startup-with-shell
1552 Specifies whether Unix child processes are started via a shell or
1553 directly.
1554
29453a14
YQ
1555set code-cache
1556show code-cache
1557 Use the target memory cache for accesses to the code segment. This
1558 improves performance of remote debugging (particularly disassembly).
1559
1c2e4450
PA
1560* You can now use a literal value 'unlimited' for options that
1561 interpret 0 or -1 as meaning "unlimited". E.g., "set
1562 trace-buffer-size unlimited" is now an alias for "set
1563 trace-buffer-size -1" and "set height unlimited" is now an alias for
1564 "set height 0".
1565
db0fec5c
DE
1566* The "set debug symtab-create" debugging option of GDB has been changed to
1567 accept a verbosity level. 0 means "off", 1 provides basic debugging
1568 output, and values of 2 or greater provides more verbose output.
1569
dccca75d
EZ
1570* New command-line options
1571--configuration
1572 Display the details of GDB configure-time options.
1573
d0353e76
YQ
1574* The command 'tsave' can now support new option '-ctf' to save trace
1575 buffer in Common Trace Format.
1576
b292c783
JK
1577* Newly installed $prefix/bin/gcore acts as a shell interface for the
1578 GDB command gcore.
1579
6e72ca20
TT
1580* GDB now implements the the C++ 'typeid' operator.
1581
b340913d
TT
1582* The new convenience variable $_exception holds the exception being
1583 thrown or caught at an exception-related catchpoint.
1584
1585* The exception-related catchpoints, like "catch throw", now accept a
1586 regular expression which can be used to filter exceptions by type.
1587
0c557179
SDJ
1588* The new convenience variable $_exitsignal is automatically set to
1589 the terminating signal number when the program being debugged dies
1590 due to an uncaught signal.
1591
d0353e76
YQ
1592* MI changes
1593
403cb6b1 1594 ** All MI commands now accept an optional "--language" option.
4e35e808
JB
1595 Support for this feature can be verified by using the "-list-features"
1596 command, which should contain "language-option".
403cb6b1 1597
6b7cbff1
JB
1598 ** The new command -info-gdb-mi-command allows the user to determine
1599 whether a GDB/MI command is supported or not.
1600
2ea126fa
JB
1601 ** The "^error" result record returned when trying to execute an undefined
1602 GDB/MI command now provides a variable named "code" whose content is the
1603 "undefined-command" error code. Support for this feature can be verified
1604 by using the "-list-features" command, which should contain
1605 "undefined-command-error-code".
1606
d0353e76
YQ
1607 ** The -trace-save MI command can optionally save trace buffer in Common
1608 Trace Format now.
1609
c5867ab6
HZ
1610 ** The new command -dprintf-insert sets a dynamic printf breakpoint.
1611
c898adb7
YQ
1612 ** The command -data-list-register-values now accepts an optional
1613 "--skip-unavailable" option. When used, only the available registers
1614 are displayed.
1615
dc673c81
YQ
1616 ** The new command -trace-frame-collected dumps collected variables,
1617 computed expressions, tvars, memory and registers in a traceframe.
1618
6211c335
YQ
1619 ** The commands -stack-list-locals, -stack-list-arguments and
1620 -stack-list-variables now accept an option "--skip-unavailable".
1621 When used, only the available locals or arguments are displayed.
1622
5713b9b5
JB
1623 ** The -exec-run command now accepts an optional "--start" option.
1624 When used, the command follows the same semantics as the "start"
1625 command, stopping the program's execution at the start of its
72bfa06c
JB
1626 main subprogram. Support for this feature can be verified using
1627 the "-list-features" command, which should contain
1628 "exec-run-start-option".
5713b9b5 1629
40555925
JB
1630 ** The new commands -catch-assert and -catch-exceptions insert
1631 catchpoints stopping the program when Ada exceptions are raised.
1632
58d06528
JB
1633 ** The new command -info-ada-exceptions provides the equivalent of
1634 the new "info exceptions" command.
1635
0201faac
JB
1636* New system-wide configuration scripts
1637 A GDB installation now provides scripts suitable for use as system-wide
1638 configuration scripts for the following systems:
1639 ** ElinOS
1640 ** Wind River Linux
1641
c1e36e3e
PA
1642* GDB now supports target-assigned range stepping with remote targets.
1643 This improves the performance of stepping source lines by reducing
1644 the number of control packets from/to GDB. See "New remote packets"
1645 below.
1646
28a93511
YQ
1647* GDB now understands the element 'tvar' in the XML traceframe info.
1648 It has the id of the collected trace state variables.
1649
4ac33720
UW
1650* On S/390 targets that provide the transactional-execution feature,
1651 the program interruption transaction diagnostic block (TDB) is now
1652 represented as a number of additional "registers" in GDB.
1653
c1e36e3e
PA
1654* New remote packets
1655
1656vCont;r
1657
1658 The vCont packet supports a new 'r' action, that tells the remote
1659 stub to step through an address range itself, without GDB
1660 involvemement at each single-step.
1661
7f91dbec
GB
1662qXfer:libraries-svr4:read's annex
1663 The previously unused annex of the qXfer:libraries-svr4:read packet
1664 is now used to support passing an argument list. The remote stub
1665 reports support for this argument list to GDB's qSupported query.
1666 The defined arguments are "start" and "prev", used to reduce work
1667 necessary for library list updating, resulting in significant
1668 speedup.
1669
c2d6af84
PA
1670* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
1671
1672 ** GDBserver now supports target-assisted range stepping. Currently
1673 enabled on x86/x86_64 GNU/Linux targets.
1674
28a93511
YQ
1675 ** GDBserver now adds element 'tvar' in the XML in the reply to
1676 'qXfer:traceframe-info:read'. It has the id of the collected
1677 trace state variables.
1678
7a60ad40
YQ
1679 ** GDBserver now supports hardware watchpoints on the MIPS GNU/Linux
1680 target.
1681
6fbe845e
AB
1682* New 'z' formatter for printing and examining memory, this displays the
1683 value as hexadecimal zero padded on the left to the size of the type.
1684
9058cc3a
TG
1685* GDB can now use Windows x64 unwinding data.
1686
0d12017b
JB
1687* The "set remotebaud" command has been replaced by "set serial baud".
1688 Similarly, "show remotebaud" has been replaced by "show serial baud".
1689 The "set remotebaud" and "show remotebaud" commands are still available
1690 to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
1691
2d450646 1692*** Changes in GDB 7.6
80c8d323 1693
59ea5688
MM
1694* Target record has been renamed to record-full.
1695 Record/replay is now enabled with the "record full" command.
1696 This also affects settings that are associated with full record/replay
1697 that have been moved from "set/show record" to "set/show record full":
1698
1699set|show record full insn-number-max
1700set|show record full stop-at-limit
1701set|show record full memory-query
1702
1703* A new record target "record-btrace" has been added. The new target
1704 uses hardware support to record the control-flow of a process. It
1705 does not support replaying the execution, but it implements the
1706 below new commands for investigating the recorded execution log.
1707 This new recording method can be enabled using:
1708
1709record btrace
1710
1711 The "record-btrace" target is only available on Intel Atom processors
1712 and requires a Linux kernel 2.6.32 or later.
1713
1714* Two new commands have been added for record/replay to give information
1715 about the recorded execution without having to replay the execution.
1716 The commands are only supported by "record btrace".
1717
1718record instruction-history prints the execution history at
1719 instruction granularity
1720
1721record function-call-history prints the execution history at
1722 function granularity
1723
543bf33d
AT
1724* New native configurations
1725
51d66578 1726ARM AArch64 GNU/Linux aarch64*-*-linux-gnu
543bf33d 1727FreeBSD/powerpc powerpc*-*-freebsd
4f4352f7 1728x86_64/Cygwin x86_64-*-cygwin*
ea5f3910 1729Tilera TILE-Gx GNU/Linux tilegx*-*-linux-gnu
543bf33d 1730
249729c4
JB
1731* New targets
1732
51d66578
MS
1733ARM AArch64 aarch64*-*-elf
1734ARM AArch64 GNU/Linux aarch64*-*-linux
249729c4 1735Lynx 178 PowerPC powerpc-*-lynx*178
3c095f49 1736x86_64/Cygwin x86_64-*-cygwin*
ea5f3910 1737Tilera TILE-Gx GNU/Linux tilegx*-*-linux
249729c4 1738
e64e0392
DE
1739* If the configured location of system.gdbinit file (as given by the
1740 --with-system-gdbinit option at configure time) is in the
1741 data-directory (as specified by --with-gdb-datadir at configure
1742 time) or in one of its subdirectories, then GDB will look for the
1743 system-wide init file in the directory specified by the
1744 --data-directory command-line option.
1745
07540c15
DE
1746* New command line options:
1747
1748-nh Disables auto-loading of ~/.gdbinit, but still executes all the
1749 other initialization files, unlike -nx which disables all of them.
1750
e93a8774
TT
1751* Removed command line options
1752
1753-epoch This was used by the gdb mode in Epoch, an ancient fork of
1754 Emacs.
1755
53342f27
TT
1756* The 'ptype' and 'whatis' commands now accept an argument to control
1757 type formatting.
1758
451b7c33
TT
1759* 'info proc' now works on some core files.
1760
a72c3253
DE
1761* Python scripting
1762
1763 ** Vectors can be created with gdb.Type.vector.
1764
d7de8e3c
TT
1765 ** Python's atexit.register now works in GDB.
1766
18a9fc12
TT
1767 ** Types can be pretty-printed via a Python API.
1768
9a27f2c6
PK
1769 ** Python 3 is now supported (in addition to Python 2.4 or later)
1770
bea883fd
SCR
1771 ** New class gdb.Architecture exposes GDB's internal representation
1772 of architecture in the Python API.
1773
1774 ** New method Frame.architecture returns the gdb.Architecture object
1775 corresponding to the frame's architecture.
1776
a72c3253
DE
1777* New Python-based convenience functions:
1778
1779 ** $_memeq(buf1, buf2, length)
1780 ** $_streq(str1, str2)
1781 ** $_strlen(str)
1782 ** $_regex(str, regex)
1783
f3c8a52a
JK
1784* The 'cd' command now defaults to using '~' (the home directory) if not
1785 given an argument.
1786
1605ef26
TT
1787* The C++ ABI now defaults to the GNU v3 ABI. This has been the
1788 default for GCC since November 2000.
1789
504b36fd
YQ
1790* The command 'forward-search' can now be abbreviated as 'fo'.
1791
f2a8bc8a
YQ
1792* The command 'info tracepoints' can now display 'installed on target'
1793 or 'not installed on target' for each non-pending location of tracepoint.
1794
23a80689
JB
1795* New configure options
1796
1797--enable-libmcheck/--disable-libmcheck
1798 By default, development versions are built with -lmcheck on hosts
1799 that support it, in order to help track memory corruption issues.
1800 Release versions, on the other hand, are built without -lmcheck
1801 by default. The --enable-libmcheck/--disable-libmcheck configure
1802 options allow the user to override that default.
393fd4c3
YQ
1803--with-babeltrace/--with-babeltrace-include/--with-babeltrace-lib
1804 This configure option allows the user to build GDB with
1805 libbabeltrace using which GDB can read Common Trace Format data.
23a80689 1806
d6b28940
TT
1807* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
1808
ab04a2af
TT
1809catch signal
1810 Catch signals. This is similar to "handle", but allows commands and
1811 conditions to be attached.
1812
d6b28940
TT
1813maint info bfds
1814 List the BFDs known to GDB.
1815
8315665e
YPK
1816python-interactive [command]
1817pi [command]
1818 Start a Python interactive prompt, or evaluate the optional command
1819 and print the result of expressions.
1820
1821py [command]
1822 "py" is a new alias for "python".
1823
18a9fc12
TT
1824enable type-printer [name]...
1825disable type-printer [name]...
1826 Enable or disable type printers.
1827
aa9259cc
TS
1828* Removed commands
1829
1830 ** For the Renesas Super-H architecture, the "regs" command has been removed
1831 (has been deprecated in GDB 7.5), and "info all-registers" should be used
1832 instead.
1833
53342f27
TT
1834* New options
1835
1836set print type methods (on|off)
1837show print type methods
1838 Control whether method declarations are displayed by "ptype".
1839 The default is to show them.
1840
1841set print type typedefs (on|off)
1842show print type typedefs
1843 Control whether typedef definitions are displayed by "ptype".
1844 The default is to show them.
1845
1b56eb55
JK
1846set filename-display basename|relative|absolute
1847show filename-display
1848 Control the way in which filenames is displayed.
1849 The default is "relative", which preserves previous behavior.
1850
e9f1758d
PA
1851set trace-buffer-size
1852show trace-buffer-size
1853 Request target to change the size of trace buffer.
1854
a46c1e42
PA
1855set remote trace-buffer-size-packet auto|on|off
1856show remote trace-buffer-size-packet
1857 Control the use of the remote protocol `QTBuffer:size' packet.
1858
be9a8770
PA
1859set debug aarch64
1860show debug aarch64
1861 Control display of debugging messages related to ARM AArch64.
1862 The default is off.
1863
1864set debug coff-pe-read
1865show debug coff-pe-read
1866 Control display of debugging messages related to reading of COFF/PE
1867 exported symbols.
1868
1869set debug mach-o
1870show debug mach-o
1871 Control display of debugging messages related to Mach-O symbols
1872 processing.
1873
1874set debug notification
1875show debug notification
1876 Control display of debugging info for async remote notification.
1877
5b9afe8a
YQ
1878* MI changes
1879
1880 ** Command parameter changes are now notified using new async record
1881 "=cmd-param-changed".
201b4506
YQ
1882 ** Trace frame changes caused by command "tfind" are now notified using
1883 new async record "=traceframe-changed".
134a2066
YQ
1884 ** The creation, deletion and modification of trace state variables
1885 are now notified using new async records "=tsv-created",
1886 "=tsv-deleted" and "=tsv-modified".
82a90ccf
YQ
1887 ** The start and stop of process record are now notified using new
1888 async record "=record-started" and "=record-stopped".
8de0566d
YQ
1889 ** Memory changes are now notified using new async record
1890 "=memory-changed".
ed8a1c2d 1891 ** The data-disassemble command response will include a "fullname" field
ec83d211 1892 containing the absolute file name when source has been requested.
62747a60
TT
1893 ** New optional parameter COUNT added to the "-data-write-memory-bytes"
1894 command, to allow pattern filling of memory areas.
3fa7bf06
MG
1895 ** New commands "-catch-load"/"-catch-unload" added for intercepting
1896 library load/unload events.
f2a8bc8a
YQ
1897 ** The response to breakpoint commands and breakpoint async records
1898 includes an "installed" field containing a boolean state about each
1899 non-pending tracepoint location is whether installed on target or not.
f5911ea1
HAQ
1900 ** Output of the "-trace-status" command includes a "trace-file" field
1901 containing the name of the trace file being examined. This field is
1902 optional, and only present when examining a trace file.
ec83d211
JK
1903 ** The "fullname" field is now always present along with the "file" field,
1904 even if the file cannot be found by GDB.
5b9afe8a 1905
608e2dbb
TT
1906* GDB now supports the "mini debuginfo" section, .gnu_debugdata.
1907 You must have the LZMA library available when configuring GDB for this
1908 feature to be enabled. For more information, see:
1909 http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Features/MiniDebugInfo
1910
f6f899bf
HAQ
1911* New remote packets
1912
1913QTBuffer:size
1914 Set the size of trace buffer. The remote stub reports support for this
1915 packet to gdb's qSupported query.
1916
10782d74
MM
1917Qbtrace:bts
1918 Enable Branch Trace Store (BTS)-based branch tracing for the current
1919 thread. The remote stub reports support for this packet to gdb's
1920 qSupported query.
1921
1922Qbtrace:off
1923 Disable branch tracing for the current thread. The remote stub reports
1924 support for this packet to gdb's qSupported query.
1925
1926qXfer:btrace:read
1927 Read the traced branches for the current thread. The remote stub
1928 reports support for this packet to gdb's qSupported query.
1929
80c8d323 1930*** Changes in GDB 7.5
d6e00af6 1931
1b3371b1
L
1932* GDB now supports x32 ABI. Visit <http://sites.google.com/site/x32abi/>
1933 for more x32 ABI info.
1934
d0e64392
MR
1935* GDB now supports access to MIPS DSP registers on Linux targets.
1936
4cc0665f
MR
1937* GDB now supports debugging microMIPS binaries.
1938
85d4a676
SS
1939* The "info os" command on GNU/Linux can now display information on
1940 several new classes of objects managed by the operating system:
1941 "info os procgroups" lists process groups
1942 "info os files" lists file descriptors
1943 "info os sockets" lists internet-domain sockets
1944 "info os shm" lists shared-memory regions
1945 "info os semaphores" lists semaphores
1946 "info os msg" lists message queues
1947 "info os modules" lists loaded kernel modules
1948
55aa24fb
SDJ
1949* GDB now has support for SDT (Static Defined Tracing) probes. Currently,
1950 the only implemented backend is for SystemTap probes (<sys/sdt.h>). You
1951 can set a breakpoint using the new "-probe, "-pstap" or "-probe-stap"
1952 options and inspect the probe arguments using the new $_probe_arg family
1953 of convenience variables. You can obtain more information about SystemTap
1954 in <http://sourceware.org/systemtap/>.
1955
72508ac0
PO
1956* GDB now supports reversible debugging on ARM, it allows you to
1957 debug basic ARM and THUMB instructions, and provides
1958 record/replay support.
1959
16899756
DE
1960* The option "symbol-reloading" has been deleted as it is no longer used.
1961
4795f398
DE
1962* Python scripting
1963
7d74f244
DE
1964 ** GDB commands implemented in Python can now be put in command class
1965 "gdb.COMMAND_USER".
1966
4795f398
DE
1967 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" is now deleted.
1968
50897289
TT
1969 ** A new class, gdb.printing.FlagEnumerationPrinter, can be used to
1970 apply "flag enum"-style pretty-printing to any enum.
1971
64e7d9dd
TT
1972 ** gdb.lookup_symbol can now work when there is no current frame.
1973
1974 ** gdb.Symbol now has a 'line' attribute, holding the line number in
1975 the source at which the symbol was defined.
1976
f0823d2c
TT
1977 ** gdb.Symbol now has the new attribute 'needs_frame' and the new
1978 method 'value'. The former indicates whether the symbol needs a
1979 frame in order to compute its value, and the latter computes the
1980 symbol's value.
1981
7b282c5a
SCR
1982 ** A new method 'referenced_value' on gdb.Value objects which can
1983 dereference pointer as well as C++ reference values.
1984
a20ee7a4
SCR
1985 ** New methods 'global_block' and 'static_block' on gdb.Symtab objects
1986 which return the global and static blocks (as gdb.Block objects),
1987 of the underlying symbol table, respectively.
1988
7efc75aa
SCR
1989 ** New function gdb.find_pc_line which returns the gdb.Symtab_and_line
1990 object associated with a PC value.
1991
ee0bf529
SCR
1992 ** gdb.Symtab_and_line has new attribute 'last' which holds the end
1993 of the address range occupied by code for the current source line.
1994
a766d390
DE
1995* Go language support.
1996 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the Go programming
1997 language.
1998
e0f9f062
DE
1999* GDBserver now supports stdio connections.
2000 E.g. (gdb) target remote | ssh myhost gdbserver - hello
2001
217bff3e
JK
2002* The binary "gdbtui" can no longer be built or installed.
2003 Use "gdb -tui" instead.
2004
cafec441
TT
2005* GDB will now print "flag" enums specially. A flag enum is one where
2006 all the enumerator values have no bits in common when pairwise
2007 "and"ed. When printing a value whose type is a flag enum, GDB will
2008 show all the constants, e.g., for enum E { ONE = 1, TWO = 2}:
2009 (gdb) print (enum E) 3
2010 $1 = (ONE | TWO)
2011
4aac40c8
TT
2012* The filename part of a linespec will now match trailing components
2013 of a source file name. For example, "break gcc/expr.c:1000" will
2014 now set a breakpoint in build/gcc/expr.c, but not
2015 build/libcpp/expr.c.
2016
d99bd577
UW
2017* The "info proc" and "generate-core-file" commands will now also
2018 work on remote targets connected to GDBserver on Linux.
2019
53fe1783
GB
2020* The command "info catch" has been removed. It has been disabled
2021 since December 2007.
2022
e41eec66
JB
2023* The "catch exception" and "catch assert" commands now accept
2024 a condition at the end of the command, much like the "break"
2025 command does. For instance:
2026
2027 (gdb) catch exception Constraint_Error if Barrier = True
2028
2029 Previously, it was possible to add a condition to such catchpoints,
2030 but it had to be done as a second step, after the catchpoint had been
2031 created, using the "condition" command.
2032
5808517f
YQ
2033* The "info static-tracepoint-marker" command will now also work on
2034 native Linux targets with in-process agent.
2035
481860b3
GB
2036* GDB can now set breakpoints on inlined functions.
2037
2038* The .gdb_index section has been updated to include symbols for
2039 inlined functions. GDB will ignore older .gdb_index sections by
2040 default, which could cause symbol files to be loaded more slowly
e615022a
DE
2041 until their .gdb_index sections can be recreated. The new command
2042 "set use-deprecated-index-sections on" will cause GDB to use any older
2043 .gdb_index sections it finds. This will restore performance, but the
2044 ability to set breakpoints on inlined functions will be lost in symbol
2045 files with older .gdb_index sections.
481860b3 2046
156942c7
DE
2047 The .gdb_index section has also been updated to record more information
2048 about each symbol. This speeds up the "info variables", "info functions"
2049 and "info types" commands when used with programs having the .gdb_index
2050 section, as well as speeding up debugging with shared libraries using
2051 the .gdb_index section.
2052
927fbba6
JB
2053* Ada support for GDB/MI Variable Objects has been added.
2054
20388dd6
YQ
2055* GDB can now support 'breakpoint always-inserted mode' in 'record'
2056 target.
2057
f3e0e960
SS
2058* MI changes
2059
2060 ** New command -info-os is the MI equivalent of "info os".
2061
37ce89eb
SS
2062 ** Output logs ("set logging" and related) now include MI output.
2063
edcc5120
TT
2064* New commands
2065
e615022a
DE
2066 ** "set use-deprecated-index-sections on|off"
2067 "show use-deprecated-index-sections on|off"
2068 Controls the use of deprecated .gdb_index sections.
2069
edcc5120
TT
2070 ** "catch load" and "catch unload" can be used to stop when a shared
2071 library is loaded or unloaded, respectively.
2072
816338b5
SS
2073 ** "enable count" can be used to auto-disable a breakpoint after
2074 several hits.
2075
57651221 2076 ** "info vtbl" can be used to show the virtual method tables for
c4aeac85
TT
2077 C++ and Java objects.
2078
06fc020f 2079 ** "explore" and its sub commands "explore value" and "explore type"
6ea71545 2080 can be used to recursively explore values and types of
06fc020f
SCR
2081 expressions. These commands are available only if GDB is
2082 configured with '--with-python'.
2083
bf88dd68
JK
2084 ** "info auto-load" shows status of all kinds of auto-loaded files,
2085 "info auto-load gdb-scripts" shows status of auto-loading GDB canned
2086 sequences of commands files, "info auto-load python-scripts"
2087 shows status of auto-loading Python script files,
2088 "info auto-load local-gdbinit" shows status of loading init file
2089 (.gdbinit) from current directory and "info auto-load libthread-db" shows
2090 status of inferior specific thread debugging shared library loading.
2091
2092 ** "info auto-load-scripts", "set auto-load-scripts on|off"
2093 and "show auto-load-scripts" commands have been deprecated, use their
2094 "info auto-load python-scripts", "set auto-load python-scripts on|off"
2095 and "show auto-load python-scripts" counterparts instead.
2096
e7e0cddf
SS
2097 ** "dprintf location,format,args..." creates a dynamic printf, which
2098 is basically a breakpoint that does a printf and immediately
2099 resumes your program's execution, so it is like a printf that you
2100 can insert dynamically at runtime instead of at compiletime.
2101
9cb709b6
TT
2102 ** "set print symbol"
2103 "show print symbol"
2104 Controls whether GDB attempts to display the symbol, if any,
2105 corresponding to addresses it prints. This defaults to "on", but
2106 you can set it to "off" to restore GDB's previous behavior.
2107
2d4c29c5
TS
2108* Deprecated commands
2109
2110 ** For the Renesas Super-H architecture, the "regs" command has been
2111 deprecated, and "info all-registers" should be used instead.
2112
a58b110a
KB
2113* New targets
2114
2115Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
60c9a3c0 2116HP OpenVMS ia64 ia64-hp-openvms*
a58b110a 2117
72895ff6
LM
2118* GDBserver supports evaluation of breakpoint conditions. When
2119 support is advertised by GDBserver, GDB may be told to send the
2120 breakpoint conditions in bytecode form to GDBserver. GDBserver
2121 will only report the breakpoint trigger to GDB when its condition
2122 evaluates to true.
2123
2124* New options
2125
4cc0665f
MR
2126set mips compression
2127show mips compression
2128 Select the compressed ISA encoding used in functions that have no symbol
2129 information available. The encoding can be set to either of:
2130 mips16
2131 micromips
2132 and is updated automatically from ELF file flags if available.
2133
72895ff6
LM
2134set breakpoint condition-evaluation
2135show breakpoint condition-evaluation
cf65ecd3 2136 Control whether breakpoint conditions are evaluated by GDB ("host") or by
5b43fab2
JK
2137 GDBserver ("target"). Default option "auto" chooses the most efficient
2138 available mode.
72895ff6
LM
2139 This option can improve debugger efficiency depending on the speed of the
2140 target.
2141
bf88dd68
JK
2142set auto-load off
2143 Disable auto-loading globally.
2144
2145show auto-load
2146 Show auto-loading setting of all kinds of auto-loaded files.
2147
2148set auto-load gdb-scripts on|off
2149show auto-load gdb-scripts
2150 Control auto-loading of GDB canned sequences of commands files.
2151
2152set auto-load python-scripts on|off
2153show auto-load python-scripts
2154 Control auto-loading of Python script files.
2155
2156set auto-load local-gdbinit on|off
2157show auto-load local-gdbinit
2158 Control loading of init file (.gdbinit) from current directory.
2159
2160set auto-load libthread-db on|off
2161show auto-load libthread-db
2162 Control auto-loading of inferior specific thread debugging shared library.
2163
7349ff92 2164set auto-load scripts-directory <dir1>[:<dir2>...]
9cc815f5 2165show auto-load scripts-directory
7349ff92
JK
2166 Set a list of directories from which to load auto-loaded scripts.
2167 Automatically loaded Python scripts and GDB scripts are located in one
2168 of the directories listed by this option.
2169 The delimiter (':' above) may differ according to the host platform.
2170
bccbefd2
JK
2171set auto-load safe-path <dir1>[:<dir2>...]
2172show auto-load safe-path
2173 Set a list of directories from which it is safe to auto-load files.
2174 The delimiter (':' above) may differ according to the host platform.
2175
4dc84fd1
JK
2176set debug auto-load on|off
2177show debug auto-load
2178 Control display of debugging info for auto-loading the files above.
2179
d3ce09f5 2180set dprintf-style gdb|call|agent
e7e0cddf 2181show dprintf-style
d3ce09f5
SS
2182 Control the way in which a dynamic printf is performed; "gdb"
2183 requests a GDB printf command, while "call" causes dprintf to call a
2184 function in the inferior. "agent" requests that the target agent
2185 (such as GDBserver) do the printing.
e7e0cddf
SS
2186
2187set dprintf-function <expr>
2188show dprintf-function
2189set dprintf-channel <expr>
2190show dprintf-channel
2191 Set the function and optional first argument to the call when using
2192 the "call" style of dynamic printf.
2193
d3ce09f5
SS
2194set disconnected-dprintf on|off
2195show disconnected-dprintf
2196 Control whether agent-style dynamic printfs continue to be in effect
2197 after GDB disconnects.
2198
6dea1fbd
JK
2199* New configure options
2200
7349ff92
JK
2201--with-auto-load-dir
2202 Configure default value for the 'set auto-load scripts-directory'
1564a261
JK
2203 setting above. It defaults to '$debugdir:$datadir/auto-load',
2204 $debugdir representing global debugging info directories (available
2205 via 'show debug-file-directory') and $datadir representing GDB's data
2206 directory (available via 'show data-directory').
7349ff92 2207
6dea1fbd
JK
2208--with-auto-load-safe-path
2209 Configure default value for the 'set auto-load safe-path' setting
7349ff92 2210 above. It defaults to the --with-auto-load-dir setting.
6dea1fbd
JK
2211
2212--without-auto-load-safe-path
2213 Set 'set auto-load safe-path' to '/', effectively disabling this
2214 security feature.
2215
72895ff6
LM
2216* New remote packets
2217
74c48cbb
PA
2218z0/z1 conditional breakpoints extension
2219
72895ff6
LM
2220 The z0/z1 breakpoint insertion packets have been extended to carry
2221 a list of conditional expressions over to the remote stub depending on the
2222 condition evaluation mode. The use of this extension can be controlled
2223 via the "set remote conditional-breakpoints-packet" command.
2224
9b224c5e
PA
2225QProgramSignals:
2226
2227 Specify the signals which the remote stub may pass to the debugged
2228 program without GDB involvement.
2229
8320cc4f
JK
2230* New command line options
2231
2232--init-command=FILE, -ix Like --command, -x but execute it
2233 before loading inferior.
2234--init-eval-command=COMMAND, -iex Like --eval-command=COMMAND, -ex but
2235 execute it before loading inferior.
2236
8837a20f
JB
2237*** Changes in GDB 7.4
2238
f8eba3c6
TT
2239* GDB now handles ambiguous linespecs more consistently; the existing
2240 FILE:LINE support has been expanded to other types of linespecs. A
2241 breakpoint will now be set on all matching locations in all
2242 inferiors, and locations will be added or removed according to
2243 inferior changes.
2244
1bfeeb0f
JL
2245* GDB now allows you to skip uninteresting functions and files when
2246 stepping with the "skip function" and "skip file" commands.
2247
480a3f21
PW
2248* GDB has two new commands: "set remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit"
2249 and "show remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit". These allows to
2250 set or show the maximum length limit (in bytes) of a remote
2251 target hardware watchpoint.
2252
2253 This allows e.g. to use "unlimited" hardware watchpoints with the
2254 gdbserver integrated in Valgrind version >= 3.7.0. Such Valgrind
2255 watchpoints are slower than real hardware watchpoints but are
2256 significantly faster than gdb software watchpoints.
2257
3a7bf607
PM
2258* Python scripting
2259
32d1c362 2260 ** The register_pretty_printer function in module gdb.printing now takes
7d0aff21 2261 an optional `replace' argument. If True, the new printer replaces any
32d1c362
DE
2262 existing one.
2263
3a7bf607 2264 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" command has been
4795f398
DE
2265 deprecated and will be deleted in GDB 7.5.
2266 A new command: "set python print-stack none|full|message" has
2267 replaced it. Additionally, the default for "print-stack" is
2268 now "message", which just prints the error message without
2269 the stack trace.
3a7bf607 2270
baacfb07 2271 ** A prompt substitution hook (prompt_hook) is now available to the
3a7bf607 2272 Python API.
713389e0 2273
fa3a4f15
PM
2274 ** A new Python module, gdb.prompt has been added to the GDB Python
2275 modules library. This module provides functionality for
baacfb07 2276 escape sequences in prompts (used by set/show
fa3a4f15
PM
2277 extended-prompt). These escape sequences are replaced by their
2278 corresponding value.
2279
5e239b84
PM
2280 ** Python commands and convenience-functions located in
2281 'data-directory'/python/gdb/command and
2282 'data-directory'/python/gdb/function are now automatically loaded
2283 on GDB start-up.
2284
9df2fbc4
PM
2285 ** Blocks now provide four new attributes. global_block and
2286 static_block will return the global and static blocks
2287 respectively. is_static and is_global are boolean attributes
2288 that indicate if the block is one of those two types.
2289
457e09f0
DE
2290 ** Symbols now provide the "type" attribute, the type of the symbol.
2291
6839b47f
KP
2292 ** The "gdb.breakpoint" function has been deprecated in favor of
2293 "gdb.breakpoints".
2294
cc72b2a2
KP
2295 ** A new class "gdb.FinishBreakpoint" is provided to catch the return
2296 of a function. This class is based on the "finish" command
2297 available in the CLI.
2298
84ad80e6
PK
2299 ** Type objects for struct and union types now allow access to
2300 the fields using standard Python dictionary (mapping) methods.
2301 For example, "some_type['myfield']" now works, as does
2302 "some_type.items()".
2303
20c168b5
KP
2304 ** A new event "gdb.new_objfile" has been added, triggered by loading a
2305 new object file.
2306
03c3051a
PK
2307 ** A new function, "deep_items" has been added to the gdb.types
2308 module in the GDB Python modules library. This function returns
2309 an iterator over the fields of a struct or union type. Unlike
2310 the standard Python "iteritems" method, it will recursively traverse
2311 any anonymous fields.
2312
7376e450
TT
2313* MI changes
2314
2315 ** "*stopped" events can report several new "reason"s, such as
2316 "solib-event".
2317
2318 ** Breakpoint changes are now notified using new async records, like
2319 "=breakpoint-modified".
2320
2321 ** New command -ada-task-info.
2322
98a5dd13
DE
2323* libthread-db-search-path now supports two special values: $sdir and $pdir.
2324 $sdir specifies the default system locations of shared libraries.
2325 $pdir specifies the directory where the libpthread used by the application
2326 lives.
2327
2328 GDB no longer looks in $sdir and $pdir after it has searched the directories
2329 mentioned in libthread-db-search-path. If you want to search those
2330 directories, they must be specified in libthread-db-search-path.
2331 The default value of libthread-db-search-path on GNU/Linux and Solaris
2332 systems is now "$sdir:$pdir".
2333
2334 $pdir is not supported by gdbserver, it is currently ignored.
2335 $sdir is supported by gdbserver.
2336
478aac75
DE
2337* New configure option --with-iconv-bin.
2338 When using the internationalization support like the one in the GNU C
2339 library, GDB will invoke the "iconv" program to get a list of supported
2340 character sets. If this program lives in a non-standard location, one can
2341 use this option to specify where to find it.
2342
9c06b0b4
TJB
2343* When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
2344 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports masked hardware
2345 watchpoints, which specify a mask in addition to an address to watch.
2346 The mask specifies that some bits of an address (the bits which are
2347 reset in the mask) should be ignored when matching the address accessed
2348 by the inferior against the watchpoint address. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
2349 section in the user manual for more details.
2350
03f2bd59
JK
2351* The new option --once causes GDBserver to stop listening for connections once
2352 the first connection is made. The listening port used by GDBserver will
2353 become available after that.
2354
71eba9c2 2355* New commands "info macros" and "alias" have been added.
edc84990 2356
2bda9cc5
JK
2357* New function parameters suffix @entry specifies value of function parameter
2358 at the time the function got called. Entry values are available only since
2359 gcc version 4.7.
2360
ed59ded5
DE
2361* New commands
2362
2363!SHELL COMMAND
2364 "!" is now an alias of the "shell" command.
2365 Note that no space is needed between "!" and SHELL COMMAND.
2366
9c06b0b4
TJB
2367* Changed commands
2368
2369watch EXPRESSION mask MASK_VALUE
2370 The watch command now supports the mask argument which allows creation
2371 of masked watchpoints, if the current architecture supports this feature.
2372
dbaefcf7
DE
2373info auto-load-scripts [REGEXP]
2374 This command was formerly named "maintenance print section-scripts".
2375 It is now generally useful and is no longer a maintenance-only command.
2376
71eba9c2 2377info macro [-all] [--] MACRO
2378 The info macro command has new options `-all' and `--'. The first for
2379 printing all definitions of a macro. The second for explicitly specifying
2380 the end of arguments and the beginning of the macro name in case the macro
2381 name starts with a hyphen.
2382
3065dfb6
SS
2383collect[/s] EXPRESSIONS
2384 The tracepoint collect command now takes an optional modifier "/s"
2385 that directs it to dereference pointer-to-character types and
2386 collect the bytes of memory up to a zero byte. The behavior is
2387 similar to what you see when you use the regular print command on a
2388 string. An optional integer following the "/s" sets a bound on the
2389 number of bytes that will be collected.
2390
f196051f
SS
2391tstart [NOTES]
2392 The trace start command now interprets any supplied arguments as a
2393 note to be recorded with the trace run, with an effect similar to
2394 setting the variable trace-notes.
2395
2396tstop [NOTES]
2397 The trace stop command now interprets any arguments as a note to be
2398 mentioned along with the tstatus report that the trace was stopped
2399 with a command. The effect is similar to setting the variable
2400 trace-stop-notes.
2401
d248b706
KY
2402* Tracepoints can now be enabled and disabled at any time after a trace
2403 experiment has been started using the standard "enable" and "disable"
2404 commands. It is now possible to start a trace experiment with no enabled
2405 tracepoints; GDB will display a warning, but will allow the experiment to
2406 begin, assuming that tracepoints will be enabled as needed while the trace
2407 is running.
2408
405f8e94
SS
2409* Fast tracepoints on 32-bit x86-architectures can now be placed at
2410 locations with 4-byte instructions, when they were previously
2411 limited to locations with instructions of 5 bytes or longer.
2412
2bda9cc5
JK
2413* New options
2414
45cfd468
DE
2415set debug dwarf2-read
2416show debug dwarf2-read
2417 Turns on or off display of debugging messages related to reading
2418 DWARF debug info. The default is off.
2419
2420set debug symtab-create
2421show debug symtab-create
2422 Turns on or off display of debugging messages related to symbol table
2423 creation. The default is off.
2424
baacfb07
PM
2425set extended-prompt
2426show extended-prompt
2427 Set the GDB prompt, and allow escape sequences to be inserted to
2428 display miscellaneous information (see 'help set extended-prompt'
2429 for the list of sequences). This prompt (and any information
2430 accessed through the escape sequences) is updated every time the
2431 prompt is displayed.
2432
2bda9cc5
JK
2433set print entry-values (both|compact|default|if-needed|no|only|preferred)
2434show print entry-values
2435 Set printing of frame argument values at function entry. In some cases
2436 GDB can determine the value of function argument which was passed by the
2437 function caller, even if the value was modified inside the called function.
2438
2439set debug entry-values
2440show debug entry-values
2441 Control display of debugging info for determining frame argument values at
2442 function entry and virtual tail call frames.
2443
c011a4f4
DE
2444set basenames-may-differ
2445show basenames-may-differ
2446 Set whether a source file may have multiple base names.
2447 (A "base name" is the name of a file with the directory part removed.
2448 Example: The base name of "/home/user/hello.c" is "hello.c".)
2449 If set, GDB will canonicalize file names (e.g., expand symlinks)
2450 before comparing them. Canonicalization is an expensive operation,
2451 but it allows the same file be known by more than one base name.
2452 If not set (the default), all source files are assumed to have just
2453 one base name, and gdb will do file name comparisons more efficiently.
2454
f196051f
SS
2455set trace-user
2456show trace-user
2457set trace-notes
2458show trace-notes
2459 Set a user name and notes for the current and any future trace runs.
2460 This is useful for long-running and/or disconnected traces, to
2461 inform others (or yourself) as to who is running the trace, supply
2462 contact information, or otherwise explain what is going on.
2463
2464set trace-stop-notes
2465show trace-stop-notes
2466 Set a note attached to the trace run, that is displayed when the
2467 trace has been stopped by a tstop command. This is useful for
2468 instance as an explanation, if you are stopping a trace run that was
2469 started by someone else.
2470
d248b706
KY
2471* New remote packets
2472
2473QTEnable
2474
2475 Dynamically enable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
2476
2477QTDisable
2478
2479 Dynamically disable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
2480
f196051f
SS
2481QTNotes
2482
2483 Set the user and notes of the trace run.
2484
2485qTP
2486
2487 Query the current status of a tracepoint.
2488
405f8e94
SS
2489qTMinFTPILen
2490
2491 Query the minimum length of instruction at which a fast tracepoint may
2492 be placed.
2493
1a532630
PP
2494* Dcache size (number of lines) and line-size are now runtime-configurable
2495 via "set dcache line" and "set dcache line-size" commands.
2496
11315641
YQ
2497* New targets
2498
2499Texas Instruments TMS320C6x tic6x-*-*
2500
87326c78
DD
2501* New Simulators
2502
2503Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
2504
e8d56f18
JB
2505*** Changes in GDB 7.3.1
2506
2507* The build failure for NetBSD and OpenBSD targets have now been fixed.
2508
d6e00af6 2509*** Changes in GDB 7.3
797054e6 2510
60f98dde
MS
2511* GDB has a new command: "thread find [REGEXP]".
2512 It finds the thread id whose name, target id, or thread extra info
2513 matches the given regular expression.
2514
eee5b35e
DD
2515* The "catch syscall" command now works on mips*-linux* targets.
2516
b716877b
AB
2517* The -data-disassemble MI command now supports modes 2 and 3 for
2518 dumping the instruction opcodes.
2519
aae1c79a
DE
2520* New command line options
2521
2522-data-directory DIR Specify DIR as the "data-directory".
2523 This is mostly for testing purposes.
2524
a86caf66
DE
2525* The "maint set python auto-load on|off" command has been renamed to
2526 "set auto-load-scripts on|off".
2527
99e7ae30
DE
2528* GDB has a new command: "set directories".
2529 It is like the "dir" command except that it replaces the
2530 source path list instead of augmenting it.
2531
4694da01
TT
2532* GDB now understands thread names.
2533
2534 On GNU/Linux, "info threads" will display the thread name as set by
2535 prctl or pthread_setname_np.
2536
2537 There is also a new command, "thread name", which can be used to
2538 assign a name internally for GDB to display.
2539
f4b8a18d
KW
2540* OpenCL C
2541 Initial support for the OpenCL C language (http://www.khronos.org/opencl)
2542 has been integrated into GDB.
2543
585d1eb8
PM
2544* Python scripting
2545
da5d4055
PM
2546 ** The function gdb.Write now accepts an optional keyword 'stream'.
2547 This keyword, when provided, will direct the output to either
2548 stdout, stderr, or GDB's logging output.
2549
9a6f1302
PM
2550 ** Parameters can now be be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
2551 you may implement the get_set_doc and get_show_doc functions.
2552 This improves how Parameter set/show documentation is processed
2553 and allows for more dynamic content.
2554
29703da4
PM
2555 ** Symbols, Symbol Table, Symbol Table and Line, Object Files,
2556 Inferior, Inferior Thread, Blocks, and Block Iterator APIs now
2557 have an is_valid method.
2558
350c6c65
PM
2559 ** Breakpoints can now be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
2560 you may implement a 'stop' function that is executed each time
2561 the inferior reaches that breakpoint.
2562
6e6fbe60
DE
2563 ** New function gdb.lookup_global_symbol looks up a global symbol.
2564
585d1eb8
PM
2565 ** GDB values in Python are now callable if the value represents a
2566 function. For example, if 'some_value' represents a function that
2567 takes two integer parameters and returns a value, you can call
2568 that function like so:
2569
2570 result = some_value (10,20)
2571
0e3509db
DE
2572 ** Module gdb.types has been added.
2573 It contains a collection of utilities for working with gdb.Types objects:
2574 get_basic_type, has_field, make_enum_dict.
2575
7b51bc51
DE
2576 ** Module gdb.printing has been added.
2577 It contains utilities for writing and registering pretty-printers.
2578 New classes: PrettyPrinter, SubPrettyPrinter,
2579 RegexpCollectionPrettyPrinter.
2580 New function: register_pretty_printer.
2581
2582 ** New commands "info pretty-printers", "enable pretty-printer" and
2583 "disable pretty-printer" have been added.
2584
99e7ae30
DE
2585 ** gdb.parameter("directories") is now available.
2586
d8e22779
TT
2587 ** New function gdb.newest_frame returns the newest frame in the
2588 selected thread.
2589
4694da01
TT
2590 ** The gdb.InferiorThread class has a new "name" attribute. This
2591 holds the thread's name.
2592
505500db
SW
2593 ** Python Support for Inferior events.
2594 Python scripts can add observers to be notified of events
824446ad 2595 occurring in the process being debugged.
c17a9e46
HZ
2596 The following events are currently supported:
2597 - gdb.events.cont Continue event.
2598 - gdb.events.exited Inferior exited event.
2599 - gdb.events.stop Signal received, and Breakpoint hit events.
2600
def98928
TT
2601* C++ Improvements:
2602
2603 ** GDB now puts template parameters in scope when debugging in an
2604 instantiation. For example, if you have:
2605
2606 template<int X> int func (void) { return X; }
2607
2608 then if you step into func<5>, "print X" will show "5". This
2609 feature requires proper debuginfo support from the compiler; it
2610 was added to GCC 4.5.
2611
66cb8159
TT
2612 ** The motion commands "next", "finish", "until", and "advance" now
2613 work better when exceptions are thrown. In particular, GDB will
2614 no longer lose control of the inferior; instead, the GDB will
2615 stop the inferior at the point at which the exception is caught.
2616 This functionality requires a change in the exception handling
2617 code that was introduced in GCC 4.5.
2618
4aac0db7
UW
2619* GDB now follows GCC's rules on accessing volatile objects when
2620 reading or writing target state during expression evaluation.
2621 One notable difference to prior behavior is that "print x = 0"
2622 no longer generates a read of x; the value of the assignment is
2623 now always taken directly from the value being assigned.
2624
283e6a52
TT
2625* GDB now has some support for using labels in the program's source in
2626 linespecs. For instance, you can use "advance label" to continue
2627 execution to a label.
2628
2629* GDB now has support for reading and writing a new .gdb_index
2630 section. This section holds a fast index of DWARF debugging
2631 information and can be used to greatly speed up GDB startup and
2632 operation. See the documentation for `save gdb-index' for details.
2633
b56df873 2634* The "watch" command now accepts an optional "-location" argument.
14c0d4e1 2635 When used, this causes GDB to watch the memory referred to by the
b56df873
TT
2636 expression. Such a watchpoint is never deleted due to it going out
2637 of scope.
2638
ae53ffa4
PA
2639* GDB now supports thread debugging of core dumps on GNU/Linux.
2640
2641 GDB now activates thread debugging using the libthread_db library
2642 when debugging GNU/Linux core dumps, similarly to when debugging
2643 live processes. As a result, when debugging a core dump file, GDB
2644 is now able to display pthread_t ids of threads. For example, "info
2645 threads" shows the same output as when debugging the process when it
2646 was live. In earlier releases, you'd see something like this:
2647
2648 (gdb) info threads
2649 * 1 LWP 6780 main () at main.c:10
2650
2651 While now you see this:
2652
2653 (gdb) info threads
2654 * 1 Thread 0x7f0f5712a700 (LWP 6780) main () at main.c:10
2655
2656 It is also now possible to inspect TLS variables when debugging core
2657 dumps.
2658
2659 When debugging a core dump generated on a machine other than the one
2660 used to run GDB, you may need to point GDB at the correct
2661 libthread_db library with the "set libthread-db-search-path"
2662 command. See the user manual for more details on this command.
2663
f1310107
TJB
2664* When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
2665 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports ranged breakpoints,
2666 which stop execution of the inferior whenever it executes an instruction
2667 at any address within the specified range. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
2668 section in the user manual for more details.
2669
248c9dbc
JB
2670* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
2671
1aee7009
JB
2672 ** GDBserver is now supported on PowerPC LynxOS (versions 4.x and 5.x),
2673 and i686 LynxOS (version 5.x).
248c9dbc 2674
eb826dc6
MF
2675 ** GDBserver is now supported on Blackfin Linux.
2676
44603653
JB
2677* New native configurations
2678
2679ia64 HP-UX ia64-*-hpux*
2680
91021223
MF
2681* New targets:
2682
2683Analog Devices, Inc. Blackfin Processor bfin-*
2684
6e1bb179
JB
2685* Ada task switching is now supported on sparc-elf targets when
2686 debugging a program using the Ravenscar Profile. For more information,
2687 see the "Tasking Support when using the Ravenscar Profile" section
2688 in the GDB user manual.
2689
50c97f38
TT
2690* Guile support was removed.
2691
448a92bf
MF
2692* New features in the GNU simulator
2693
2694 ** The --map-info flag lists all known core mappings.
2695
66ee2731
MF
2696 ** CFI flashes may be simulated via the "cfi" device.
2697
76b8507d 2698*** Changes in GDB 7.2
bfbf3774 2699
ba25b921
PA
2700* Shared library support for remote targets by default
2701
2702 When GDB is configured for a generic, non-OS specific target, like
2703 for example, --target=arm-eabi or one of the many *-*-elf targets,
2704 GDB now queries remote stubs for loaded shared libraries using the
2705 `qXfer:libraries:read' packet. Previously, shared library support
2706 was always disabled for such configurations.
2707
4656f5c6
SW
2708* C++ Improvements:
2709
2710 ** Argument Dependent Lookup (ADL)
2711
2712 In C++ ADL lookup directs function search to the namespaces of its
2713 arguments even if the namespace has not been imported.
2714 For example:
2715 namespace A
2716 {
2717 class B { };
2718 void foo (B) { }
2719 }
2720 ...
2721 A::B b
2722 foo(b)
2723 Here the compiler will search for `foo' in the namespace of 'b'
2724 and find A::foo. GDB now supports this. This construct is commonly
2725 used in the Standard Template Library for operators.
2726
2727 ** Improved User Defined Operator Support
2728
2729 In addition to member operators, GDB now supports lookup of operators
2730 defined in a namespace and imported with a `using' directive, operators
2731 defined in the global scope, operators imported implicitly from an
2732 anonymous namespace, and the ADL operators mentioned in the previous
2733 entry.
2734 GDB now also supports proper overload resolution for all the previously
2735 mentioned flavors of operators.
2736
254e6b9e
DE
2737 ** static const class members
2738
2739 Printing of static const class members that are initialized in the
2740 class definition has been fixed.
2741
711e434b
PM
2742* Windows Thread Information Block access.
2743
2744 On Windows targets, GDB now supports displaying the Windows Thread
2745 Information Block (TIB) structure. This structure is visible either
2746 by using the new command `info w32 thread-information-block' or, by
2747 dereferencing the new convenience variable named `$_tlb', a
2748 thread-specific pointer to the TIB. This feature is also supported
2749 when remote debugging using GDBserver.
2750
0fb4aa4b
PA
2751* Static tracepoints
2752
2753 Static tracepoints are calls in the user program into a tracing
2754 library. One such library is a port of the LTTng kernel tracer to
2755 userspace --- UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer, http://lttng.org/ust).
2756 When debugging with GDBserver, GDB now supports combining the GDB
2757 tracepoint machinery with such libraries. For example: the user can
2758 use GDB to probe a static tracepoint marker (a call from the user
2759 program into the tracing library) with the new "strace" command (see
2760 "New commands" below). This creates a "static tracepoint" in the
2761 breakpoint list, that can be manipulated with the same feature set
2762 as fast and regular tracepoints. E.g., collect registers, local and
2763 global variables, collect trace state variables, and define
2764 tracepoint conditions. In addition, the user can collect extra
2765 static tracepoint marker specific data, by collecting the new
2766 $_sdata internal variable. When analyzing the trace buffer, you can
2767 inspect $_sdata like any other variable available to GDB. For more
2768 information, see the "Tracepoints" chapter in GDB user manual. New
2769 remote packets have been defined to support static tracepoints, see
2770 the "New remote packets" section below.
2771
ca11e899
SS
2772* Better reconstruction of tracepoints after disconnected tracing
2773
2774 GDB will attempt to download the original source form of tracepoint
2775 definitions when starting a trace run, and then will upload these
2776 upon reconnection to the target, resulting in a more accurate
2777 reconstruction of the tracepoints that are in use on the target.
2778
2779* Observer mode
2780
2781 You can now exercise direct control over the ways that GDB can
2782 affect your program. For instance, you can disallow the setting of
2783 breakpoints, so that the program can run continuously (assuming
2784 non-stop mode). In addition, the "observer" variable is available
2785 to switch all of the different controls; in observer mode, GDB
2786 cannot affect the target's behavior at all, which is useful for
2787 tasks like diagnosing live systems in the field.
2788
2789* The new convenience variable $_thread holds the number of the
2790 current thread.
2791
711e434b
PM
2792* New remote packets
2793
2794qGetTIBAddr
2795
2796 Return the address of the Windows Thread Information Block of a given thread.
2797
dde08ee1
PA
2798qRelocInsn
2799
2800 In response to several of the tracepoint packets, the target may now
2801 also respond with a number of intermediate `qRelocInsn' request
2802 packets before the final result packet, to have GDB handle
2803 relocating an instruction to execute at a different address. This
2804 is particularly useful for stubs that support fast tracepoints. GDB
2805 reports support for this feature in the qSupported packet.
2806
0fb4aa4b
PA
2807qTfSTM, qTsSTM
2808
2809 List static tracepoint markers in the target program.
2810
2811qTSTMat
2812
2813 List static tracepoint markers at a given address in the target
2814 program.
2815
2816qXfer:statictrace:read
2817
2818 Read the static trace data collected (by a `collect $_sdata'
2819 tracepoint action). The remote stub reports support for this packet
2820 to gdb's qSupported query.
2821
ca11e899
SS
2822QAllow
2823
2824 Send the current settings of GDB's permission flags.
2825
2826QTDPsrc
2827
2828 Send part of the source (textual) form of a tracepoint definition,
2829 which includes location, conditional, and action list.
2830
3f7b2faa
DE
2831* The source command now accepts a -s option to force searching for the
2832 script in the source search path even if the script name specifies
2833 a directory.
2834
d337e9f0
PA
2835* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
2836
0fb4aa4b
PA
2837 - GDBserver now support tracepoints (including fast tracepoints, and
2838 static tracepoints). The feature is currently supported by the
2839 i386-linux and amd64-linux builds. See the "Tracepoints support
2840 in gdbserver" section in the manual for more information.
2841
2842 GDBserver JIT compiles the tracepoint's conditional agent
2843 expression bytecode into native code whenever possible for low
2844 overhead dynamic tracepoints conditionals. For such tracepoints,
2845 an expression that examines program state is evaluated when the
2846 tracepoint is reached, in order to determine whether to capture
2847 trace data. If the condition is simple and false, processing the
2848 tracepoint finishes very quickly and no data is gathered.
2849
2850 GDBserver interfaces with the UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer) library
2851 for static tracepoints support.
d337e9f0 2852
c24d0242
PM
2853 - GDBserver now supports x86_64 Windows 64-bit debugging.
2854
c8d5aac9
L
2855* GDB now sends xmlRegisters= in qSupported packet to indicate that
2856 it understands register description.
2857
7c953934
TT
2858* The --batch flag now disables pagination and queries.
2859
8685c86f
L
2860* X86 general purpose registers
2861
2862 GDB now supports reading/writing byte, word and double-word x86
2863 general purpose registers directly. This means you can use, say,
2864 $ah or $ax to refer, respectively, to the byte register AH and
2865 16-bit word register AX that are actually portions of the 32-bit
2866 register EAX or 64-bit register RAX.
2867
95a42b64 2868* The `commands' command now accepts a range of breakpoints to modify.
86b17b60
PA
2869 A plain `commands' following a command that creates multiple
2870 breakpoints affects all the breakpoints set by that command. This
2871 applies to breakpoints set by `rbreak', and also applies when a
2872 single `break' command creates multiple breakpoints (e.g.,
2873 breakpoints on overloaded c++ functions).
95a42b64 2874
8bd10a10
CM
2875* The `rbreak' command now accepts a filename specification as part of
2876 its argument, limiting the functions selected by the regex to those
2877 in the specified file.
2878
ab38a727
PA
2879* Support for remote debugging Windows and SymbianOS shared libraries
2880 from Unix hosts has been improved. Non Windows GDB builds now can
2881 understand target reported file names that follow MS-DOS based file
2882 system semantics, such as file names that include drive letters and
2883 use the backslash character as directory separator. This makes it
2884 possible to transparently use the "set sysroot" and "set
2885 solib-search-path" on Unix hosts to point as host copies of the
2886 target's shared libraries. See the new command "set
2887 target-file-system-kind" described below, and the "Commands to
2888 specify files" section in the user manual for more information.
2889
6149aea9
PA
2890* New commands
2891
f1421989
HZ
2892eval template, expressions...
2893 Convert the values of one or more expressions under the control
2894 of the string template to a command line, and call it.
2895
ab38a727
PA
2896set target-file-system-kind unix|dos-based|auto
2897show target-file-system-kind
2898 Set or show the assumed file system kind for target reported file
2899 names.
2900
6149aea9
PA
2901save breakpoints <filename>
2902 Save all current breakpoint definitions to a file suitable for use
2903 in a later debugging session. To read the saved breakpoint
2904 definitions, use the `source' command.
2905
2906`save tracepoints' is a new alias for `save-tracepoints'. The latter
2907is now deprecated.
2908
0fb4aa4b
PA
2909info static-tracepoint-markers
2910 Display information about static tracepoint markers in the target.
2911
2912strace FN | FILE:LINE | *ADDR | -m MARKER_ID
2913 Define a static tracepoint by probing a marker at the given
2914 function, line, address, or marker ID.
2915
ca11e899
SS
2916set observer on|off
2917show observer
2918 Enable and disable observer mode.
2919
2920set may-write-registers on|off
2921set may-write-memory on|off
2922set may-insert-breakpoints on|off
2923set may-insert-tracepoints on|off
2924set may-insert-fast-tracepoints on|off
2925set may-interrupt on|off
2926 Set individual permissions for GDB effects on the target. Note that
2927 some of these settings can have undesirable or surprising
2928 consequences, particularly when changed in the middle of a session.
2929 For instance, disabling the writing of memory can prevent
2930 breakpoints from being inserted, cause single-stepping to fail, or
2931 even crash your program, if you disable after breakpoints have been
2932 inserted. However, GDB should not crash.
2933
2934set record memory-query on|off
2935show record memory-query
2936 Control whether to stop the inferior if memory changes caused
2937 by an instruction cannot be recorded.
2938
53a71c06
CR
2939* Changed commands
2940
2941disassemble
2942 The disassemble command now supports "start,+length" form of two arguments.
2943
f3e9a817
PM
2944* Python scripting
2945
9279c692
JB
2946** GDB now provides a new directory location, called the python directory,
2947 where Python scripts written for GDB can be installed. The location
2948 of that directory is <data-directory>/python, where <data-directory>
2949 is the GDB data directory. For more details, see section `Scripting
2950 GDB using Python' in the manual.
2951
adc36818 2952** The GDB Python API now has access to breakpoints, symbols, symbol
595939de
PM
2953 tables, program spaces, inferiors, threads and frame's code blocks.
2954 Additionally, GDB Parameters can now be created from the API, and
2955 manipulated via set/show in the CLI.
f870a310 2956
fa33c3cd 2957** New functions gdb.target_charset, gdb.target_wide_charset,
07ca107c
DE
2958 gdb.progspaces, gdb.current_progspace, and gdb.string_to_argv.
2959
2960** New exception gdb.GdbError.
fa33c3cd
DE
2961
2962** Pretty-printers are now also looked up in the current program space.
f3e9a817 2963
967cf477
DE
2964** Pretty-printers can now be individually enabled and disabled.
2965
8a1ea21f
DE
2966** GDB now looks for names of Python scripts to auto-load in a
2967 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts', in addition to looking
2968 for a OBJFILE-gdb.py script when OBJFILE is read by the debugger.
2969
a7bdde9e
VP
2970* Tracepoint actions were unified with breakpoint commands. In particular,
2971there are no longer differences in "info break" output for breakpoints and
2972tracepoints and the "commands" command can be used for both tracepoints and
2973regular breakpoints.
2974
05071a4d
PA
2975* New targets
2976
2977ARM Symbian arm*-*-symbianelf*
2978
6aecb9c2
JB
2979* D language support.
2980 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the D programming
2981 language.
2982
431e49aa
TJB
2983* GDB now supports the extended ptrace interface for PowerPC which is
2984 available since Linux kernel version 2.6.34. This automatically enables
2985 any hardware breakpoints and additional hardware watchpoints available in
2986 the processor. The old ptrace interface exposes just one hardware
2987 watchpoint and no hardware breakpoints.
2988
2989* GDB is now able to use the Data Value Compare (DVC) register available on
2990 embedded PowerPC processors to implement in hardware simple watchpoint
2991 conditions of the form:
2992
2993 watch ADDRESS|VARIABLE if ADDRESS|VARIABLE == CONSTANT EXPRESSION
2994
2995 This works in native GDB running on Linux kernels with the extended ptrace
2996 interface mentioned above.
2997
bfbf3774 2998*** Changes in GDB 7.1
abc7453d 2999
4eef138c
TT
3000* C++ Improvements
3001
3002 ** Namespace Support
71dee663
SW
3003
3004 GDB now supports importing of namespaces in C++. This enables the
3005 user to inspect variables from imported namespaces. Support for
3006 namepace aliasing has also been added. So, if a namespace is
3007 aliased in the current scope (e.g. namepace C=A; ) the user can
3008 print variables using the alias (e.g. (gdb) print C::x).
3009
4eef138c
TT
3010 ** Bug Fixes
3011
3012 All known bugs relating to the printing of virtual base class were
3013 fixed. It is now possible to call overloaded static methods using a
3014 qualified name.
3015
3016 ** Cast Operators
3017
3018 The C++ cast operators static_cast<>, dynamic_cast<>, const_cast<>,
3019 and reinterpret_cast<> are now handled by the C++ expression parser.
3020
2d1c1221
ME
3021* New targets
3022
3023Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze-*-*
34207b9e 3024Renesas RX rx-*-elf
2d1c1221
ME
3025
3026* New Simulators
3027
3028Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze
34207b9e 3029Renesas RX rx
2d1c1221 3030
6c95b8df
PA
3031* Multi-program debugging.
3032
3033 GDB now has support for multi-program (a.k.a. multi-executable or
3034 multi-exec) debugging. This allows for debugging multiple inferiors
3035 simultaneously each running a different program under the same GDB
3036 session. See "Debugging Multiple Inferiors and Programs" in the
3037 manual for more information. This implied some user visible changes
3038 in the multi-inferior support. For example, "info inferiors" now
3039 lists inferiors that are not running yet or that have exited
3040 already. See also "New commands" and "New options" below.
3041
d5551862
SS
3042* New tracing features
3043
3044 GDB's tracepoint facility now includes several new features:
3045
3046 ** Trace state variables
f61e138d
SS
3047
3048 GDB tracepoints now include support for trace state variables, which
3049 are variables managed by the target agent during a tracing
3050 experiment. They are useful for tracepoints that trigger each
3051 other, so for instance one tracepoint can count hits in a variable,
3052 and then a second tracepoint has a condition that is true when the
3053 count reaches a particular value. Trace state variables share the
3054 $-syntax of GDB convenience variables, and can appear in both
3055 tracepoint actions and condition expressions. Use the "tvariable"
3056 command to create, and "info tvariables" to view; see "Trace State
3057 Variables" in the manual for more detail.
7a697b8d 3058
d5551862 3059 ** Fast tracepoints
7a697b8d
SS
3060
3061 GDB now includes an option for defining fast tracepoints, which
3062 targets may implement more efficiently, such as by installing a jump
3063 into the target agent rather than a trap instruction. The resulting
3064 speedup can be by two orders of magnitude or more, although the
3065 tradeoff is that some program locations on some target architectures
3066 might not allow fast tracepoint installation, for instance if the
3067 instruction to be replaced is shorter than the jump. To request a
3068 fast tracepoint, use the "ftrace" command, with syntax identical to
3069 the regular trace command.
3070
d5551862
SS
3071 ** Disconnected tracing
3072
3073 It is now possible to detach GDB from the target while it is running
3074 a trace experiment, then reconnect later to see how the experiment
3075 is going. In addition, a new variable disconnected-tracing lets you
3076 tell the target agent whether to continue running a trace if the
3077 connection is lost unexpectedly.
3078
00bf0b85
SS
3079 ** Trace files
3080
3081 GDB now has the ability to save the trace buffer into a file, and
3082 then use that file as a target, similarly to you can do with
3083 corefiles. You can select trace frames, print data that was
3084 collected in them, and use tstatus to display the state of the
3085 tracing run at the moment that it was saved. To create a trace
3086 file, use "tsave <filename>", and to use it, do "target tfile
3087 <name>".
4daf5ac0
SS
3088
3089 ** Circular trace buffer
3090
3091 You can ask the target agent to handle the trace buffer as a
3092 circular buffer, discarding the oldest trace frames to make room for
3093 newer ones, by setting circular-trace-buffer to on. This feature may
3094 not be available for all target agents.
3095
21a0512e
PP
3096* Changed commands
3097
3098disassemble
3099 The disassemble command, when invoked with two arguments, now requires
3100 the arguments to be comma-separated.
3101
0fe7935b
DJ
3102info variables
3103 The info variables command now displays variable definitions. Files
3104 which only declare a variable are not shown.
3105
fb2e7cb4
JB
3106source
3107 The source command is now capable of sourcing Python scripts.
3108 This feature is dependent on the debugger being build with Python
3109 support.
3110
3111 Related to this enhancement is also the introduction of a new command
3112 "set script-extension" (see below).
3113
6c95b8df
PA
3114* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
3115
399cd161
MS
3116record save [<FILENAME>]
3117 Save a file (in core file format) containing the process record
3118 execution log for replay debugging at a later time.
3119
3120record restore <FILENAME>
3121 Restore the process record execution log that was saved at an
3122 earlier time, for replay debugging.
3123
6c95b8df
PA
3124add-inferior [-copies <N>] [-exec <FILENAME>]
3125 Add a new inferior.
3126
3127clone-inferior [-copies <N>] [ID]
3128 Make a new inferior ready to execute the same program another
3129 inferior has loaded.
3130
3131remove-inferior ID
3132 Remove an inferior.
3133
3134maint info program-spaces
3135 List the program spaces loaded into GDB.
3136
9a7071a8
JB
3137set remote interrupt-sequence [Ctrl-C | BREAK | BREAK-g]
3138show remote interrupt-sequence
3139 Allow the user to select one of ^C, a BREAK signal or BREAK-g
3140 as the sequence to the remote target in order to interrupt the execution.
3141 Ctrl-C is a default. Some system prefers BREAK which is high level of
3142 serial line for some certain time. Linux kernel prefers BREAK-g, a.k.a
3143 Magic SysRq g. It is BREAK signal and character 'g'.
3144
3145set remote interrupt-on-connect [on | off]
3146show remote interrupt-on-connect
3147 When interrupt-on-connect is ON, gdb sends interrupt-sequence to
3148 remote target when gdb connects to it. This is needed when you debug
3149 Linux kernel.
3150
3151set remotebreak [on | off]
3152show remotebreak
3153Deprecated. Use "set/show remote interrupt-sequence" instead.
3154
f61e138d
SS
3155tvariable $NAME [ = EXP ]
3156 Create or modify a trace state variable.
3157
3158info tvariables
3159 List trace state variables and their values.
3160
3161delete tvariable $NAME ...
3162 Delete one or more trace state variables.
3163
6da95a67
SS
3164teval EXPR, ...
3165 Evaluate the given expressions without collecting anything into the
3166 trace buffer. (Valid in tracepoint actions only.)
3167
7a697b8d
SS
3168ftrace FN / FILE:LINE / *ADDR
3169 Define a fast tracepoint at the given function, line, or address.
3170
b0f02ee9
JK
3171* New expression syntax
3172
3173 GDB now parses the 0b prefix of binary numbers the same way as GCC does.
3174 GDB now parses 0b101010 identically with 42.
3175
6c95b8df
PA
3176* New options
3177
3178set follow-exec-mode new|same
3179show follow-exec-mode
3180 Control whether GDB reuses the same inferior across an exec call or
3181 creates a new one. This is useful to be able to restart the old
3182 executable after the inferior having done an exec call.
3183
236f1d4d
SS
3184set default-collect EXPR, ...
3185show default-collect
3186 Define a list of expressions to be collected at each tracepoint.
3187 This is a useful way to ensure essential items are not overlooked,
3188 such as registers or a critical global variable.
3189
d5551862
SS
3190set disconnected-tracing
3191show disconnected-tracing
3192 If set to 1, the target is instructed to continue tracing if it
3193 loses its connection to GDB. If 0, the target is to stop tracing
3194 upon disconnection.
3195
4daf5ac0
SS
3196set circular-trace-buffer
3197show circular-trace-buffer
3198 If set to on, the target is instructed to use a circular trace buffer
3199 and discard the oldest trace frames instead of stopping the trace due
3200 to a full trace buffer. If set to off, the trace stops when the buffer
3201 fills up. Some targets may not support this.
3202
fb2e7cb4
JB
3203set script-extension off|soft|strict
3204show script-extension
3205 If set to "off", the debugger does not perform any script language
3206 recognition, and all sourced files are assumed to be GDB scripts.
3207 If set to "soft" (the default), files are sourced according to
3208 filename extension, falling back to GDB scripts if the first
3209 evaluation failed.
3210 If set to "strict", files are sourced according to filename extension.
3211
2b71fc8e
JB
3212set ada trust-PAD-over-XVS on|off
3213show ada trust-PAD-over-XVS
3214 If off, activate a workaround against a bug in the debugging information
3215 generated by the compiler for PAD types (see gcc/exp_dbug.ads in
3216 the GCC sources for more information about the GNAT encoding and
3217 PAD types in particular). It is always safe to set this option to
3218 off, but this introduces a slight performance penalty. The default
3219 is on.
3220
de2e5182
TT
3221* Python API Improvements
3222
3223 ** GDB provides the new class gdb.LazyString. This is useful in
3224 some pretty-printing cases. The new method gdb.Value.lazy_string
3225 provides a simple way to create objects of this type.
3226
3227 ** The fields returned by gdb.Type.fields now have an
3228 `is_base_class' attribute.
3229
3230 ** The new method gdb.Type.range returns the range of an array type.
3231
3232 ** The new method gdb.parse_and_eval can be used to parse and
3233 evaluate an expression.
3234
f61e138d
SS
3235* New remote packets
3236
3237QTDV
3238 Define a trace state variable.
3239
3240qTV
3241 Get the current value of a trace state variable.
3242
d5551862
SS
3243QTDisconnected
3244 Set desired tracing behavior upon disconnection.
3245
4daf5ac0
SS
3246QTBuffer:circular
3247 Set the trace buffer to be linear or circular.
3248
d5551862
SS
3249qTfP, qTsP
3250 Get data about the tracepoints currently in use.
3251
2d483d34
MS
3252* Bug fixes
3253
3254Process record now works correctly with hardware watchpoints.
3255
6e0e5977
JB
3256Multiple bug fixes have been made to the mips-irix port, making it
3257much more reliable. In particular:
3258 - Debugging threaded applications is now possible again. Previously,
3259 GDB would hang while starting the program, or while waiting for
3260 the program to stop at a breakpoint.
3261 - Attaching to a running process no longer hangs.
3262 - An error occurring while loading a core file has been fixed.
3263 - Changing the value of the PC register now works again. This fixes
3264 problems observed when using the "jump" command, or when calling
3265 a function from GDB, or even when assigning a new value to $pc.
3266 - With the "finish" and "return" commands, the return value for functions
3267 returning a small array is now correctly printed.
3268 - It is now possible to break on shared library code which gets executed
3269 during a shared library init phase (code executed while executing
3270 their .init section). Previously, the breakpoint would have no effect.
3271 - GDB is now able to backtrace through the signal handler for
3272 non-threaded programs.
3273
93c26624
JK
3274PIE (Position Independent Executable) programs debugging is now supported.
3275This includes debugging execution of PIC (Position Independent Code) shared
3276libraries although for that, it should be possible to run such libraries as an
3277executable program.
3278
abc7453d 3279*** Changes in GDB 7.0
75feb17d 3280
4efc6507
DE
3281* GDB now has an interface for JIT compilation. Applications that
3282dynamically generate code can create symbol files in memory and register
3283them with GDB. For users, the feature should work transparently, and
3284for JIT developers, the interface is documented in the GDB manual in the
3285"JIT Compilation Interface" chapter.
3286
782b2b07
SS
3287* Tracepoints may now be conditional. The syntax is as for
3288breakpoints; either an "if" clause appended to the "trace" command,
3289or the "condition" command is available. GDB sends the condition to
3290the target for evaluation using the same bytecode format as is used
3291for tracepoint actions.
3292
53a71c06
CR
3293* The disassemble command now supports: an optional /r modifier, print the
3294raw instructions in hex as well as in symbolic form, and an optional /m
3295modifier to print mixed source+assembly.
e6158f16 3296
e7a8dbfb
HZ
3297* Process record and replay
3298
3299 In a architecture environment that supports ``process record and
3300 replay'', ``process record and replay'' target can record a log of
3301 the process execution, and replay it with both forward and reverse
3302 execute commands.
3303
64644d9b
MS
3304* Reverse debugging: GDB now has new commands reverse-continue, reverse-
3305step, reverse-next, reverse-finish, reverse-stepi, reverse-nexti, and
3306set execution-direction {forward|reverse}, for targets that support
3307reverse execution.
3308
b9412953
DD
3309* GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on MIPS/Linux systems. This
3310feature is available with a native GDB running on kernel version
33112.6.28 or later.
3312
6c7a06a3
TT
3313* GDB now has support for multi-byte and wide character sets on the
3314target. Strings whose character type is wchar_t, char16_t, or
3315char32_t are now correctly printed. GDB supports wide- and unicode-
3316literals in C, that is, L'x', L"string", u'x', u"string", U'x', and
3317U"string" syntax. And, GDB allows the "%ls" and "%lc" formats in
3318`printf'. This feature requires iconv to work properly; if your
3319system does not have a working iconv, GDB can use GNU libiconv. See
3320the installation instructions for more information.
3321
f1838a98
UW
3322* GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
3323remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
3324with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
3325the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
3326
55333a84
DE
3327* "info sharedlibrary" now takes an optional regex of libraries to show,
3328and it now reports if a shared library has no debugging information.
3329
7f6a6314
PM
3330* Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
3331now complete on file names.
3332
65d12d83
TT
3333* When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
3334completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
3335For instance, consider:
3336
3337 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
3338 # struct example variable;
3339 (gdb) p variable.
3340
3341If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
3342completions will be "f1" and "f2".
3343
edb3359d
DJ
3344* Inlined functions are now supported. They show up in backtraces, and
3345the "step", "next", and "finish" commands handle them automatically.
3346
2fae03e8
TT
3347* GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
3348operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
3349macros.
3350
47a3467a 3351* GDB now supports inspecting extra signal information, exported by
58d6951d
DJ
3352the new $_siginfo convenience variable. The feature is currently
3353implemented on linux ARM, i386 and amd64.
3354
3355* GDB can now display the VFP floating point registers and NEON vector
3356registers on ARM targets. Both ARM GNU/Linux native GDB and gdbserver
3357can provide these registers (requires Linux 2.6.30 or later). Remote
3358and simulator targets may also provide them.
47a3467a 3359
08388c79
DE
3360* New remote packets
3361
3362qSearch:memory:
3363 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
3364
a6f3e723
SL
3365QStartNoAckMode
3366 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
3367 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
3368 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
3369
d7713ae0
EZ
3370vKill
3371 Kill the process with the specified process ID. Use this in preference
3372 to `k' when multiprocess protocol extensions are supported.
3373
07e059b5
VP
3374qXfer:osdata:read
3375 Obtains additional operating system information
3376
47a3467a
PA
3377qXfer:siginfo:read
3378qXfer:siginfo:write
3379 Read or write additional signal information.
3380
060871df
PA
3381* Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
3382
3383 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
3384 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
3385 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
3386
c055b101 3387* GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
a0ef4274 3388DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
c055b101
CV
3389
3390* The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
a0ef4274
DJ
3391and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
3392`set/show sh calling-convention'.
c055b101 3393
31fffb02
CS
3394* GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
3395with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
3396
88d8a8e0
JB
3397* 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
3398
7f99b190
JB
3399* Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
3400
ccd213ac
DJ
3401* Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
3402which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
3403
1fddbabb 3404* The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
31fffb02 3405list of section offsets.
1fddbabb 3406
a0ef4274
DJ
3407* On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
3408conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
3409have also been fixed.
3410
bfb8797a 3411* GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
158c7665
PH
3412From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
3413are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
bfb8797a 3414
71c25dea
TT
3415* GDB now parses C++ symbol and type names more flexibly. For
3416example, given:
3417
3418 template<typename T> class C { };
3419 C<char const *> c;
3420
3421GDB will now correctly handle all of:
3422
3423 ptype C<char const *>
3424 ptype C<char const*>
3425 ptype C<const char *>
3426 ptype C<const char*>
3427
ccd213ac
DJ
3428* New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
3429
3430 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
3431 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
3432
7ae0e2a2
UW
3433 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
3434 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
3435 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
3436
a6f3e723
SL
3437 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
3438 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
3439
da8bd9a3
DJ
3440 - Support for the sparc64-linux-gnu target is now included in
3441 gdbserver.
3442
d70e31dd
DE
3443 - The amd64-linux build of gdbserver now supports debugging both
3444 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
3445
3446 - The i386-linux, amd64-linux, and i386-win32 builds of gdbserver
3447 now support hardware watchpoints, and will use them automatically
3448 as appropriate.
3449
d57a3c85
TJB
3450* Python scripting
3451
3452 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
3453 available is determined at configure time.
3454
d8906c6f
TJB
3455 New GDB commands can now be written in Python.
3456
aadc346a
JB
3457* Ada tasking support
3458
3459 Ada tasks can now be inspected in GDB. The following commands have
3460 been introduced:
3461
3462 info tasks
3463 Print the list of Ada tasks.
3464 info task N
3465 Print detailed information about task number N.
3466 task
3467 Print the task number of the current task.
3468 task N
3469 Switch the context of debugging to task number N.
3470
adb483fe
DJ
3471* Support for user-defined prefixed commands. The "define" command can
3472add new commands to existing prefixes, e.g. "target".
3473
2277426b
PA
3474* Multi-inferior, multi-process debugging.
3475
3476 GDB now has generalized support for multi-inferior debugging. See
3477 "Debugging Multiple Inferiors" in the manual for more information.
3478 Although availability still depends on target support, the command
3479 set is more uniform now. The GNU/Linux specific multi-forks support
3480 has been migrated to this new framework. This implied some user
3481 visible changes; see "New commands" and also "Removed commands"
3482 below.
3483
08d16641
PA
3484* Target descriptions can now describe the target OS ABI. See the
3485"Target Description Format" section in the user manual for more
3486information.
3487
e35359c5
UW
3488* Target descriptions can now describe "compatible" architectures
3489to indicate that the target can execute applications for a different
3490architecture in addition to those for the main target architecture.
3491See the "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for
3492more information.
3493
85e747d2
UW
3494* Multi-architecture debugging.
3495
3496 GDB now includes general supports for debugging applications on
3497 hybrid systems that use more than one single processor architecture
3498 at the same time. Each such hybrid architecture still requires
3499 specific support to be added. The only hybrid architecture supported
3500 in this version of GDB is the Cell Broadband Engine.
3501
3502* GDB now supports integrated debugging of Cell/B.E. applications that
3503use both the PPU and SPU architectures. To enable support for hybrid
3504Cell/B.E. debugging, you need to configure GDB to support both the
3505powerpc-linux or powerpc64-linux and the spu-elf targets, using the
3506--enable-targets configure option.
3507
11ade57a
PA
3508* Non-stop mode debugging.
3509
3510 For some targets, GDB now supports an optional mode of operation in
3511 which you can examine stopped threads while other threads continue
3512 to execute freely. This is referred to as non-stop mode, with the
3513 old mode referred to as all-stop mode. See the "Non-Stop Mode"
3514 section in the user manual for more information.
3515
3516 To be able to support remote non-stop debugging, a remote stub needs
3517 to implement the non-stop mode remote protocol extensions, as
3518 described in the "Remote Non-Stop" section of the user manual. The
3519 GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been adjusted to support these
3520 extensions on linux targets.
3521
d7713ae0 3522* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
75feb17d 3523
a96d9b2e
SDJ
3524catch syscall [NAME(S) | NUMBER(S)]
3525 Catch system calls. Arguments, which should be names of system
3526 calls or their numbers, mean catch only those syscalls. Without
3527 arguments, every syscall will be caught. When the inferior issues
3528 any of the specified syscalls, GDB will stop and announce the system
3529 call, both when it is called and when its call returns. This
3530 feature is currently available with a native GDB running on the
3531 Linux Kernel, under the following architectures: x86, x86_64,
3532 PowerPC and PowerPC64.
3533
08388c79
DE
3534find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
3535 val1 [, val2, ...]
3536 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
3537
d57a3c85
TJB
3538maint set python print-stack
3539maint show python print-stack
3540 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
3541
3542python [CODE]
3543 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
3544
d7713ae0
EZ
3545macro define
3546macro list
3547macro undef
3548 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
3549 interactively.
3550
3551info os processes
3552 Show operating system information about processes.
3553
2277426b
PA
3554info inferiors
3555 List the inferiors currently under GDB's control.
3556
3557inferior NUM
3558 Switch focus to inferior number NUM.
3559
3560detach inferior NUM
3561 Detach from inferior number NUM.
3562
3563kill inferior NUM
3564 Kill inferior number NUM.
3565
d7713ae0
EZ
3566* New options
3567
3285f3fe
UW
3568set spu stop-on-load
3569show spu stop-on-load
3570 Control whether to stop for new SPE threads during Cell/B.E. debugging.
3571
ff1a52c6
UW
3572set spu auto-flush-cache
3573show spu auto-flush-cache
3574 Control whether to automatically flush the software-managed cache
3575 during Cell/B.E. debugging.
3576
d7713ae0
EZ
3577set sh calling-convention
3578show sh calling-convention
3579 Control the calling convention used when calling SH target functions.
3580
e0a3ce09 3581set debug timestamp
75feb17d 3582show debug timestamp
d7713ae0
EZ
3583 Control display of timestamps with GDB debugging output.
3584
3585set disassemble-next-line
3586show disassemble-next-line
3587 Control display of disassembled source lines or instructions when
3588 the debuggee stops.
3589
3590set remote noack-packet
3591show remote noack-packet
3592 Set/show the use of remote protocol QStartNoAckMode packet. See above
3593 under "New remote packets."
3594
3595set remote query-attached-packet
3596show remote query-attached-packet
3597 Control use of remote protocol `qAttached' (query-attached) packet.
3598
3599set remote read-siginfo-object
3600show remote read-siginfo-object
3601 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:read' (read-siginfo-object)
3602 packet.
3603
3604set remote write-siginfo-object
3605show remote write-siginfo-object
3606 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:write' (write-siginfo-object)
3607 packet.
3608
40ab02ce
MS
3609set remote reverse-continue
3610show remote reverse-continue
3611 Control use of remote protocol 'bc' (reverse-continue) packet.
3612
3613set remote reverse-step
3614show remote reverse-step
3615 Control use of remote protocol 'bs' (reverse-step) packet.
3616
d7713ae0
EZ
3617set displaced-stepping
3618show displaced-stepping
3619 Control displaced stepping mode. Displaced stepping is a way to
3620 single-step over breakpoints without removing them from the debuggee.
3621 Also known as "out-of-line single-stepping".
3622
3623set debug displaced
3624show debug displaced
3625 Control display of debugging info for displaced stepping.
3626
3627maint set internal-error
3628maint show internal-error
3629 Control what GDB does when an internal error is detected.
3630
3631maint set internal-warning
3632maint show internal-warning
3633 Control what GDB does when an internal warning is detected.
75feb17d 3634
ccd213ac
DJ
3635set exec-wrapper
3636show exec-wrapper
3637unset exec-wrapper
3638 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
fa4727a6 3639
aad4b048
JB
3640set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
3641show multiple-symbols
3642 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
3643 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
3644 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
3645
74960c60
VP
3646set breakpoint always-inserted
3647show breakpoint always-inserted
3648 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
3649 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
3650 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
3651
0428b8f5
DJ
3652set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
3653show arm fallback-mode
3654set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
3655show arm force-mode
3656 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
3657 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
3658 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
3659 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
3660
10568435
JK
3661set disable-randomization
3662show disable-randomization
3663 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
3664 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
3665 multiple debugging sessions.
3666
d7713ae0
EZ
3667set non-stop
3668show non-stop
3669 Control whether other threads are stopped or not when some thread hits
3670 a breakpoint.
3671
b3eb342c 3672set target-async
d7713ae0 3673show target-async
b3eb342c
VP
3674 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
3675 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
3676 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
3677 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
3678
6c7a06a3
TT
3679set target-wide-charset
3680show target-wide-charset
3681 The target-wide-charset is the name of the character set that GDB
3682 uses when printing characters whose type is wchar_t.
3683
84603566
SL
3684set tcp auto-retry (on|off)
3685show tcp auto-retry
3686set tcp connect-timeout
3687show tcp connect-timeout
3688 These commands allow GDB to retry failed TCP connections to a remote stub
3689 with a specified timeout period; this is useful if the stub is launched
3690 in parallel with GDB but may not be ready to accept connections immediately.
3691
17a37d48
PP
3692set libthread-db-search-path
3693show libthread-db-search-path
3694 Control list of directories which GDB will search for appropriate
3695 libthread_db.
3696
d4db2f36
PA
3697set schedule-multiple (on|off)
3698show schedule-multiple
3699 Allow GDB to resume all threads of all processes or only threads of
3700 the current process.
3701
4e5d721f
DE
3702set stack-cache
3703show stack-cache
3704 Use more aggressive caching for accesses to the stack. This improves
3705 performance of remote debugging (particularly backtraces) without
3706 affecting correctness.
3707
910c5da8
JB
3708set interactive-mode (on|off|auto)
3709show interactive-mode
3710 Control whether GDB runs in interactive mode (on) or not (off).
3711 When in interactive mode, GDB waits for the user to answer all
3712 queries. Otherwise, GDB does not wait and assumes the default
3713 answer. When set to auto (the default), GDB determines which
3714 mode to use based on the stdin settings.
3715
2277426b
PA
3716* Removed commands
3717
3718info forks
3719 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `info
3720 inferiors' command. To list checkpoints, you can still use the
3721 `info checkpoints' command, which was an alias for the `info forks'
3722 command.
3723
3724fork NUM
3725 Replaced by the new `inferior' command. To switch between
3726 checkpoints, you can still use the `restart' command, which was an
3727 alias for the `fork' command.
3728
3729process PID
3730 This is removed, since some targets don't have a notion of
3731 processes. To switch between processes, you can still use the
3732 `inferior' command using GDB's own inferior number.
3733
3734delete fork NUM
3735 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `kill
3736 inferior' command. To delete a checkpoint, you can still use the
3737 `delete checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `delete
3738 fork' command.
3739
3740detach fork NUM
3741 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `detach
3742 inferior' command. To detach a checkpoint, you can still use the
3743 `detach checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `detach
3744 fork' command.
3745
a80b95ba
TG
3746* New native configurations
3747
3748x86/x86_64 Darwin i[34567]86-*-darwin*
3749
b8bfd3ed
JB
3750x86_64 MinGW x86_64-*-mingw*
3751
75a2d5e7
TT
3752* New targets
3753
c28c63d8 3754Lattice Mico32 lm32-*
75a2d5e7 3755x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
4c1d2973 3756x86_64 DICOS x86_64-*-dicos*
5f814c3b 3757S+core 3 score-*-*
75a2d5e7 3758
6de3146c
PA
3759* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports x86 Windows CE
3760 (mingw32ce) debugging.
3761
d5cbbe6e
JB
3762* Removed commands
3763
3764catch load
3765catch unload
3766 These commands were actually not implemented on any target.
3767
75feb17d 3768*** Changes in GDB 6.8
f9ed52be 3769
af5ca30d
NH
3770* New native configurations
3771
3772NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
94a0e877 3773Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
af5ca30d
NH
3774
3775* New targets
3776
3777NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
94a0e877 3778Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
af5ca30d 3779
7a404eba
PA
3780* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
3781
3782 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
3783 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
3784 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
3785 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
3786
430ebac9
PA
3787* GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
3788(mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
3789
fe6fbf8b 3790* Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
8d5f9c6f 3791is resolved.
fe6fbf8b
VP
3792
3793* GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
8d5f9c6f
DJ
3794including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
3795and in inlined functions.
fe6fbf8b 3796
10665d76
JB
3797* GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
3798accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
3799more than one contiguous range of addresses.
3800
7cc46491
DJ
3801* Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
3802
d71340b8
DJ
3803* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
3804registers on PowerPC targets.
3805
523c4513
DJ
3806* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
3807targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
3808
a6b151f1
DJ
3809* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
3810commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
3811
2d717e4f
DJ
3812* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
3813extended-remote mode.
3814
24a836bd 3815* hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
d001be7a
DJ
3816The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
3817error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
3818The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
24a836bd 3819
d0c678e6
UW
3820* GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
3821building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
3822target architectures.
3823
d64a946d
TJB
3824* GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
3825Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
3826now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
3827stored in two consecutive float registers.
3828
ee163bf5
VP
3829* The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
3830breakpoints now.
3831
b93b6ca7 3832* Improved support for debugging Ada
d001be7a
DJ
3833Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
3834include:
b93b6ca7
JB
3835 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
3836 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
3837 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
3838 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
3839 of an assignment
3840 - Improved command completion in Ada
3841 - Several bug fixes
3842
d001be7a
DJ
3843* GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
3844process.
3845
a6b151f1
DJ
3846* New commands
3847
6d53d0af
JB
3848set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
3849show print frame-arguments
3850 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
3851 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
3852
a6b151f1
DJ
3853remote put
3854remote get
3855remote delete
3856 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
3857
3858* New MI commands
3859
3860-target-file-put
3861-target-file-get
3862-target-file-delete
3863 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
3864
3865* New remote packets
3866
3867vFile:open:
3868vFile:close:
3869vFile:pread:
3870vFile:pwrite:
3871vFile:unlink:
3872 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
d0c678e6 3873
2d717e4f
DJ
3874vAttach
3875 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
3876 mode.
3877
3878vRun
3879 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
3880
8d5f9c6f 3881*** Changes in GDB 6.7
6dd09645 3882
19d378fc
MS
3883* Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
3884bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
3885Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
3886
3a40aaa0
UW
3887* When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
3888symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
3889-Bsymbolic linker option.
3890
a6ec25f2
BW
3891* When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
3892recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
3893is not supported.
3894
6dd09645
JB
3895* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
3896frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
3897
c9bb8148
DJ
3898* GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
389932-bit or 64-bit register values.
3900
0d5de010
DJ
3901* Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
3902
23181151
DJ
3903* GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
3904target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
3905a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
3906
ea37ba09
DJ
3907* Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
3908automatically displayed as character or string data.
3909
3910* The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
3911arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
3912as strings.
e1f48ead 3913
123dc839
DJ
3914* Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
3915for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
8d5f9c6f 3916only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
123dc839 3917
05a4558a
DJ
3918* GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
3919iWMMXt coprocessor.
fb1e4ffc 3920
7c963485
PA
3921* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
3922ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
3923has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
3924
b18be20d
DJ
3925* GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
3926
0ca420ce
UW
3927* GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
3928
31d99776
DJ
3929* The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
3930layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
3931segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
3932
a4642986
MR
3933* The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
3934immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
3935
cfa9d6d9
DJ
3936* The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
3937"library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
3938packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
3939where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
3940Windows and SymbianOS).
255e7678
DJ
3941
3942* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
3943(DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
f5db8714
JK
3944
3945* GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
3946according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
cfa9d6d9 3947
c9bb8148
DJ
3948* New commands
3949
23776285
MR
3950set remoteflow
3951show remoteflow
3952 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
3953 when debugging using remote targets.
3954
c9bb8148
DJ
3955set mem inaccessible-by-default
3956show mem inaccessible-by-default
3957 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
3958 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
3959 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
3960 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
3961 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
3962
3963set breakpoint auto-hw
3964show breakpoint auto-hw
3965 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
3966 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
3967 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
3968 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
3969 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
3970 including "next" and "finish".
3971
0e420bd8
JB
3972catch exception
3973catch exception unhandled
3974 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
3975
3976catch assert
3977 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
3978
f822c95b
DJ
3979set sysroot
3980show sysroot
3981 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
3982 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
3983 an alias to "set sysroot".
3984
83cc5c53
UW
3985info spu
3986 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
3987 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
3988 architecture.
3989
bd372731
MK
3990* New native configurations
3991
3992OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
3993
23181151
DJ
3994set tdesc filename
3995unset tdesc filename
3996show tdesc filename
3997 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
3998 not query the target for its built-in description.
3999
c9bb8148
DJ
4000* New targets
4001
54fe9172 4002OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
c9bb8148 4003MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
c077150c 4004Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
c9bb8148 4005
6dd09645
JB
4006* New remote packets
4007
4008QPassSignals:
4009 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
4010 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
4011
23181151
DJ
4012qXfer:features:read:
4013 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
4014 features.
6dd09645 4015
83cc5c53
UW
4016qXfer:spu:read:
4017qXfer:spu:write:
4018 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
4019 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
4020
cfa9d6d9
DJ
4021qXfer:libraries:read:
4022 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
4023 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
4024 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
4025 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
4026
483367ee
DJ
4027* Removed targets
4028
4029Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
4030
d08950c4
UW
4031alpha*-*-osf1*
4032alpha*-*-osf2*
7ce59000 4033d10v-*-*
483367ee
DJ
4034hppa*-*-hiux*
4035i[34567]86-ncr-*
4036i[34567]86-*-dgux*
4037i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
4038i[34567]86-*-netware*
4039i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
4040i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
4041i[34567]86-*-sco*
4042i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
4043i[34567]86-*-sysv4*
4044i[34567]86-*-sysv5*
4045i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
4046i[34567]86-*-unixware*
4047i[34567]86-*-sysv*
4048i[34567]86-*-isc*
4049m68*-cisco*-*
4050m68*-tandem-*
ad527d2e 4051mips*-*-pe
483367ee 4052rs6000-*-lynxos*
ad527d2e 4053sh*-*-pe
483367ee 4054
7ce59000
DJ
4055* Other removed features
4056
4057target abug
4058target cpu32bug
4059target est
4060target rom68k
4061
4062 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
4063
ea35711c
DJ
4064target hms
4065target e7000
4066target sh3
4067target sh3e
4068
4069 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
4070 H8/300.
4071
4072target ocd
4073
4074 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
4075 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
4076 interfaces.
4077
7ce59000
DJ
4078DWARF 1 support
4079
4080 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
4081 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
4082
54d61198
DJ
4083Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
4084
4085 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
4086 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
4087 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
4088 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
4089
ea35711c
DJ
4090MIPS ".pdr" sections
4091
4092 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
4093 in debugging information.
4094
4095Scheme support
4096
4097 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
4098 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
4099
1a69e1e4
DJ
4100set mips stack-arg-size
4101set mips saved-gpreg-size
4102
4103 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
4104
6dd09645 4105*** Changes in GDB 6.6
e374b601 4106
ca3bf3bd
DJ
4107* New targets
4108
4109Xtensa xtensa-elf
9c309e77 4110Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
ca3bf3bd 4111
6aec2e11
DJ
4112* GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
4113(mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
4114running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
4115
4116* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
4117Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
4118supported.
4119
17218d91
DJ
4120* The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
4121broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
4122
9ebce043
DJ
4123* The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
4124stub provides the required support.
4125
7d3d3ece
DJ
4126* Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
4127longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
4128
4f8253f3
JB
4129* New commands
4130
4131set substitute-path
4132unset substitute-path
4133show substitute-path
4134 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
4135 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
4136 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
4137 between compilation and debugging.
4138
9fa66fd7
AS
4139set trace-commands
4140show trace-commands
4141 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
4142 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
4143 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
4144
1f5befc1
DJ
4145* REMOVED features
4146
4147The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
4148
2ec3381a
DJ
4149Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
4150an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
4151
3d00d119
DJ
4152The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
4153
be2a5f71
DJ
4154* New remote packets
4155
4156qSupported:
4157 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
4158 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
4159 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
4160 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
4161 target.
4162
0876f84a
DJ
4163qXfer:auxv:read:
4164 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
4165 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
4166
9ebce043
DJ
4167qXfer:memory-map:read:
4168 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
4169 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
4170
4171vFlashErase:
4172vFlashWrite:
4173vFlashDone:
4174 Erase and program a flash memory device.
4175
0876f84a
DJ
4176* Removed remote packets
4177
4178qPart:auxv:read:
4179 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
4180 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
4181
e374b601 4182*** Changes in GDB 6.5
53e5f3cf 4183
96309189
MS
4184* New targets
4185
4186Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
4187
4188Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
4189
53e5f3cf
AS
4190* New commands
4191
4192init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
4193 only if it doesn't already have a value.
4194
ac264b3b
MS
4195The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
4196
4197checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
4198
4199restart <n> Return the program state to a
4200 previously saved state.
4201
4202info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
4203
4204delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
4205
4206set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
4207 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
4208
4209info forks List forks of the user program that
4210 are available to be debugged.
4211
4212fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
4213 forks of the user program that are
4214 available to be debugged.
4215
4216delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
4217 that are available to be debugged (and
4218 kill the forked process).
4219
4220detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
4221 that are available to be debugged (and
4222 allow the process to continue).
4223
3950dc3f
NS
4224* New architecture
4225
4226Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
4227
0ea3f30e
DJ
4228* Improved Windows host support
4229
4230GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
4231native console support, and remote communications using either
4232network sockets or serial ports.
4233
f79daebb
GM
4234* Improved Modula-2 language support
4235
4236GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
4237basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
4238pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
4239printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
4240written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
4241GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
4242
acab6ab2
MM
4243* REMOVED features
4244
4245The ARM rdi-share module.
4246
f4267320
DJ
4247The Netware NLM debug server.
4248
53e5f3cf 4249*** Changes in GDB 6.4
156a53ca 4250
e0ecbda1
MK
4251* New native configurations
4252
02a677ac 4253OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
e0ecbda1
MK
4254OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
4255
d64a6579
KB
4256* New targets
4257
4258Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
4259
b33a6190
AS
4260* New command line options
4261
4262--batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
4263--return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
4264 the child (debugged) program exited with.
4265--eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
4266 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
4267 specified multiple times and in conjunction
4268 with the --command (-x) option.
4269
11dced61
AC
4270* Deprecated commands removed
4271
4272The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
4273removed:
4274
4275 Command Replacement
4276 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
4277 othernames set arm disassembler
4278 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
4279 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
4280 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
4281 regs info registers
4282
6fe85783
MK
4283* New BSD user-level threads support
4284
4285It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
4286library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
4287configurations are:
4288
4289FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
4290FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
4291OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
4292
4293Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
4294are not yet supported.
4295
5260ca71
MS
4296* New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
4297(Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
4298
e84ecc99
AC
4299* REMOVED configurations and files
4300
4301VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
9445aa30 4302Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
9445aa30 4303National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
156a53ca 4304
31e35378
JB
4305* New "set print array-indexes" command
4306
4307After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
4308when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
4309behavior.
4310
e85e5c83
MK
4311* VAX floating point support
4312
4313GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
4314
d91e9901
AS
4315* User-defined command support
4316
4317In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
4318to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
4319section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
4320
f2cb65ca
MC
4321*** Changes in GDB 6.3:
4322
f47b1503
AS
4323* New command line option
4324
4325GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
4326debugging.
4327
f2cb65ca
MC
4328* GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
4329
4330GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
4331information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
4332by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
4333proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
4334to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
860660cb 4335
d08c0230
AC
4336* Internationalization
4337
4338When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
4339internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
4340continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
4341
117ea3cf
PH
4342* Ada
4343
4344Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
4345implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
4346into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
4347
d08c0230
AC
4348* New native configurations
4349
4350GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
4351
4352* Remote 'p' packet
4353
4354GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
4355packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
4356
4357* END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
4358
4359GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
4360The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
4361features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
4362i386 application).
4363
4364GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
4365compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
4366continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
4367configurations:
4368
4369hppa-*-hpux
4370ia64-*-aix
4371mips-*-irix*
4372*-*-lynx
4373mips-*-linux-gnu
4374sds protocol
4375xdr protocol
4376powerpc bdm protocol
4377
4378Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
4379made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
4380
4381* OBSOLETE configurations and files
4382
4383Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
4384been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
4385configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
4386permanently REMOVED.
4387
4388h8300-*-*
4389mcore-*-*
4390mn10300-*-*
4391ns32k-*-*
4392sh64-*-*
4393v850-*-*
4394
ebb7c577
AC
4395*** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
4396
4397* MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
4398
4399When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
4400heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
4401been fixed.
4402
4403* MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
4404
4405When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
4406fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
4407IRIX long double values).
4408
4409* VAX and "next"
4410
4411A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
4412command. This problem has been fixed.
4413
860660cb 4414*** Changes in GDB 6.2:
faae5abe 4415
0dea2468
AC
4416* Fix for ``many threads''
4417
4418On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
4419rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
4420error message:
4421
4422 ptrace: No such process.
4423 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
4424
4425This problem has been fixed.
4426
2c07db7a
AC
4427* "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
4428
4429Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
4430GDB to dump core).
4431
c23968a2
JB
4432* New ``start'' command.
4433
4434This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
4435
71009278
MK
4436* New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
4437
4438Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
4439live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
4440platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
4441
4442FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
4443FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
4444NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
4445NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
4446NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
4447OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
4448OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
4449OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
4450OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
4451
3c0b7db2
AC
4452* Signal trampoline code overhauled
4453
4454Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
4455These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
4456of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
4457call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
4458signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
4459
73cc75f3
AC
4460Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
4461features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
4462include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
3c0b7db2 4463
7243600a
BF
4464* Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
4465
6f606e1c
MK
4466* New native configurations
4467
97dc871c 4468GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
0e56aeaf 4469OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
bf2ca189
MK
4470OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
4471OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
d195bc9f 4472OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 4473NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
9f076e7a 4474OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 4475
a1b461bf
AC
4476* END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
4477
4478GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
4479The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
4480including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
4481migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
4482compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
4483work, was also included.
4484
4485GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
4486module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
4487
4488h8300-*-*
4489mcore-*-*
4490mn10300-*-*
4491ns32k-*-*
4492sh64-*-*
4493v850-*-*
4494xstormy16-*-*
4495
4496Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
4497made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
4498
3c7012f5
AC
4499* REMOVED configurations and files
4500
4501Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
4502Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
4503Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
4504Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
4505Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
4506AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
4507Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
4508decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
4509riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
4510sonymips mips-sony-*
4511sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
4512
e5fe55f7
AC
4513*** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
4514
4515* TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
4516
4517The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
4518GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
4519command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
4520program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
4521with GDB".
4522
4523* Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
4524
4525Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
4526libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
4527cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
4528GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
4529shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
4530the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
4531are created.
4532
4533Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
4534
4535* Fixed ISO-C build problems
4536
4537The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
4538non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
4539compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
4540
4541* Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
4542
4543Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
4544wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
4545
4546* Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
4547
4548The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
4549permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
4550systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
4551
4552* Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
4553
4554Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
4555has been updated to use constant array sizes.
4556
4557* Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
4558
4559GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
4560its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
4561panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
4562
4563* Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
4564
4565When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
4566by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
4567not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
4568
faae5abe 4569*** Changes in GDB 6.1:
f2c06f52 4570
9175c9a3
MC
4571* Removed --with-mmalloc
4572
4573Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
4574conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
4575
3cc87ec0
MK
4576* Changes in AMD64 configurations
4577
4578The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
4579the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
4580and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
4581you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
4582
f0424ef6
MK
4583* Revised SPARC target
4584
4585The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
4586FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
03cebad2
MK
4587support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
4588from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
4589(Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
f0424ef6 4590
59659be2
ILT
4591* New C++ demangler
4592
4593GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
4594names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
4595with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
4596programs.
4597
9e08b29b
DJ
4598* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
4599
4600GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
4601arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
4602encountered these.
4603
8dfe8985
DC
4604* C++ nested types and namespaces
4605
4606GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
4607improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
4608is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
4609Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
4610namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
4611"Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
4612frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
4613if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
4614GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
4615
cced5e27
MK
4616* New native configurations
4617
4618NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
27d1e716 4619OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2031c21a 4620OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
f2cab569
MK
4621OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
4622OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
cced5e27 4623
b4b4b794
KI
4624* New debugging protocols
4625
4626M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
4627
7989c619
AC
4628* "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
4629
4630The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
4631and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
4632tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
4633
5994185b
AC
4634* OBSOLETE configurations and files
4635
4636Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
4637been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
4638configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
4639permanently REMOVED.
4640
4641Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
4642Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
4643Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
4644Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
4645Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
4646AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
4647Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
0748d941
AC
4648decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
4649riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
4650sonymips mips-sony-*
4651sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
5994185b 4652
0ddabb4c
AC
4653* REMOVED configurations and files
4654
4655SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
4656SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4a8269c0
AC
4657Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
4658Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
4659H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
4660HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
4661HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
4662HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
4663PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
cf7c5c23 4664386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
4a8269c0
AC
4665Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
4666 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
4667 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f0424ef6
MK
4668SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
4669SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
4a8269c0
AC
4670Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
4671Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
0ddabb4c 4672
c7f1390e
DJ
4673*** Changes in GDB 6.0:
4674
1fe43d45
AC
4675* Objective-C
4676
4677Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
4678integrated into GDB.
4679
e6beb428
AC
4680* New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
4681
4682DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
4683information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
4684By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
4685backtraces.
4686
4687The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
4688have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
4689DWARF 2 CFI support.
4690
4691* Hosted file I/O.
4692
4693GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
4694file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
4695remote protocol documentation for details.
4696
4697* All targets using the new architecture framework.
4698
4699All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
4700architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
4701to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
4702ppc32 on ppc64).
4703
4704* GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
4705
4706GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
4707per-thread variables.
4708
4709* GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
4710
4711GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
4712GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
4713
4714* Separate debug info.
4715
4716GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
4717automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
4718of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
4719system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
4720and optional debug files.
4721
4722* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
4723
4724DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
4725describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
4726debugger.
4727
4728GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
4729for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
4730
4731* Java
4732
4733A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
4734Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
4735considered "useable".
4736
85f8f974
DJ
4737* GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
4738
4739The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
4740commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
4741kernel.
4742
0fac0b41
DJ
4743* GDB supports logging output to a file
4744
4745There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
4746used to capture GDB's output to a file.
f2c06f52 4747
6ad8ae5c
DJ
4748* The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
4749
4750The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
4751disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
4752command.
4753
e286caf2 4754* d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
5f601589
AC
4755
4756The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
4757registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
4758
d28f9cdf
DJ
4759* Profiling support
4760
4761A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
4762be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
4763session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
4764"--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
4765data, for more informative profiling results.
4766
da0f9dcd
AC
4767* Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
4768
4769The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
4770option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
b68767c1 4771"mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
da0f9dcd
AC
4772
4773Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
4774removed.
4775
fb9b6b35
JJ
4776Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
4777Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
4778Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
4779 in a subsequent -var-update.
4780
954a4db8
MK
4781* New native configurations.
4782
4783FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
4784
6760f9e6
JB
4785* Multi-arched targets.
4786
b4263afa 4787HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
85a453d5 4788Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
6760f9e6 4789
1b831c93
AC
4790* OBSOLETE configurations and files
4791
4792Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
4793been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
4794configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
4795permanently REMOVED.
4796
8b0e5691 4797Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
67f16606 4798Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
fd2299bd 4799H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
56056df7
AC
4800HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
4801HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
4802HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
78c43945 4803PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2fbce691
AC
4804Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
4805 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
4806 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f81824a9
AC
4807Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
4808Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
fd2299bd 4809
5835abe7
NC
4810* REMOVED configurations and files
4811
4812V850EA ISA
1b831c93
AC
4813Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
4814IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
4815i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
4816i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
4817i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
4818HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
4819 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
4820 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
4821Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
4822Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
4823Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
4824OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
4825I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5835abe7 4826
a094c6fb
AC
4827* MIPS $fp behavior changed
4828
4829The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
4830the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
4831context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
4832address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
4833The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
4834
299ffc64 4835*** Changes in GDB 5.3:
37057839 4836
46248966
AC
4837* GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
4838
4839When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
4840`/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
4841in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
4842library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
4843shared libs like mad''.
4844
b9d14705 4845* ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
6da02953 4846
b9d14705
DJ
4847Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
4848the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
4849arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
4850powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
6da02953 4851
e0e9281e
JB
4852* GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
4853
4854GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
4855and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
4856they expand.
4857
dd73b9bb
AC
4858The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
4859invocations in expression, and shows the result.
4860
4861The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
4862macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
4863
e0e9281e
JB
4864Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
4865information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
4866your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
4867information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
4868
2250ee0c
CV
4869* Multi-arched targets.
4870
6e3ba3b8
JT
4871DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
4872DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
2250ee0c 4873NEC V850 v850-*-*
6e3ba3b8 4874National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
a1789893
GS
4875Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
4876Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
2250ee0c 4877
cd9bfe15 4878* New targets.
e33ce519 4879
456f8b9d
DB
4880Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
4881
e33ce519 4882
da8ca43d
JT
4883* New native configurations
4884
4885Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
029923d4 4886SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
45888261 4887MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
9ce5c36a 4888UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
da8ca43d 4889
cd9bfe15
AC
4890* OBSOLETE configurations and files
4891
4892Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
4893been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
4894configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
4895permanently REMOVED.
4896
92eb23c5 4897Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
a99a9e1b 4898OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1c7cc583 4899IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
7a3085c1 4900Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
7fb623f7 4901Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
eb4c54a2 4902Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
d8ee244c
MK
4903i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
4904i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
4905i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
822e978b
AC
4906HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
4907 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
4908 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
4d210288 4909I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
92eb23c5 4910
db034ac5
AC
4911* OBSOLETE languages
4912
4913CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
4914
cd9bfe15
AC
4915* REMOVED configurations and files
4916
4917AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
4918A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
4919AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
4920AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
4921AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
4922
4923testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
4924
20f01a46
DH
4925* New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
4926
4927This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
4928commands. The default is 1024.
4929
a5941fbf
MK
4930* Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
4931
4932Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
4933
89743e04
MS
4934* New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
4935
4936These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
4937to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
4938from a file into memory (restore).
37057839 4939
9fb14e79
JB
4940* Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
4941
4942The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
4943including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
4944of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
4945
2037aebb
AC
4946*** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
4947
4948* New targets.
4949
4950Atmel AVR avr*-*-*
4951
4952* Bug fixes
4953
4954gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
4955mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
4956Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
4957
4958gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
4959dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
4960Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
4961
4962Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
4963Surprisingly enough, it works now.
4964By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
4965
4966i386 hardware watchpoint support:
4967avoid misses on second run for some targets.
4968By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
4969
37057839 4970*** Changes in GDB 5.2:
eb7cedd9 4971
1a703748
MS
4972* New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
4973
4974This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
4975really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
4976In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
4977target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
4978This can be a significant performance improvement on some
4979(notably embedded) targets.
4980
cefd4ef5
MS
4981* New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
4982
55241689
AC
4983This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
4984process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
4985GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
4986hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
cefd4ef5 4987
352ed7b4
MS
4988* New command line option
4989
4990GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
4991
4992* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
4993
4994There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
4995command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
4996a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
4997be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
4998open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
4999issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
5000a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
5001it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
5002GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
5003is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
5004
fe419ffc
RE
5005* Changes in ARM configurations.
5006
5007Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
5008configuration is fully multi-arch.
5009
eb7cedd9
MK
5010* New native configurations
5011
fe419ffc 5012ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
eb7cedd9 5013x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
55241689 5014AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
768f0842 5015Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
eb7cedd9 5016
c9f63e6b
CV
5017* New targets
5018
5019Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
5020
9b4ff276
AC
5021* OBSOLETE configurations and files
5022
5023Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5024been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5025configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5026permanently REMOVED.
5027
5028AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
5029A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
5030AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
5031AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
5032AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
5033
b4ceaee6 5034testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
9b4ff276 5035
e2caac18
AC
5036* REMOVED configurations and files
5037
5038TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
7bc65f05 5039WDC 65816 w65-*-*
7768dd6c
AC
5040PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
5041PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
5042PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
5e734e1f 5043Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1406caf7
AC
5044Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
5045 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
7e24f0b1 5046SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
9b567150 5047Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
3680c638
AC
5048Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
5049ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
a752853e 5050Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
e2caac18 5051
c2a727fa
TT
5052* Changes to command line processing
5053
5054The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
5055for the inferior from gdb's command line.
5056
467d8519
TT
5057* Changes to key bindings
5058
5059There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
5060
7072a954
AC
5061*** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
5062
5063Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
5064
5065Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
5066corrupted.
5067
5068Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
5069
5070Numerous documentation fixes.
5071
5072Numerous testsuite fixes.
5073
34f47bc4 5074*** Changes in GDB 5.1:
139760b7
MK
5075
5076* New native configurations
5077
5078Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
5079x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
55241689 5080MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
e23194cb
EZ
5081MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
5082ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
55241689 5083s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
139760b7 5084
bf64bfd6
AC
5085* New targets
5086
def90278 5087Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
24be5c34 5088CRIS cris-axis
55241689 5089UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
def90278 5090
17e78a56 5091* OBSOLETE configurations and files
bf64bfd6
AC
5092
5093x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
9b9c068d 5094Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
bb19ff3b
AC
5095Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
5096 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
76f4ea53
AC
5097TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
5098WDC 65816 w65-*-*
4a1968f4 5099Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1b2b2c16
AC
5100PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
5101PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
5102PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
24f89b68 5103SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
514e603d
AC
5104Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
5105ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
d036b4d9 5106Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
bf64bfd6 5107
17e78a56
AC
5108stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
5109kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
5110
7fcca85b
AC
5111Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5112been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5113configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5114permanently REMOVED.
5115
a196c81c 5116* REMOVED configurations and files
7fcca85b
AC
5117
5118Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
5119Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
5120Pyramid pyramid-*-*
5121ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
5122Tahoe tahoe-*-*
a196c81c 5123ser-ocd.c *-*-*
bf64bfd6 5124
6d6b80e5 5125* GDB has been converted to ISO C.
e23194cb 5126
6d6b80e5 5127GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
e23194cb
EZ
5128sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
5129present.
5130
bf64bfd6
AC
5131* Other news:
5132
e23194cb
EZ
5133* "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
5134
5135* The MI enabled by default.
5136
5137The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
5138revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
5139engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
5140using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
5141which is now deprecated.
5142
5143* Support for debugging Pascal programs.
5144
5145GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
5146main features are supported:
5147
5148 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
5149
5150 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
5151 extension;
5152
5153 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
5154
5155 - a Pascal expression parser.
5156
5157However, some important features are not yet supported.
5158
5159 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
5160
5161 - there are some problems with boolean types;
5162
5163 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
5164 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
5165
5166 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
5167
5168 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
5169
5170* Changes in completion.
5171
5172Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
5173to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
5174users expect at the shell prompt.
5175
5176Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
5177`breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
5178program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
5179files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
5180be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
5181considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
5182name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
5183
5184`set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
5185
5186* New platform-independent commands:
5187
5188It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
5189hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
5190documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
5191
5192* Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
5193
d7275149
MK
5194Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
5195revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
5196many threads as your system allows you to have.
5197
e23194cb
EZ
5198Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
5199
d7275149
MK
5200Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
5201multi-threaded programs though.
e23194cb
EZ
5202
5203* Changes in MIPS configurations.
bf64bfd6
AC
5204
5205Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
5206
e23194cb
EZ
5207GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
5208debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
5209supported.)
5210
5211* Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
5212
5213Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
5214breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
5215implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
5216put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
5217and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
5218registers.
5219
5220The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
5221debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
5222watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
5223
5224* Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
5225
5226New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
5227the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
5228
5229New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
5230display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
5231IDT.
5232
5233New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
5234from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
5235New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
5236a given linear address.
5237
5238GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
5239program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
5240which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
5241
5242DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
5243
6c56c069
EZ
5244It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
5245
e23194cb
EZ
5246* Changes in documentation.
5247
5248All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
5249Documentation License.
5250
5251Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
5252manual.
5253
5254TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
5255
5256Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
5257manual.
5258
5259The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
5260documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
5261hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
5262
5d6640b1
AC
5263* GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
5264
5265The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
5266``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
5267contents of this file.
5268
1a1d8446
AC
5269* gdba.el deleted
5270
5271GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
139760b7 5272
9debab2f 5273*** Changes in GDB 5.0:
7a292a7a 5274
c63ce875
EZ
5275* Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
5276
5277Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
5278programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
5279displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
5280greater level of detail.
5281
5282* Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
5283
5284It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
5285bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
5286on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
5287written.
5288
5289* Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
5290
5291The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
5292necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
5293machines ``out of the box''.
5294
5295The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
5296possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
5297signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
5298would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
5299interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
5300
5301It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
5302standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
5303even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
5304and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
5305terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
5306
5307The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
5308enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
5309also works.
5310
5311DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
5312GDB.
5313
5314It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
5315directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
5316times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
5317breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
5318
ed9a39eb
JM
5319* New native configurations
5320
5321ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
afc05dd4 5322PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
ed9a39eb 5323
7a292a7a
SS
5324* New targets
5325
96baa820 5326Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
adf40b2e
JM
5327x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
5328PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
7a292a7a
SS
5329TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
5330
085dd6e6
JM
5331* OBSOLETE configurations
5332
5333Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
5334Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
9846de1b 5335Pyramid pyramid-*-*
ed9a39eb 5336ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
104c1213 5337Tahoe tahoe-*-*
7a292a7a 5338
9debab2f
AC
5339Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
5340but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
5341these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
5342be permanently REMOVED.
5343
5330533d
SS
5344* Gould support removed
5345
5346Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
5347
bc9e5bbf
AC
5348* New features for SVR4
5349
5350On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
5351without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
5352load symbols from the running process's executable file.
5353
5354* Many C++ enhancements
5355
5356C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
5357in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
5358
adf40b2e
JM
5359* Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
5360
5361A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
5362sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
5363with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
5364``|<program> <args>'' vis:
5365
5366 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
5367 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
5368
43e526b9
JM
5369* MIPS 64 remote protocol
5370
5371A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
5372expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
5373instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
5374
5375The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
5376added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
5377
96baa820
JM
5378* ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
5379
5380The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
5381``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
5382include ``set remote P-packet''.
5383
11cf8741
JM
5384* Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
5385
5386The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
5387accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
5388``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
5389
7876dd43
DB
5390* ``apropos'' command added.
5391
5392The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
5393documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
5394try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
5395
bc9e5bbf
AC
5396* New MI interface
5397
5398A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
5399interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
7162c0ca
EZ
5400process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
5401"GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
5402enabled by configuring with:
bc9e5bbf
AC
5403
5404 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
5405
c906108c
SS
5406*** Changes in GDB-4.18:
5407
5408* New native configurations
5409
5410HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
5411HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
55241689 5412M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
c906108c
SS
5413
5414* New targets
5415
5416Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
5417Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
5418Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
5419
5420* OBSOLETE configurations
5421
5422Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
5423
5424Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
5425but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
5426these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
5427be permanently REMOVED.
5428
5429* ANSI/ISO C
5430
5431As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
5432buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
5433containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
5434use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
5435available. If this is not true, please report the affected
5436configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
5437information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
5438already.
5439
5440* Readline 2.2
5441
5442GDB now uses readline 2.2.
5443
5444* set extension-language
5445
5446You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
5447languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
5448you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
5449 set extension-language .c c++
5450The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
5451and their associated languages.
5452
5453* Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
5454
5455When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
5456you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
5457PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
5458
5459 set processor NAME
5460
5461sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
5462following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
5463
5464 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
5465 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
5466 403 IBM PowerPC 403
5467 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
5468 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
5469 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
5470 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
5471 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
5472 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
5473 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
5474 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
5475
5476At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
5477special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
5478registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
5479only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
5480
5481* HP-UX support
5482
5483Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
5484more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
5485library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
5486support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
5487for xdb and dbx commands.
5488
5489* Catchpoints
5490
5491HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
5492generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
5493to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
5494
5495This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
5496argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
5497output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
5498
5499* Debugging across forks
5500
5501On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
5502in the inferior.
5503
5504* TUI
5505
5506HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
5507it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
5508configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
5509
5510* GDB remote protocol additions
5511
5512A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
5513Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
5514fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
5515allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
5516
5517For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
5518full 64-bit address. The command
5519
5520 set remoteaddresssize 32
5521
5522can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
5523the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
5524will be discarded.
5525
5526In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
5527command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
5528
5529 maint packet heythere
5530
5531sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
5532disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
5533time.
5534
5535The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
5536target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
5537downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
5538
5539* Tracing can collect general expressions
5540
5541You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
5542further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
5543doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
5544
5545* mask-address variable for Mips
5546
5547For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
5548a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
5549of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
5550
5551* Higher serial baud rates
5552
5553GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
5554230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
5555to achieve all of these rates.)
5556
5557* i960 simulator
5558
5559The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
5560builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
5561
5562
5563*** Changes in GDB-4.17:
5564
5565* New native configurations
5566
5567Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
5568Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
5569Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
5570PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
5571PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
5572Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
5573Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
5574
5575* New targets
5576
5577Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
5578Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
5579Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
5580Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
5581MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
5582MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
5583MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
5584Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
5585Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
5586Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
5587NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
5588
5589* New debugging protocols
5590
5591ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
5592M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
5593DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
5594PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
5595PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
5596Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
5597
5598* DWARF 2
5599
5600All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
5601format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
5602information.
5603
5604* Java frontend
5605
5606GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
5607only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
5608
5609* solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
5610
5611For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
5612loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
5613locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
5614
5615* Live range splitting
5616
5617GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
5618range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
5619more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
5620
5621* Hurd support
5622
5623GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
5624updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
5625
5626* ARM Thumb support
5627
5628GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
5629instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
5630instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
5631accordingly.
5632
5633* MIPS16 support
5634
5635GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
5636instruction set.
5637
5638* Overlay support
5639
5640GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
5641linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
5642will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
5643control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
5644additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
5645in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
5646
5647* info symbol
5648
5649The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
5650the symbol at the specified address.
5651
5652* Trace support
5653
5654The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
5655asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
5656extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
5657includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
5658file tracepoint.c for more details.
5659
5660* MIPS simulator
5661
5662Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
5663by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
5664of most MIPS variants.
5665
5666* Sparc simulator
5667
5668Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
5669by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
5670Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
5671
5672* set architecture
5673
5674For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
5675basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
5676architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
5677the possible architectures.
5678
5679*** Changes in GDB-4.16:
5680
5681* New native configurations
5682
5683Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
5684M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
5685PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
5686PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
5687PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
5688RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
5689
5690* New targets
5691
5692ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
5693I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5694MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
5695MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
5696PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
5697Hitachi SH3 sh-*-*
5698Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
5699
5700* PowerPC simulator
5701
5702The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
5703contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
5704PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
5705basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
5706performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
5707
5708* Solaris 2.5
5709
5710GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
5711
5712* Windows 95/NT native
5713
5714GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
5715To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
5716which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
5717Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
5718ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
5719
5720* dont-repeat command
5721
5722If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
5723command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
5724useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
5725extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
5726
5727* Send break instead of ^C
5728
5729The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
5730rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
5731GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
5732
5733* Remote protocol timeout
5734
5735The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
5736that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
5737to read from the target. The default value is 2.
5738
5739* Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
5740
5741By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
5742loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
5743stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
5744when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
5745in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
5746
5747Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
5748/usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
5749automatically on hpux10.
5750
5751* Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
5752
5753Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
5754
5755* Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
5756
5757When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
5758may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
5759the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
5760every character. The default value is 1050.
5761
5762* Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
5763
5764If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
5765a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
5766replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
5767details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
5768remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
5769to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
5770
5771* Speedups for remote debugging
5772
5773GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
5774the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
5775and more efficient S-record downloading.
5776
5777* Memory use reductions and statistics collection
5778
5779GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
5780Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
5781
5782*** Changes in GDB-4.15:
5783
5784* Psymtabs for XCOFF
5785
5786The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
5787can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
5788
5789* Remote targets use caching
5790
5791Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
5792remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
5793it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
5794debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
5795off' turns the the data cache off.
5796
5797* Remote targets may have threads
5798
5799The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
5800in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
5801gdb/remote.c for details.
5802
5803* NetROM support
5804
5805If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
5806support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
5807acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
5808write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
5809support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
5810another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
5811sequence is something like
5812
5813 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
5814 load <prog>
5815 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
5816
5817* Macintosh host
5818
5819GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
5820may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
5821it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
5822available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
5823device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
5824directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
5825scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
5826mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
5827
5828* Autoconf
5829
5830GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
5831but does simplify configuration and building.
5832
5833* hpux10
5834
5835GDB now supports hpux10.
5836
5837*** Changes in GDB-4.14:
5838
5839* New native configurations
5840
5841x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
5842x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
5843NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
5844Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
5845
5846* New targets
5847
5848A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
5849HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
5850CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
5851PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
5852WDC 65816 w65-*-*
5853
5854* Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
5855
5856GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
5857possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
5858filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
5859the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
5860if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
5861
5862* Arguments to user-defined commands
5863
5864User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
5865Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
5866trivial example:
5867define adder
5868 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
5869
5870To execute the command use:
5871adder 1 2 3
5872
5873Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
5874Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
5875use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
5876
5877* New `if' and `while' commands
5878
5879This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
5880commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
5881expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
5882execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
5883terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
5884`else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
5885if the expression is zero.
5886
5887* Fortran source language mode
5888
5889GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
5890Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
5891variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
5892with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
5893Fortran compilers.
5894
5895* Better HPUX support
5896
5897Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
5898running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
5899processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
5900for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
5901that behavior do the following before running the program:
5902
5903 adb -w a.out
5904 __dld_flags?W 0x5
5905 control-d
5906
5907This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
5908To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
5909
5910 adb -w a.out
5911 __dld_flags?W 0x4
5912 control-d
5913
5914You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
5915the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
5916external linkage.
5917
5918GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
5919HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
5920
5921* Target byte order now dynamically selectable
5922
5923You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
5924commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
5925current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
5926"set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
5927associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
5928configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
5929
5930* New DOS host serial code
5931
5932This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
5933no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
5934a PC's serial port.
5935
5936*** Changes in GDB-4.13:
5937
5938* New "complete" command
5939
5940This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
5941were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
5942
5943* Trailing space optional in prompt
5944
5945"set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
5946allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
5947
5948* Breakpoint hit counts
5949
5950"info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
5951has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
5952can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
5953to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
5954less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
5955that breakpoint.
5956
5957* Ability to stop printing at NULL character
5958
5959"set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
5960an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
5961arrays actually contain only short strings.
5962
5963* Shared library breakpoints
5964
5965In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
5966breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
5967
5968* Hardware watchpoints
5969
5970There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
5971targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
5972
55241689 5973Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
c906108c
SS
5974
5975* Annotations
5976
5977Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
5978and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
5979
5980* Improved Irix 5 support
5981
5982GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
5983
5984* Improved HPPA support
5985
5986GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
5987
5988* New native configurations
5989
5990Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
5991HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
5992Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
5993RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
5994
5995* New targets
5996
5997OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
5998MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
5999Sparc64 sparc64-*-*
6000
6001* Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
6002
6003There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
6004This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
6005
6006* Fixes
6007
6008As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
6009and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
6010
6011*** Changes in GDB-4.12:
6012
6013* Irix 5 is now supported
6014
6015* HPPA support
6016
6017GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
6018to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
6019GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
6020of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
6021can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
6022
6023
6024*** Changes in GDB-4.11:
6025
6026* User visible changes:
6027
6028* Remote Debugging
6029
6030The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
6031target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
6032debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
6033integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
6034debugging info for the mips target).
6035
6036* DEC Alpha native support
6037
6038GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
6039debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
6040work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
6041Alpha-specific notes.
6042
6043* Preliminary thread implementation
6044
6045GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
6046
6047* LynxOS native and target support for 386
6048
6049This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
6050to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
6051for details).
6052
6053* Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
6054
6055This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
6056mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
6057call methods, ...etc.
6058
6059*** Changes in GDB-4.10:
6060
6061 * User visible changes:
6062
6063Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
6064supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
6065other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
6066somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
6067
6068Filename completion now works.
6069
6070When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
6071arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
6072addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
6073
6074All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
6075vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
6076should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
6077your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
6078to be on the far side of a thin network line.
6079
6080 * DEC alpha support
6081
6082This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
6083cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
6084
6085
6086*** Changes in GDB-4.9:
6087
6088 * Testsuite
6089
6090This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
6091The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
6092via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
6093
6094 * C++ demangling
6095
6096'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
6097emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
6098Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
6099disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
6100use gdb with AT&T cfront.
6101
6102 * Simulators
6103
6104GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
6105So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
6106Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
6107
6108 * New targets supported
6109
6110H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
6111H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
6112SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
6113Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
6114IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
6115
6116Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
6117version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
6118GO32 memory extender.
6119
6120 * New remote protocols
6121
6122MIPS remote debugging protocol.
6123
6124 * New source languages supported
6125
6126This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
6127used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
6128into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
6129
6130
6131*** Changes in GDB-4.8:
6132
6133 * HP Precision Architecture supported
6134
6135GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
6136version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
6137University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
6138compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
6139format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
6140(as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
6141
6142Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
6143
6144 * Faster and better demangling
6145
6146We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
6147demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
6148character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
6149only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
6150This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
6151increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
6152symbol lookups.
6153
6154`Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
6155from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
6156compiler does not actually implement.
6157
6158 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
6159
6160In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
6161inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
6162recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
6163very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
6164The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
6165circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
6166fix.
6167
6168The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
6169release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
6170
6171 * Improved configure script
6172
6173The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
6174you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
6175host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
6176done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
6177
6178We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
6179version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
6180`--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
6181The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
6182only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
6183We hope to make this the default in a future release.
6184
6185 * Documentation improvements
6186
6187There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
6188produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
6189before submitting changes.
6190
6191The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
6192M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
6193`info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
6194you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
6195a future texinfo-X.Y release.
6196
6197*NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
6198We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
6199been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
6200or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
6201`texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
6202around this problem.
6203
6204 * New features
6205
6206GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
6207the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
6208`print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
6209the target program.
6210
6211The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
6212how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
6213
6214 * New native hosts supported
6215
6216HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
6217386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
6218
6219 * New targets supported
6220
6221AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
6222
6223 * New file formats supported
6224
6225BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
6226HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
6227
6228 * Major bug fixes
6229
6230Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
6231
6232We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
6233printf_filtered("%s") problems.
6234
6235We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
6236for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
6237release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
6238
6239You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
6240will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
6241
6242We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
6243for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
6244especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
6245libraries.
6246
6247The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
6248information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
6249command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
6250any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
6251when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
6252
6253 * Internal improvements
6254
6255GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
6256debugging of multiple languages in the future.
6257
6258GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
6259Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
6260symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
6261contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
6262shared code that handles any of them.
6263
6264 * New command line options
6265
6266We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
6267
6268 * Mmalloc licensing
6269
6270The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
6271General Public License.
6272
6273*** Changes in GDB-4.7:
6274
6275 * Host/native/target split
6276
6277GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
6278hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
6279target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
6280local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
6281ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
6282
6283The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
6284GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
6285is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
6286code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
6287any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
6288built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
6289handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
6290
6291GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
6292It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
6293plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
6294
6295 * New hosts supported
6296
6297HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
6298386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
6299386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
6300
6301 * New targets supported
6302
6303Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
630468030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
6305
6306 * New native hosts supported
6307
6308386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
6309 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
6310386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
6311
6312 * New file formats supported
6313
6314BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
6315supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
6316format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
6317
6318 * New commands
6319
6320`show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
6321`show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
6322These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
6323
6324`info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
6325
6326You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
6327scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
6328prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
6329executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
6330
6331 * C++ improvements
6332
6333We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
6334info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
6335symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
6336
6337Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
6338
6339 * Major bug fixes
6340
6341The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
6342fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
6343by the compiler.
6344
6345We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
6346support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
6347
6348John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
6349slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
6350that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
6351purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
6352the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
6353mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
6354
6355Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
6356about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
6357completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
6358we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
6359
6360 * AMD 29k support
6361
6362A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
6363specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
6364calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
6365usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
6366in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
6367
6368We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
6369Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
6370of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
6371resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
6372
6373 * Remote interfaces
6374
6375We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
6376with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
6377message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
6378This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
6379needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
6380breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
6381each instruction being stepped through.
6382
6383The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
6384registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
6385
6386There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
6387find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
6388Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
6389processor with a serial port.
6390
6391 * Configuration
6392
6393Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
6394`table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
6395supported, and what files each one uses.
6396
6397 * Library changes
6398
6399There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
6400disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
6401Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
6402disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
6403
6404The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
6405Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
6406can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
6407grants all the rights from the General Public License.
6408
6409 * Documentation
6410
6411The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
6412reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
6413as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
6414encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
6415system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
6416bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
6417
6418And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
6419
6420
6421*** Changes in GDB-4.6:
6422
6423 * Better support for C++ function names
6424
6425GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
6426names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
6427(using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
6428single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
6429Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
6430
6431GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
6432the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
6433You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
6434lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
6435for the list of formats.
6436
6437 * G++ symbol mangling problem
6438
6439Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
6440C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
6441directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
6442can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
6443usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
6444about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
6445this problem.)
6446
6447 * New 'maintenance' command
6448
6449All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
6450the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
6451can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
6452
6453 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
6454 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
6455 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
6456 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
6457 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
6458 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
6459
6460The following commands are new:
6461
6462 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
6463 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
6464 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
6465
6466 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
6467
6468We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
6469(e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
6470be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
6471read after argv processing.
6472
6473 * New hosts supported
6474
6475Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
6476
55241689 6477GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
c906108c
SS
6478
6479We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
6480is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
6481for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
6482masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
6483fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
6484It costs extra.
6485
6486 * New targets supported
6487
6488Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
6489
6490 * More smarts about finding #include files
6491
6492GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
6493all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
6494greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
6495especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
6496the one that contains your sources.
6497
6498We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
6499breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
6500try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
6501
6502 * Interesting infernals change
6503
6504GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
6505section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
6506target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
6507stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
6508
6509 * Bug fixes (of course!)
6510
6511There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
6512 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
6513 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
6514
6515See the ChangeLog for details.
6516
6517*** Changes in GDB-4.5:
6518
6519 * New machines supported (host and target)
6520
6521IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
6522
6523SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
6524
6525 * New malloc package
6526
6527GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
6528Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
6529capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
6530This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
6531pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
6532more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
6533
6534 * info proc
6535
6536The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
6537'help info proc' for details.
6538
6539 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
6540
6541The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
6542Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
6543possible.
6544
6545 * File name changes for MS-DOS
6546
6547Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
6548support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
6549conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
6550environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
6551that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
6552in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
6553
6554 * Cross byte order fixes
6555
6556Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
6557targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
6558
6559 * New -mapped and -readnow options
6560
6561If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
6562system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
6563`symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
6564program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
6565called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
6566Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
6567and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
6568the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
6569option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
6570starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
6571
6572You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
6573the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
6574information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
6575slower, but makes future operations faster.
6576
6577The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
6578build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
6579A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
6580use is:
6581
6582 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
6583
6584The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
6585It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
6586shared across multiple host platforms.
6587
6588 * longjmp() handling
6589
6590GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
6591siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
6592all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
6593platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
6594
6595 * Solaris 2.0
6596
6597Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
6598this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
6599reading symbols.
6600
6601 * Bug fixes
6602
6603As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
6604People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
6605crashes and trashed symbol tables.
6606
6607*** Changes in GDB-4.4:
6608
6609 * New machines supported (host and target)
6610
6611SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
6612 (except core files)
6613BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
6614Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
6615
6616 * New machines supported (target)
6617
6618AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
6619
6620 * C++ support
6621
6622GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
6623The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
6624per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
6625
6626GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
6627`ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
6628extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
6629good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
6630will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
6631released.
6632
6633 * New features for SVR4
6634
6635GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
6636shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
6637only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
6638
6639The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
6640on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
6641it prints the address mappings of the process.
6642
6643If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
6644bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
6645
6646 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
6647
6648Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
6649now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
6650skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
6651make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
6652same code linked statically.
6653
6654 * New Getopt
6655
6656GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
6657version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
6658continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
6659Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
6660added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
6661future by other options that begin with the same letter.
6662
6663 * Bugs fixed
6664
6665The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
6666Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
6667See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
6668
6669
6670*** Changes in GDB-4.3:
6671
6672 * New machines supported (host and target)
6673
6674Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
6675NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
6676Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
6677
6678 * Almost SCO Unix support
6679
6680We had hoped to support:
6681SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
6682(except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
6683that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
6684about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
6685
6686 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
6687
6688GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
6689debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
6690is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
6691send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
6692reqired (if any).
6693
6694 * New Readline
6695
6696GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
6697is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
6698required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
6699
6700 * Bugs fixed
6701
6702The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
6703Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
6704See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
6705
6706 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
6707
6708GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
6709supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
6710symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
6711
6712Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
6713mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
6714debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
6715mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
6716version 2.
6717
6718Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
6719really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
6720line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
6721variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
6722situation somewhat.
6723
6724When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
6725However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
6726methods.
6727
6728We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
6729DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
6730encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
6731
6732
6733*** Changes in GDB-4.2:
6734
6735 * Improved configuration
6736
6737Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
6738Porting BFD is simpler.
6739
6740 * Stepping improved
6741
6742The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
6743of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
6744in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
6745function that has debugging information is called within the line.
6746
6747 * Bug fixing
6748
6749Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
6750
6751 * New host supported (not target)
6752
6753Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
6754
6755
6756*** Changes in GDB-4.1:
6757
6758 * Multiple source language support
6759
6760GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
6761It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
6762and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
6763language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
6764You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
6765`set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
6766
6767 * GDB and Modula-2
6768
6769GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
6770currently under development at the State University of New York at
6771Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
6772continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
6773
6774Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
6775debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
6776symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
6777
6778There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
6779in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
6780
6781 * set write on/off
6782
6783GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
6784a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
6785the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
6786by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
6787effect immediately.
6788
6789 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
6790
6791When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
6792shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
6793The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
6794examining core files.
6795
6796 * set listsize
6797
6798You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
6799The default is 10.
6800
6801 * New machines supported (host and target)
6802
6803SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
6804Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
6805Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
6806
6807 * New hosts supported (not targets)
6808
6809IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
6810
6811 * New targets supported (not hosts)
6812
6813AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
6814AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
6815Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
6816
6817 * New remote interfaces
6818
6819AMD 29000 Adapt
6820AMD 29000 Minimon
6821
6822
6823*** Changes in GDB-4.0:
6824
6825 * New Facilities
6826
6827Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
6828
6829Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
6830target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
6831is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
6832remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
6833remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
6834also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
6835using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
6836stub on the target system.
6837
6838New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
6839
6840GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
6841library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
6842object file types such as a.out and coff.
6843
6844There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
6845refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
6846
6847
6848 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
6849
6850All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
6851by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
6852
6853For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
6854``Show prompt'' produces the response:
6855Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
6856
6857What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
6858print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
6859will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
6860all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
6861
6862confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
6863 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
6864 it is already running. Default is ON.
6865
6866editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
6867 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
6868 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
6869 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
6870 Default is ON.
6871
6872history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
6873 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
6874 or the value of the environment variable
6875 GDBHISTFILE.
6876
6877history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
6878 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
6879 HISTSIZE.
6880
6881history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
6882 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
6883 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
6884
6885history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
6886 history expansion will be performed on
6887 command line input. The default is OFF.
6888
6889radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
6890 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
6891 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
6892
6893height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
6894 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
6895 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
6896 variable TERM.
6897
6898width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
6899 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
6900 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
6901 variable TERM.
6902
6903Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
6904``set width'' instead.
6905
6906print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
6907 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
6908 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
6909 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
6910
6911print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
6912 is OFF.
6913
6914print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
6915 "raw" form if off.
6916
6917print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
6918 like instructions.
6919
6920print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
6921
6922
6923 * Support for Epoch Environment.
6924
6925The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
6926new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
6927are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
6928window.
6929
6930
6931 * Support for Shared Libraries
6932
6933GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
6934Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
6935before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
6936happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
6937At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
6938from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
6939shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
6940It can be abbreviated ``share''.
6941
6942sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
6943 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
6944 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
6945
6946info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
6947
6948
6949 * Watchpoints
6950
6951A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
6952expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
6953tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
6954quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
6955problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
6956more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
6957
6958watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
6959
6960info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
6961
6962delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
6963disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
6964enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
6965
6966
6967 * C++ multiple inheritance
6968
6969When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
6970for C++ programs.
6971
6972 * C++ exception handling
6973
6974Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
6975ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
6976the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
6977handler's context).
6978
6979catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
6980 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
6981 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
6982
6983info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
6984 current stack frame.
6985
6986
6987 * Minor command changes
6988
6989The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
6990command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
6991is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
6992
6993The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
6994at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
6995frames without printing.
6996
6997 * New directory command
6998
6999'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
7000The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
7001about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
7002with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
7003find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
7004
7005 * Configuring GDB for compilation
7006
7007For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
7008for more details.
7009
7010GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
7011two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
7012Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
7013where the program that you are debugging will run.
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