gdb/NEWS: Fix typo
[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 7.6
5
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6* GDB now supports Fission DWP file format version 2.
7 http://gcc.gnu.org/wiki/DebugFission
8
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9* New convenience function "$_isvoid", to check whether an expression
10 is void. A void expression is an expression where the type of the
11 result is "void". For example, some convenience variables may be
12 "void" when evaluated (e.g., "$_exitcode" before the execution of
13 the program being debugged; or an undefined convenience variable).
14 Another example, when calling a function whose return type is
15 "void".
16
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17* The "maintenance print objfiles" command now takes an optional regexp.
18
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19* The "catch syscall" command now works on arm*-linux* targets.
20
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21* GDB now consistently shows "<not saved>" when printing values of
22 registers the debug info indicates have not been saved in the frame
23 and there's nowhere to retrieve them from
24 (callee-saved/call-clobbered registers):
25
26 (gdb) p $rax
27 $1 = <not saved>
28
29 (gdb) info registers rax
30 rax <not saved>
31
32 Before, the former would print "<optimized out>", and the latter
33 "*value not available*".
34
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35* Python scripting
36
37 ** Frame filters and frame decorators have been added.
f76c27b5 38 ** Temporary breakpoints are now supported.
bc79de95 39 ** Line tables representation has been added.
1e611234 40
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41* New targets
42
43Nios II ELF nios2*-*-elf
44Nios II GNU/Linux nios2*-*-linux
42059f0e 45Texas Instruments MSP430 msp430*-*-elf
a1217d97 46
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47* Removed native configurations
48
49Support for these a.out NetBSD and OpenBSD obsolete configurations has
50been removed. ELF variants of these configurations are kept supported.
51
52arm*-*-netbsd* but arm*-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
53i[34567]86-*-netbsd* but i[34567]86-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
54i[34567]86-*-openbsd[0-2].* but i[34567]86-*-openbsd* is kept supported.
55i[34567]86-*-openbsd3.[0-3]
56m68*-*-netbsd* but m68*-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
57sparc-*-netbsd* but sparc-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
58vax-*-netbsd* but vax-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
59
bd712aed 60* New commands:
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61catch rethrow
62 Like "catch throw", but catches a re-thrown exception.
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63maint check-psymtabs
64 Renamed from old "maint check-symtabs".
65maint check-symtabs
66 Perform consistency checks on symtabs.
67maint expand-symtabs
68 Expand symtabs matching an optional regexp.
b340913d 69
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70show configuration
71 Display the details of GDB configure-time options.
72
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73maint set|show per-command
74maint set|show per-command space
75maint set|show per-command time
76maint set|show per-command symtab
77 Enable display of per-command gdb resource usage.
78
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79remove-symbol-file FILENAME
80remove-symbol-file -a ADDRESS
81 Remove a symbol file added via add-symbol-file. The file to remove
82 can be identified by its filename or by an address that lies within
83 the boundaries of this symbol file in memory.
84
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85info exceptions
86info exceptions REGEXP
87 Display the list of Ada exceptions defined in the program being
88 debugged. If provided, only the exceptions whose names match REGEXP
89 are listed.
90
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91* New options
92
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93set debug symfile off|on
94show debug symfile
95 Control display of debugging info regarding reading symbol files and
96 symbol tables within those files
97
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98set print raw frame-arguments
99show print raw frame-arguments
100 Set/show whether to print frame arguments in raw mode,
101 disregarding any defined pretty-printers.
102
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103set remote trace-status-packet
104show remote trace-status-packet
105 Set/show the use of remote protocol qTStatus packet.
106
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107set debug nios2
108show debug nios2
109 Control display of debugging messages related to Nios II targets.
110
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111set range-stepping
112show range-stepping
113 Control whether target-assisted range stepping is enabled.
114
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115set startup-with-shell
116show startup-with-shell
117 Specifies whether Unix child processes are started via a shell or
118 directly.
119
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120* You can now use a literal value 'unlimited' for options that
121 interpret 0 or -1 as meaning "unlimited". E.g., "set
122 trace-buffer-size unlimited" is now an alias for "set
123 trace-buffer-size -1" and "set height unlimited" is now an alias for
124 "set height 0".
125
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126* The "set debug symtab-create" debugging option of GDB has been changed to
127 accept a verbosity level. 0 means "off", 1 provides basic debugging
128 output, and values of 2 or greater provides more verbose output.
129
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130* New command-line options
131--configuration
132 Display the details of GDB configure-time options.
133
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134* The command 'tsave' can now support new option '-ctf' to save trace
135 buffer in Common Trace Format.
136
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137* Newly installed $prefix/bin/gcore acts as a shell interface for the
138 GDB command gcore.
139
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140* GDB now implements the the C++ 'typeid' operator.
141
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142* The new convenience variable $_exception holds the exception being
143 thrown or caught at an exception-related catchpoint.
144
145* The exception-related catchpoints, like "catch throw", now accept a
146 regular expression which can be used to filter exceptions by type.
147
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148* The new convenience variable $_exitsignal is automatically set to
149 the terminating signal number when the program being debugged dies
150 due to an uncaught signal.
151
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152* MI changes
153
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154 ** All MI commands now accept an optional "--language" option.
155
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156 ** The -trace-save MI command can optionally save trace buffer in Common
157 Trace Format now.
158
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159 ** The new command -dprintf-insert sets a dynamic printf breakpoint.
160
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161 ** The command -data-list-register-values now accepts an optional
162 "--skip-unavailable" option. When used, only the available registers
163 are displayed.
164
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165 ** The new command -trace-frame-collected dumps collected variables,
166 computed expressions, tvars, memory and registers in a traceframe.
167
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168 ** The commands -stack-list-locals, -stack-list-arguments and
169 -stack-list-variables now accept an option "--skip-unavailable".
170 When used, only the available locals or arguments are displayed.
171
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172 ** The -exec-run command now accepts an optional "--start" option.
173 When used, the command follows the same semantics as the "start"
174 command, stopping the program's execution at the start of its
175 main subprogram.
176
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177 ** The new commands -catch-assert and -catch-exceptions insert
178 catchpoints stopping the program when Ada exceptions are raised.
179
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180 ** The new command -info-ada-exceptions provides the equivalent of
181 the new "info exceptions" command.
182
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183* New system-wide configuration scripts
184 A GDB installation now provides scripts suitable for use as system-wide
185 configuration scripts for the following systems:
186 ** ElinOS
187 ** Wind River Linux
188
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189* GDB now supports target-assigned range stepping with remote targets.
190 This improves the performance of stepping source lines by reducing
191 the number of control packets from/to GDB. See "New remote packets"
192 below.
193
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194* GDB now understands the element 'tvar' in the XML traceframe info.
195 It has the id of the collected trace state variables.
196
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197* On S/390 targets that provide the transactional-execution feature,
198 the program interruption transaction diagnostic block (TDB) is now
199 represented as a number of additional "registers" in GDB.
200
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201* New remote packets
202
203vCont;r
204
205 The vCont packet supports a new 'r' action, that tells the remote
206 stub to step through an address range itself, without GDB
207 involvemement at each single-step.
208
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209qXfer:libraries-svr4:read's annex
210 The previously unused annex of the qXfer:libraries-svr4:read packet
211 is now used to support passing an argument list. The remote stub
212 reports support for this argument list to GDB's qSupported query.
213 The defined arguments are "start" and "prev", used to reduce work
214 necessary for library list updating, resulting in significant
215 speedup.
216
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217* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
218
219 ** GDBserver now supports target-assisted range stepping. Currently
220 enabled on x86/x86_64 GNU/Linux targets.
221
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222 ** GDBserver now adds element 'tvar' in the XML in the reply to
223 'qXfer:traceframe-info:read'. It has the id of the collected
224 trace state variables.
225
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226 ** GDBserver now supports hardware watchpoints on the MIPS GNU/Linux
227 target.
228
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229* New 'z' formatter for printing and examining memory, this displays the
230 value as hexadecimal zero padded on the left to the size of the type.
231
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232* GDB can now use Windows x64 unwinding data.
233
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234* The "set remotebaud" command has been replaced by "set serial baud".
235 Similarly, "show remotebaud" has been replaced by "show serial baud".
236 The "set remotebaud" and "show remotebaud" commands are still available
237 to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
238
2d450646 239*** Changes in GDB 7.6
80c8d323 240
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241* Target record has been renamed to record-full.
242 Record/replay is now enabled with the "record full" command.
243 This also affects settings that are associated with full record/replay
244 that have been moved from "set/show record" to "set/show record full":
245
246set|show record full insn-number-max
247set|show record full stop-at-limit
248set|show record full memory-query
249
250* A new record target "record-btrace" has been added. The new target
251 uses hardware support to record the control-flow of a process. It
252 does not support replaying the execution, but it implements the
253 below new commands for investigating the recorded execution log.
254 This new recording method can be enabled using:
255
256record btrace
257
258 The "record-btrace" target is only available on Intel Atom processors
259 and requires a Linux kernel 2.6.32 or later.
260
261* Two new commands have been added for record/replay to give information
262 about the recorded execution without having to replay the execution.
263 The commands are only supported by "record btrace".
264
265record instruction-history prints the execution history at
266 instruction granularity
267
268record function-call-history prints the execution history at
269 function granularity
270
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271* New native configurations
272
51d66578 273ARM AArch64 GNU/Linux aarch64*-*-linux-gnu
543bf33d 274FreeBSD/powerpc powerpc*-*-freebsd
4f4352f7 275x86_64/Cygwin x86_64-*-cygwin*
ea5f3910 276Tilera TILE-Gx GNU/Linux tilegx*-*-linux-gnu
543bf33d 277
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278* New targets
279
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280ARM AArch64 aarch64*-*-elf
281ARM AArch64 GNU/Linux aarch64*-*-linux
249729c4 282Lynx 178 PowerPC powerpc-*-lynx*178
3c095f49 283x86_64/Cygwin x86_64-*-cygwin*
ea5f3910 284Tilera TILE-Gx GNU/Linux tilegx*-*-linux
249729c4 285
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286* If the configured location of system.gdbinit file (as given by the
287 --with-system-gdbinit option at configure time) is in the
288 data-directory (as specified by --with-gdb-datadir at configure
289 time) or in one of its subdirectories, then GDB will look for the
290 system-wide init file in the directory specified by the
291 --data-directory command-line option.
292
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293* New command line options:
294
295-nh Disables auto-loading of ~/.gdbinit, but still executes all the
296 other initialization files, unlike -nx which disables all of them.
297
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298* Removed command line options
299
300-epoch This was used by the gdb mode in Epoch, an ancient fork of
301 Emacs.
302
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303* The 'ptype' and 'whatis' commands now accept an argument to control
304 type formatting.
305
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306* 'info proc' now works on some core files.
307
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308* Python scripting
309
310 ** Vectors can be created with gdb.Type.vector.
311
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312 ** Python's atexit.register now works in GDB.
313
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314 ** Types can be pretty-printed via a Python API.
315
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316 ** Python 3 is now supported (in addition to Python 2.4 or later)
317
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318 ** New class gdb.Architecture exposes GDB's internal representation
319 of architecture in the Python API.
320
321 ** New method Frame.architecture returns the gdb.Architecture object
322 corresponding to the frame's architecture.
323
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324* New Python-based convenience functions:
325
326 ** $_memeq(buf1, buf2, length)
327 ** $_streq(str1, str2)
328 ** $_strlen(str)
329 ** $_regex(str, regex)
330
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331* The 'cd' command now defaults to using '~' (the home directory) if not
332 given an argument.
333
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334* The C++ ABI now defaults to the GNU v3 ABI. This has been the
335 default for GCC since November 2000.
336
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337* The command 'forward-search' can now be abbreviated as 'fo'.
338
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339* The command 'info tracepoints' can now display 'installed on target'
340 or 'not installed on target' for each non-pending location of tracepoint.
341
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342* New configure options
343
344--enable-libmcheck/--disable-libmcheck
345 By default, development versions are built with -lmcheck on hosts
346 that support it, in order to help track memory corruption issues.
347 Release versions, on the other hand, are built without -lmcheck
348 by default. The --enable-libmcheck/--disable-libmcheck configure
349 options allow the user to override that default.
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350--with-babeltrace/--with-babeltrace-include/--with-babeltrace-lib
351 This configure option allows the user to build GDB with
352 libbabeltrace using which GDB can read Common Trace Format data.
23a80689 353
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354* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
355
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356catch signal
357 Catch signals. This is similar to "handle", but allows commands and
358 conditions to be attached.
359
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360maint info bfds
361 List the BFDs known to GDB.
362
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363python-interactive [command]
364pi [command]
365 Start a Python interactive prompt, or evaluate the optional command
366 and print the result of expressions.
367
368py [command]
369 "py" is a new alias for "python".
370
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371enable type-printer [name]...
372disable type-printer [name]...
373 Enable or disable type printers.
374
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375* Removed commands
376
377 ** For the Renesas Super-H architecture, the "regs" command has been removed
378 (has been deprecated in GDB 7.5), and "info all-registers" should be used
379 instead.
380
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381* New options
382
383set print type methods (on|off)
384show print type methods
385 Control whether method declarations are displayed by "ptype".
386 The default is to show them.
387
388set print type typedefs (on|off)
389show print type typedefs
390 Control whether typedef definitions are displayed by "ptype".
391 The default is to show them.
392
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393set filename-display basename|relative|absolute
394show filename-display
395 Control the way in which filenames is displayed.
396 The default is "relative", which preserves previous behavior.
397
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398set trace-buffer-size
399show trace-buffer-size
400 Request target to change the size of trace buffer.
401
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402set remote trace-buffer-size-packet auto|on|off
403show remote trace-buffer-size-packet
404 Control the use of the remote protocol `QTBuffer:size' packet.
405
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406set debug aarch64
407show debug aarch64
408 Control display of debugging messages related to ARM AArch64.
409 The default is off.
410
411set debug coff-pe-read
412show debug coff-pe-read
413 Control display of debugging messages related to reading of COFF/PE
414 exported symbols.
415
416set debug mach-o
417show debug mach-o
418 Control display of debugging messages related to Mach-O symbols
419 processing.
420
421set debug notification
422show debug notification
423 Control display of debugging info for async remote notification.
424
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425* MI changes
426
427 ** Command parameter changes are now notified using new async record
428 "=cmd-param-changed".
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429 ** Trace frame changes caused by command "tfind" are now notified using
430 new async record "=traceframe-changed".
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431 ** The creation, deletion and modification of trace state variables
432 are now notified using new async records "=tsv-created",
433 "=tsv-deleted" and "=tsv-modified".
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434 ** The start and stop of process record are now notified using new
435 async record "=record-started" and "=record-stopped".
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436 ** Memory changes are now notified using new async record
437 "=memory-changed".
ed8a1c2d 438 ** The data-disassemble command response will include a "fullname" field
ec83d211 439 containing the absolute file name when source has been requested.
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440 ** New optional parameter COUNT added to the "-data-write-memory-bytes"
441 command, to allow pattern filling of memory areas.
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442 ** New commands "-catch-load"/"-catch-unload" added for intercepting
443 library load/unload events.
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444 ** The response to breakpoint commands and breakpoint async records
445 includes an "installed" field containing a boolean state about each
446 non-pending tracepoint location is whether installed on target or not.
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447 ** Output of the "-trace-status" command includes a "trace-file" field
448 containing the name of the trace file being examined. This field is
449 optional, and only present when examining a trace file.
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450 ** The "fullname" field is now always present along with the "file" field,
451 even if the file cannot be found by GDB.
5b9afe8a 452
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453* GDB now supports the "mini debuginfo" section, .gnu_debugdata.
454 You must have the LZMA library available when configuring GDB for this
455 feature to be enabled. For more information, see:
456 http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Features/MiniDebugInfo
457
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458* New remote packets
459
460QTBuffer:size
461 Set the size of trace buffer. The remote stub reports support for this
462 packet to gdb's qSupported query.
463
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464Qbtrace:bts
465 Enable Branch Trace Store (BTS)-based branch tracing for the current
466 thread. The remote stub reports support for this packet to gdb's
467 qSupported query.
468
469Qbtrace:off
470 Disable branch tracing for the current thread. The remote stub reports
471 support for this packet to gdb's qSupported query.
472
473qXfer:btrace:read
474 Read the traced branches for the current thread. The remote stub
475 reports support for this packet to gdb's qSupported query.
476
80c8d323 477*** Changes in GDB 7.5
d6e00af6 478
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479* GDB now supports x32 ABI. Visit <http://sites.google.com/site/x32abi/>
480 for more x32 ABI info.
481
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482* GDB now supports access to MIPS DSP registers on Linux targets.
483
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484* GDB now supports debugging microMIPS binaries.
485
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486* The "info os" command on GNU/Linux can now display information on
487 several new classes of objects managed by the operating system:
488 "info os procgroups" lists process groups
489 "info os files" lists file descriptors
490 "info os sockets" lists internet-domain sockets
491 "info os shm" lists shared-memory regions
492 "info os semaphores" lists semaphores
493 "info os msg" lists message queues
494 "info os modules" lists loaded kernel modules
495
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496* GDB now has support for SDT (Static Defined Tracing) probes. Currently,
497 the only implemented backend is for SystemTap probes (<sys/sdt.h>). You
498 can set a breakpoint using the new "-probe, "-pstap" or "-probe-stap"
499 options and inspect the probe arguments using the new $_probe_arg family
500 of convenience variables. You can obtain more information about SystemTap
501 in <http://sourceware.org/systemtap/>.
502
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503* GDB now supports reversible debugging on ARM, it allows you to
504 debug basic ARM and THUMB instructions, and provides
505 record/replay support.
506
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507* The option "symbol-reloading" has been deleted as it is no longer used.
508
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509* Python scripting
510
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511 ** GDB commands implemented in Python can now be put in command class
512 "gdb.COMMAND_USER".
513
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514 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" is now deleted.
515
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516 ** A new class, gdb.printing.FlagEnumerationPrinter, can be used to
517 apply "flag enum"-style pretty-printing to any enum.
518
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519 ** gdb.lookup_symbol can now work when there is no current frame.
520
521 ** gdb.Symbol now has a 'line' attribute, holding the line number in
522 the source at which the symbol was defined.
523
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524 ** gdb.Symbol now has the new attribute 'needs_frame' and the new
525 method 'value'. The former indicates whether the symbol needs a
526 frame in order to compute its value, and the latter computes the
527 symbol's value.
528
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529 ** A new method 'referenced_value' on gdb.Value objects which can
530 dereference pointer as well as C++ reference values.
531
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532 ** New methods 'global_block' and 'static_block' on gdb.Symtab objects
533 which return the global and static blocks (as gdb.Block objects),
534 of the underlying symbol table, respectively.
535
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536 ** New function gdb.find_pc_line which returns the gdb.Symtab_and_line
537 object associated with a PC value.
538
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539 ** gdb.Symtab_and_line has new attribute 'last' which holds the end
540 of the address range occupied by code for the current source line.
541
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542* Go language support.
543 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the Go programming
544 language.
545
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546* GDBserver now supports stdio connections.
547 E.g. (gdb) target remote | ssh myhost gdbserver - hello
548
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549* The binary "gdbtui" can no longer be built or installed.
550 Use "gdb -tui" instead.
551
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552* GDB will now print "flag" enums specially. A flag enum is one where
553 all the enumerator values have no bits in common when pairwise
554 "and"ed. When printing a value whose type is a flag enum, GDB will
555 show all the constants, e.g., for enum E { ONE = 1, TWO = 2}:
556 (gdb) print (enum E) 3
557 $1 = (ONE | TWO)
558
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559* The filename part of a linespec will now match trailing components
560 of a source file name. For example, "break gcc/expr.c:1000" will
561 now set a breakpoint in build/gcc/expr.c, but not
562 build/libcpp/expr.c.
563
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564* The "info proc" and "generate-core-file" commands will now also
565 work on remote targets connected to GDBserver on Linux.
566
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567* The command "info catch" has been removed. It has been disabled
568 since December 2007.
569
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570* The "catch exception" and "catch assert" commands now accept
571 a condition at the end of the command, much like the "break"
572 command does. For instance:
573
574 (gdb) catch exception Constraint_Error if Barrier = True
575
576 Previously, it was possible to add a condition to such catchpoints,
577 but it had to be done as a second step, after the catchpoint had been
578 created, using the "condition" command.
579
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580* The "info static-tracepoint-marker" command will now also work on
581 native Linux targets with in-process agent.
582
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583* GDB can now set breakpoints on inlined functions.
584
585* The .gdb_index section has been updated to include symbols for
586 inlined functions. GDB will ignore older .gdb_index sections by
587 default, which could cause symbol files to be loaded more slowly
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588 until their .gdb_index sections can be recreated. The new command
589 "set use-deprecated-index-sections on" will cause GDB to use any older
590 .gdb_index sections it finds. This will restore performance, but the
591 ability to set breakpoints on inlined functions will be lost in symbol
592 files with older .gdb_index sections.
481860b3 593
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594 The .gdb_index section has also been updated to record more information
595 about each symbol. This speeds up the "info variables", "info functions"
596 and "info types" commands when used with programs having the .gdb_index
597 section, as well as speeding up debugging with shared libraries using
598 the .gdb_index section.
599
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600* Ada support for GDB/MI Variable Objects has been added.
601
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602* GDB can now support 'breakpoint always-inserted mode' in 'record'
603 target.
604
f3e0e960
SS
605* MI changes
606
607 ** New command -info-os is the MI equivalent of "info os".
608
37ce89eb
SS
609 ** Output logs ("set logging" and related) now include MI output.
610
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TT
611* New commands
612
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DE
613 ** "set use-deprecated-index-sections on|off"
614 "show use-deprecated-index-sections on|off"
615 Controls the use of deprecated .gdb_index sections.
616
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TT
617 ** "catch load" and "catch unload" can be used to stop when a shared
618 library is loaded or unloaded, respectively.
619
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SS
620 ** "enable count" can be used to auto-disable a breakpoint after
621 several hits.
622
57651221 623 ** "info vtbl" can be used to show the virtual method tables for
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TT
624 C++ and Java objects.
625
06fc020f 626 ** "explore" and its sub commands "explore value" and "explore type"
6ea71545 627 can be used to recursively explore values and types of
06fc020f
SCR
628 expressions. These commands are available only if GDB is
629 configured with '--with-python'.
630
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631 ** "info auto-load" shows status of all kinds of auto-loaded files,
632 "info auto-load gdb-scripts" shows status of auto-loading GDB canned
633 sequences of commands files, "info auto-load python-scripts"
634 shows status of auto-loading Python script files,
635 "info auto-load local-gdbinit" shows status of loading init file
636 (.gdbinit) from current directory and "info auto-load libthread-db" shows
637 status of inferior specific thread debugging shared library loading.
638
639 ** "info auto-load-scripts", "set auto-load-scripts on|off"
640 and "show auto-load-scripts" commands have been deprecated, use their
641 "info auto-load python-scripts", "set auto-load python-scripts on|off"
642 and "show auto-load python-scripts" counterparts instead.
643
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SS
644 ** "dprintf location,format,args..." creates a dynamic printf, which
645 is basically a breakpoint that does a printf and immediately
646 resumes your program's execution, so it is like a printf that you
647 can insert dynamically at runtime instead of at compiletime.
648
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TT
649 ** "set print symbol"
650 "show print symbol"
651 Controls whether GDB attempts to display the symbol, if any,
652 corresponding to addresses it prints. This defaults to "on", but
653 you can set it to "off" to restore GDB's previous behavior.
654
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TS
655* Deprecated commands
656
657 ** For the Renesas Super-H architecture, the "regs" command has been
658 deprecated, and "info all-registers" should be used instead.
659
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KB
660* New targets
661
662Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
60c9a3c0 663HP OpenVMS ia64 ia64-hp-openvms*
a58b110a 664
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665* GDBserver supports evaluation of breakpoint conditions. When
666 support is advertised by GDBserver, GDB may be told to send the
667 breakpoint conditions in bytecode form to GDBserver. GDBserver
668 will only report the breakpoint trigger to GDB when its condition
669 evaluates to true.
670
671* New options
672
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MR
673set mips compression
674show mips compression
675 Select the compressed ISA encoding used in functions that have no symbol
676 information available. The encoding can be set to either of:
677 mips16
678 micromips
679 and is updated automatically from ELF file flags if available.
680
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681set breakpoint condition-evaluation
682show breakpoint condition-evaluation
cf65ecd3 683 Control whether breakpoint conditions are evaluated by GDB ("host") or by
5b43fab2
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684 GDBserver ("target"). Default option "auto" chooses the most efficient
685 available mode.
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686 This option can improve debugger efficiency depending on the speed of the
687 target.
688
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689set auto-load off
690 Disable auto-loading globally.
691
692show auto-load
693 Show auto-loading setting of all kinds of auto-loaded files.
694
695set auto-load gdb-scripts on|off
696show auto-load gdb-scripts
697 Control auto-loading of GDB canned sequences of commands files.
698
699set auto-load python-scripts on|off
700show auto-load python-scripts
701 Control auto-loading of Python script files.
702
703set auto-load local-gdbinit on|off
704show auto-load local-gdbinit
705 Control loading of init file (.gdbinit) from current directory.
706
707set auto-load libthread-db on|off
708show auto-load libthread-db
709 Control auto-loading of inferior specific thread debugging shared library.
710
7349ff92 711set auto-load scripts-directory <dir1>[:<dir2>...]
9cc815f5 712show auto-load scripts-directory
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JK
713 Set a list of directories from which to load auto-loaded scripts.
714 Automatically loaded Python scripts and GDB scripts are located in one
715 of the directories listed by this option.
716 The delimiter (':' above) may differ according to the host platform.
717
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718set auto-load safe-path <dir1>[:<dir2>...]
719show auto-load safe-path
720 Set a list of directories from which it is safe to auto-load files.
721 The delimiter (':' above) may differ according to the host platform.
722
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JK
723set debug auto-load on|off
724show debug auto-load
725 Control display of debugging info for auto-loading the files above.
726
d3ce09f5 727set dprintf-style gdb|call|agent
e7e0cddf 728show dprintf-style
d3ce09f5
SS
729 Control the way in which a dynamic printf is performed; "gdb"
730 requests a GDB printf command, while "call" causes dprintf to call a
731 function in the inferior. "agent" requests that the target agent
732 (such as GDBserver) do the printing.
e7e0cddf
SS
733
734set dprintf-function <expr>
735show dprintf-function
736set dprintf-channel <expr>
737show dprintf-channel
738 Set the function and optional first argument to the call when using
739 the "call" style of dynamic printf.
740
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SS
741set disconnected-dprintf on|off
742show disconnected-dprintf
743 Control whether agent-style dynamic printfs continue to be in effect
744 after GDB disconnects.
745
6dea1fbd
JK
746* New configure options
747
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JK
748--with-auto-load-dir
749 Configure default value for the 'set auto-load scripts-directory'
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JK
750 setting above. It defaults to '$debugdir:$datadir/auto-load',
751 $debugdir representing global debugging info directories (available
752 via 'show debug-file-directory') and $datadir representing GDB's data
753 directory (available via 'show data-directory').
7349ff92 754
6dea1fbd
JK
755--with-auto-load-safe-path
756 Configure default value for the 'set auto-load safe-path' setting
7349ff92 757 above. It defaults to the --with-auto-load-dir setting.
6dea1fbd
JK
758
759--without-auto-load-safe-path
760 Set 'set auto-load safe-path' to '/', effectively disabling this
761 security feature.
762
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LM
763* New remote packets
764
74c48cbb
PA
765z0/z1 conditional breakpoints extension
766
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LM
767 The z0/z1 breakpoint insertion packets have been extended to carry
768 a list of conditional expressions over to the remote stub depending on the
769 condition evaluation mode. The use of this extension can be controlled
770 via the "set remote conditional-breakpoints-packet" command.
771
9b224c5e
PA
772QProgramSignals:
773
774 Specify the signals which the remote stub may pass to the debugged
775 program without GDB involvement.
776
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JK
777* New command line options
778
779--init-command=FILE, -ix Like --command, -x but execute it
780 before loading inferior.
781--init-eval-command=COMMAND, -iex Like --eval-command=COMMAND, -ex but
782 execute it before loading inferior.
783
8837a20f
JB
784*** Changes in GDB 7.4
785
f8eba3c6
TT
786* GDB now handles ambiguous linespecs more consistently; the existing
787 FILE:LINE support has been expanded to other types of linespecs. A
788 breakpoint will now be set on all matching locations in all
789 inferiors, and locations will be added or removed according to
790 inferior changes.
791
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JL
792* GDB now allows you to skip uninteresting functions and files when
793 stepping with the "skip function" and "skip file" commands.
794
480a3f21
PW
795* GDB has two new commands: "set remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit"
796 and "show remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit". These allows to
797 set or show the maximum length limit (in bytes) of a remote
798 target hardware watchpoint.
799
800 This allows e.g. to use "unlimited" hardware watchpoints with the
801 gdbserver integrated in Valgrind version >= 3.7.0. Such Valgrind
802 watchpoints are slower than real hardware watchpoints but are
803 significantly faster than gdb software watchpoints.
804
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805* Python scripting
806
32d1c362 807 ** The register_pretty_printer function in module gdb.printing now takes
7d0aff21 808 an optional `replace' argument. If True, the new printer replaces any
32d1c362
DE
809 existing one.
810
3a7bf607 811 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" command has been
4795f398
DE
812 deprecated and will be deleted in GDB 7.5.
813 A new command: "set python print-stack none|full|message" has
814 replaced it. Additionally, the default for "print-stack" is
815 now "message", which just prints the error message without
816 the stack trace.
3a7bf607 817
baacfb07 818 ** A prompt substitution hook (prompt_hook) is now available to the
3a7bf607 819 Python API.
713389e0 820
fa3a4f15
PM
821 ** A new Python module, gdb.prompt has been added to the GDB Python
822 modules library. This module provides functionality for
baacfb07 823 escape sequences in prompts (used by set/show
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PM
824 extended-prompt). These escape sequences are replaced by their
825 corresponding value.
826
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PM
827 ** Python commands and convenience-functions located in
828 'data-directory'/python/gdb/command and
829 'data-directory'/python/gdb/function are now automatically loaded
830 on GDB start-up.
831
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PM
832 ** Blocks now provide four new attributes. global_block and
833 static_block will return the global and static blocks
834 respectively. is_static and is_global are boolean attributes
835 that indicate if the block is one of those two types.
836
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DE
837 ** Symbols now provide the "type" attribute, the type of the symbol.
838
6839b47f
KP
839 ** The "gdb.breakpoint" function has been deprecated in favor of
840 "gdb.breakpoints".
841
cc72b2a2
KP
842 ** A new class "gdb.FinishBreakpoint" is provided to catch the return
843 of a function. This class is based on the "finish" command
844 available in the CLI.
845
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PK
846 ** Type objects for struct and union types now allow access to
847 the fields using standard Python dictionary (mapping) methods.
848 For example, "some_type['myfield']" now works, as does
849 "some_type.items()".
850
20c168b5
KP
851 ** A new event "gdb.new_objfile" has been added, triggered by loading a
852 new object file.
853
03c3051a
PK
854 ** A new function, "deep_items" has been added to the gdb.types
855 module in the GDB Python modules library. This function returns
856 an iterator over the fields of a struct or union type. Unlike
857 the standard Python "iteritems" method, it will recursively traverse
858 any anonymous fields.
859
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TT
860* MI changes
861
862 ** "*stopped" events can report several new "reason"s, such as
863 "solib-event".
864
865 ** Breakpoint changes are now notified using new async records, like
866 "=breakpoint-modified".
867
868 ** New command -ada-task-info.
869
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DE
870* libthread-db-search-path now supports two special values: $sdir and $pdir.
871 $sdir specifies the default system locations of shared libraries.
872 $pdir specifies the directory where the libpthread used by the application
873 lives.
874
875 GDB no longer looks in $sdir and $pdir after it has searched the directories
876 mentioned in libthread-db-search-path. If you want to search those
877 directories, they must be specified in libthread-db-search-path.
878 The default value of libthread-db-search-path on GNU/Linux and Solaris
879 systems is now "$sdir:$pdir".
880
881 $pdir is not supported by gdbserver, it is currently ignored.
882 $sdir is supported by gdbserver.
883
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DE
884* New configure option --with-iconv-bin.
885 When using the internationalization support like the one in the GNU C
886 library, GDB will invoke the "iconv" program to get a list of supported
887 character sets. If this program lives in a non-standard location, one can
888 use this option to specify where to find it.
889
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TJB
890* When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
891 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports masked hardware
892 watchpoints, which specify a mask in addition to an address to watch.
893 The mask specifies that some bits of an address (the bits which are
894 reset in the mask) should be ignored when matching the address accessed
895 by the inferior against the watchpoint address. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
896 section in the user manual for more details.
897
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JK
898* The new option --once causes GDBserver to stop listening for connections once
899 the first connection is made. The listening port used by GDBserver will
900 become available after that.
901
71eba9c2 902* New commands "info macros" and "alias" have been added.
edc84990 903
2bda9cc5
JK
904* New function parameters suffix @entry specifies value of function parameter
905 at the time the function got called. Entry values are available only since
906 gcc version 4.7.
907
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DE
908* New commands
909
910!SHELL COMMAND
911 "!" is now an alias of the "shell" command.
912 Note that no space is needed between "!" and SHELL COMMAND.
913
9c06b0b4
TJB
914* Changed commands
915
916watch EXPRESSION mask MASK_VALUE
917 The watch command now supports the mask argument which allows creation
918 of masked watchpoints, if the current architecture supports this feature.
919
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DE
920info auto-load-scripts [REGEXP]
921 This command was formerly named "maintenance print section-scripts".
922 It is now generally useful and is no longer a maintenance-only command.
923
71eba9c2 924info macro [-all] [--] MACRO
925 The info macro command has new options `-all' and `--'. The first for
926 printing all definitions of a macro. The second for explicitly specifying
927 the end of arguments and the beginning of the macro name in case the macro
928 name starts with a hyphen.
929
3065dfb6
SS
930collect[/s] EXPRESSIONS
931 The tracepoint collect command now takes an optional modifier "/s"
932 that directs it to dereference pointer-to-character types and
933 collect the bytes of memory up to a zero byte. The behavior is
934 similar to what you see when you use the regular print command on a
935 string. An optional integer following the "/s" sets a bound on the
936 number of bytes that will be collected.
937
f196051f
SS
938tstart [NOTES]
939 The trace start command now interprets any supplied arguments as a
940 note to be recorded with the trace run, with an effect similar to
941 setting the variable trace-notes.
942
943tstop [NOTES]
944 The trace stop command now interprets any arguments as a note to be
945 mentioned along with the tstatus report that the trace was stopped
946 with a command. The effect is similar to setting the variable
947 trace-stop-notes.
948
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KY
949* Tracepoints can now be enabled and disabled at any time after a trace
950 experiment has been started using the standard "enable" and "disable"
951 commands. It is now possible to start a trace experiment with no enabled
952 tracepoints; GDB will display a warning, but will allow the experiment to
953 begin, assuming that tracepoints will be enabled as needed while the trace
954 is running.
955
405f8e94
SS
956* Fast tracepoints on 32-bit x86-architectures can now be placed at
957 locations with 4-byte instructions, when they were previously
958 limited to locations with instructions of 5 bytes or longer.
959
2bda9cc5
JK
960* New options
961
45cfd468
DE
962set debug dwarf2-read
963show debug dwarf2-read
964 Turns on or off display of debugging messages related to reading
965 DWARF debug info. The default is off.
966
967set debug symtab-create
968show debug symtab-create
969 Turns on or off display of debugging messages related to symbol table
970 creation. The default is off.
971
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PM
972set extended-prompt
973show extended-prompt
974 Set the GDB prompt, and allow escape sequences to be inserted to
975 display miscellaneous information (see 'help set extended-prompt'
976 for the list of sequences). This prompt (and any information
977 accessed through the escape sequences) is updated every time the
978 prompt is displayed.
979
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JK
980set print entry-values (both|compact|default|if-needed|no|only|preferred)
981show print entry-values
982 Set printing of frame argument values at function entry. In some cases
983 GDB can determine the value of function argument which was passed by the
984 function caller, even if the value was modified inside the called function.
985
986set debug entry-values
987show debug entry-values
988 Control display of debugging info for determining frame argument values at
989 function entry and virtual tail call frames.
990
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DE
991set basenames-may-differ
992show basenames-may-differ
993 Set whether a source file may have multiple base names.
994 (A "base name" is the name of a file with the directory part removed.
995 Example: The base name of "/home/user/hello.c" is "hello.c".)
996 If set, GDB will canonicalize file names (e.g., expand symlinks)
997 before comparing them. Canonicalization is an expensive operation,
998 but it allows the same file be known by more than one base name.
999 If not set (the default), all source files are assumed to have just
1000 one base name, and gdb will do file name comparisons more efficiently.
1001
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SS
1002set trace-user
1003show trace-user
1004set trace-notes
1005show trace-notes
1006 Set a user name and notes for the current and any future trace runs.
1007 This is useful for long-running and/or disconnected traces, to
1008 inform others (or yourself) as to who is running the trace, supply
1009 contact information, or otherwise explain what is going on.
1010
1011set trace-stop-notes
1012show trace-stop-notes
1013 Set a note attached to the trace run, that is displayed when the
1014 trace has been stopped by a tstop command. This is useful for
1015 instance as an explanation, if you are stopping a trace run that was
1016 started by someone else.
1017
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KY
1018* New remote packets
1019
1020QTEnable
1021
1022 Dynamically enable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
1023
1024QTDisable
1025
1026 Dynamically disable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
1027
f196051f
SS
1028QTNotes
1029
1030 Set the user and notes of the trace run.
1031
1032qTP
1033
1034 Query the current status of a tracepoint.
1035
405f8e94
SS
1036qTMinFTPILen
1037
1038 Query the minimum length of instruction at which a fast tracepoint may
1039 be placed.
1040
1a532630
PP
1041* Dcache size (number of lines) and line-size are now runtime-configurable
1042 via "set dcache line" and "set dcache line-size" commands.
1043
11315641
YQ
1044* New targets
1045
1046Texas Instruments TMS320C6x tic6x-*-*
1047
87326c78
DD
1048* New Simulators
1049
1050Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
1051
e8d56f18
JB
1052*** Changes in GDB 7.3.1
1053
1054* The build failure for NetBSD and OpenBSD targets have now been fixed.
1055
d6e00af6 1056*** Changes in GDB 7.3
797054e6 1057
60f98dde
MS
1058* GDB has a new command: "thread find [REGEXP]".
1059 It finds the thread id whose name, target id, or thread extra info
1060 matches the given regular expression.
1061
eee5b35e
DD
1062* The "catch syscall" command now works on mips*-linux* targets.
1063
b716877b
AB
1064* The -data-disassemble MI command now supports modes 2 and 3 for
1065 dumping the instruction opcodes.
1066
aae1c79a
DE
1067* New command line options
1068
1069-data-directory DIR Specify DIR as the "data-directory".
1070 This is mostly for testing purposes.
1071
a86caf66
DE
1072* The "maint set python auto-load on|off" command has been renamed to
1073 "set auto-load-scripts on|off".
1074
99e7ae30
DE
1075* GDB has a new command: "set directories".
1076 It is like the "dir" command except that it replaces the
1077 source path list instead of augmenting it.
1078
4694da01
TT
1079* GDB now understands thread names.
1080
1081 On GNU/Linux, "info threads" will display the thread name as set by
1082 prctl or pthread_setname_np.
1083
1084 There is also a new command, "thread name", which can be used to
1085 assign a name internally for GDB to display.
1086
f4b8a18d
KW
1087* OpenCL C
1088 Initial support for the OpenCL C language (http://www.khronos.org/opencl)
1089 has been integrated into GDB.
1090
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PM
1091* Python scripting
1092
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PM
1093 ** The function gdb.Write now accepts an optional keyword 'stream'.
1094 This keyword, when provided, will direct the output to either
1095 stdout, stderr, or GDB's logging output.
1096
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PM
1097 ** Parameters can now be be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
1098 you may implement the get_set_doc and get_show_doc functions.
1099 This improves how Parameter set/show documentation is processed
1100 and allows for more dynamic content.
1101
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PM
1102 ** Symbols, Symbol Table, Symbol Table and Line, Object Files,
1103 Inferior, Inferior Thread, Blocks, and Block Iterator APIs now
1104 have an is_valid method.
1105
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PM
1106 ** Breakpoints can now be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
1107 you may implement a 'stop' function that is executed each time
1108 the inferior reaches that breakpoint.
1109
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DE
1110 ** New function gdb.lookup_global_symbol looks up a global symbol.
1111
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PM
1112 ** GDB values in Python are now callable if the value represents a
1113 function. For example, if 'some_value' represents a function that
1114 takes two integer parameters and returns a value, you can call
1115 that function like so:
1116
1117 result = some_value (10,20)
1118
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DE
1119 ** Module gdb.types has been added.
1120 It contains a collection of utilities for working with gdb.Types objects:
1121 get_basic_type, has_field, make_enum_dict.
1122
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DE
1123 ** Module gdb.printing has been added.
1124 It contains utilities for writing and registering pretty-printers.
1125 New classes: PrettyPrinter, SubPrettyPrinter,
1126 RegexpCollectionPrettyPrinter.
1127 New function: register_pretty_printer.
1128
1129 ** New commands "info pretty-printers", "enable pretty-printer" and
1130 "disable pretty-printer" have been added.
1131
99e7ae30
DE
1132 ** gdb.parameter("directories") is now available.
1133
d8e22779
TT
1134 ** New function gdb.newest_frame returns the newest frame in the
1135 selected thread.
1136
4694da01
TT
1137 ** The gdb.InferiorThread class has a new "name" attribute. This
1138 holds the thread's name.
1139
505500db
SW
1140 ** Python Support for Inferior events.
1141 Python scripts can add observers to be notified of events
824446ad 1142 occurring in the process being debugged.
c17a9e46
HZ
1143 The following events are currently supported:
1144 - gdb.events.cont Continue event.
1145 - gdb.events.exited Inferior exited event.
1146 - gdb.events.stop Signal received, and Breakpoint hit events.
1147
def98928
TT
1148* C++ Improvements:
1149
1150 ** GDB now puts template parameters in scope when debugging in an
1151 instantiation. For example, if you have:
1152
1153 template<int X> int func (void) { return X; }
1154
1155 then if you step into func<5>, "print X" will show "5". This
1156 feature requires proper debuginfo support from the compiler; it
1157 was added to GCC 4.5.
1158
66cb8159
TT
1159 ** The motion commands "next", "finish", "until", and "advance" now
1160 work better when exceptions are thrown. In particular, GDB will
1161 no longer lose control of the inferior; instead, the GDB will
1162 stop the inferior at the point at which the exception is caught.
1163 This functionality requires a change in the exception handling
1164 code that was introduced in GCC 4.5.
1165
4aac0db7
UW
1166* GDB now follows GCC's rules on accessing volatile objects when
1167 reading or writing target state during expression evaluation.
1168 One notable difference to prior behavior is that "print x = 0"
1169 no longer generates a read of x; the value of the assignment is
1170 now always taken directly from the value being assigned.
1171
283e6a52
TT
1172* GDB now has some support for using labels in the program's source in
1173 linespecs. For instance, you can use "advance label" to continue
1174 execution to a label.
1175
1176* GDB now has support for reading and writing a new .gdb_index
1177 section. This section holds a fast index of DWARF debugging
1178 information and can be used to greatly speed up GDB startup and
1179 operation. See the documentation for `save gdb-index' for details.
1180
b56df873 1181* The "watch" command now accepts an optional "-location" argument.
14c0d4e1 1182 When used, this causes GDB to watch the memory referred to by the
b56df873
TT
1183 expression. Such a watchpoint is never deleted due to it going out
1184 of scope.
1185
ae53ffa4
PA
1186* GDB now supports thread debugging of core dumps on GNU/Linux.
1187
1188 GDB now activates thread debugging using the libthread_db library
1189 when debugging GNU/Linux core dumps, similarly to when debugging
1190 live processes. As a result, when debugging a core dump file, GDB
1191 is now able to display pthread_t ids of threads. For example, "info
1192 threads" shows the same output as when debugging the process when it
1193 was live. In earlier releases, you'd see something like this:
1194
1195 (gdb) info threads
1196 * 1 LWP 6780 main () at main.c:10
1197
1198 While now you see this:
1199
1200 (gdb) info threads
1201 * 1 Thread 0x7f0f5712a700 (LWP 6780) main () at main.c:10
1202
1203 It is also now possible to inspect TLS variables when debugging core
1204 dumps.
1205
1206 When debugging a core dump generated on a machine other than the one
1207 used to run GDB, you may need to point GDB at the correct
1208 libthread_db library with the "set libthread-db-search-path"
1209 command. See the user manual for more details on this command.
1210
f1310107
TJB
1211* When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
1212 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports ranged breakpoints,
1213 which stop execution of the inferior whenever it executes an instruction
1214 at any address within the specified range. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
1215 section in the user manual for more details.
1216
248c9dbc
JB
1217* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
1218
1aee7009
JB
1219 ** GDBserver is now supported on PowerPC LynxOS (versions 4.x and 5.x),
1220 and i686 LynxOS (version 5.x).
248c9dbc 1221
eb826dc6
MF
1222 ** GDBserver is now supported on Blackfin Linux.
1223
44603653
JB
1224* New native configurations
1225
1226ia64 HP-UX ia64-*-hpux*
1227
91021223
MF
1228* New targets:
1229
1230Analog Devices, Inc. Blackfin Processor bfin-*
1231
6e1bb179
JB
1232* Ada task switching is now supported on sparc-elf targets when
1233 debugging a program using the Ravenscar Profile. For more information,
1234 see the "Tasking Support when using the Ravenscar Profile" section
1235 in the GDB user manual.
1236
50c97f38
TT
1237* Guile support was removed.
1238
448a92bf
MF
1239* New features in the GNU simulator
1240
1241 ** The --map-info flag lists all known core mappings.
1242
66ee2731
MF
1243 ** CFI flashes may be simulated via the "cfi" device.
1244
76b8507d 1245*** Changes in GDB 7.2
bfbf3774 1246
ba25b921
PA
1247* Shared library support for remote targets by default
1248
1249 When GDB is configured for a generic, non-OS specific target, like
1250 for example, --target=arm-eabi or one of the many *-*-elf targets,
1251 GDB now queries remote stubs for loaded shared libraries using the
1252 `qXfer:libraries:read' packet. Previously, shared library support
1253 was always disabled for such configurations.
1254
4656f5c6
SW
1255* C++ Improvements:
1256
1257 ** Argument Dependent Lookup (ADL)
1258
1259 In C++ ADL lookup directs function search to the namespaces of its
1260 arguments even if the namespace has not been imported.
1261 For example:
1262 namespace A
1263 {
1264 class B { };
1265 void foo (B) { }
1266 }
1267 ...
1268 A::B b
1269 foo(b)
1270 Here the compiler will search for `foo' in the namespace of 'b'
1271 and find A::foo. GDB now supports this. This construct is commonly
1272 used in the Standard Template Library for operators.
1273
1274 ** Improved User Defined Operator Support
1275
1276 In addition to member operators, GDB now supports lookup of operators
1277 defined in a namespace and imported with a `using' directive, operators
1278 defined in the global scope, operators imported implicitly from an
1279 anonymous namespace, and the ADL operators mentioned in the previous
1280 entry.
1281 GDB now also supports proper overload resolution for all the previously
1282 mentioned flavors of operators.
1283
254e6b9e
DE
1284 ** static const class members
1285
1286 Printing of static const class members that are initialized in the
1287 class definition has been fixed.
1288
711e434b
PM
1289* Windows Thread Information Block access.
1290
1291 On Windows targets, GDB now supports displaying the Windows Thread
1292 Information Block (TIB) structure. This structure is visible either
1293 by using the new command `info w32 thread-information-block' or, by
1294 dereferencing the new convenience variable named `$_tlb', a
1295 thread-specific pointer to the TIB. This feature is also supported
1296 when remote debugging using GDBserver.
1297
0fb4aa4b
PA
1298* Static tracepoints
1299
1300 Static tracepoints are calls in the user program into a tracing
1301 library. One such library is a port of the LTTng kernel tracer to
1302 userspace --- UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer, http://lttng.org/ust).
1303 When debugging with GDBserver, GDB now supports combining the GDB
1304 tracepoint machinery with such libraries. For example: the user can
1305 use GDB to probe a static tracepoint marker (a call from the user
1306 program into the tracing library) with the new "strace" command (see
1307 "New commands" below). This creates a "static tracepoint" in the
1308 breakpoint list, that can be manipulated with the same feature set
1309 as fast and regular tracepoints. E.g., collect registers, local and
1310 global variables, collect trace state variables, and define
1311 tracepoint conditions. In addition, the user can collect extra
1312 static tracepoint marker specific data, by collecting the new
1313 $_sdata internal variable. When analyzing the trace buffer, you can
1314 inspect $_sdata like any other variable available to GDB. For more
1315 information, see the "Tracepoints" chapter in GDB user manual. New
1316 remote packets have been defined to support static tracepoints, see
1317 the "New remote packets" section below.
1318
ca11e899
SS
1319* Better reconstruction of tracepoints after disconnected tracing
1320
1321 GDB will attempt to download the original source form of tracepoint
1322 definitions when starting a trace run, and then will upload these
1323 upon reconnection to the target, resulting in a more accurate
1324 reconstruction of the tracepoints that are in use on the target.
1325
1326* Observer mode
1327
1328 You can now exercise direct control over the ways that GDB can
1329 affect your program. For instance, you can disallow the setting of
1330 breakpoints, so that the program can run continuously (assuming
1331 non-stop mode). In addition, the "observer" variable is available
1332 to switch all of the different controls; in observer mode, GDB
1333 cannot affect the target's behavior at all, which is useful for
1334 tasks like diagnosing live systems in the field.
1335
1336* The new convenience variable $_thread holds the number of the
1337 current thread.
1338
711e434b
PM
1339* New remote packets
1340
1341qGetTIBAddr
1342
1343 Return the address of the Windows Thread Information Block of a given thread.
1344
dde08ee1
PA
1345qRelocInsn
1346
1347 In response to several of the tracepoint packets, the target may now
1348 also respond with a number of intermediate `qRelocInsn' request
1349 packets before the final result packet, to have GDB handle
1350 relocating an instruction to execute at a different address. This
1351 is particularly useful for stubs that support fast tracepoints. GDB
1352 reports support for this feature in the qSupported packet.
1353
0fb4aa4b
PA
1354qTfSTM, qTsSTM
1355
1356 List static tracepoint markers in the target program.
1357
1358qTSTMat
1359
1360 List static tracepoint markers at a given address in the target
1361 program.
1362
1363qXfer:statictrace:read
1364
1365 Read the static trace data collected (by a `collect $_sdata'
1366 tracepoint action). The remote stub reports support for this packet
1367 to gdb's qSupported query.
1368
ca11e899
SS
1369QAllow
1370
1371 Send the current settings of GDB's permission flags.
1372
1373QTDPsrc
1374
1375 Send part of the source (textual) form of a tracepoint definition,
1376 which includes location, conditional, and action list.
1377
3f7b2faa
DE
1378* The source command now accepts a -s option to force searching for the
1379 script in the source search path even if the script name specifies
1380 a directory.
1381
d337e9f0
PA
1382* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
1383
0fb4aa4b
PA
1384 - GDBserver now support tracepoints (including fast tracepoints, and
1385 static tracepoints). The feature is currently supported by the
1386 i386-linux and amd64-linux builds. See the "Tracepoints support
1387 in gdbserver" section in the manual for more information.
1388
1389 GDBserver JIT compiles the tracepoint's conditional agent
1390 expression bytecode into native code whenever possible for low
1391 overhead dynamic tracepoints conditionals. For such tracepoints,
1392 an expression that examines program state is evaluated when the
1393 tracepoint is reached, in order to determine whether to capture
1394 trace data. If the condition is simple and false, processing the
1395 tracepoint finishes very quickly and no data is gathered.
1396
1397 GDBserver interfaces with the UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer) library
1398 for static tracepoints support.
d337e9f0 1399
c24d0242
PM
1400 - GDBserver now supports x86_64 Windows 64-bit debugging.
1401
c8d5aac9
L
1402* GDB now sends xmlRegisters= in qSupported packet to indicate that
1403 it understands register description.
1404
7c953934
TT
1405* The --batch flag now disables pagination and queries.
1406
8685c86f
L
1407* X86 general purpose registers
1408
1409 GDB now supports reading/writing byte, word and double-word x86
1410 general purpose registers directly. This means you can use, say,
1411 $ah or $ax to refer, respectively, to the byte register AH and
1412 16-bit word register AX that are actually portions of the 32-bit
1413 register EAX or 64-bit register RAX.
1414
95a42b64 1415* The `commands' command now accepts a range of breakpoints to modify.
86b17b60
PA
1416 A plain `commands' following a command that creates multiple
1417 breakpoints affects all the breakpoints set by that command. This
1418 applies to breakpoints set by `rbreak', and also applies when a
1419 single `break' command creates multiple breakpoints (e.g.,
1420 breakpoints on overloaded c++ functions).
95a42b64 1421
8bd10a10
CM
1422* The `rbreak' command now accepts a filename specification as part of
1423 its argument, limiting the functions selected by the regex to those
1424 in the specified file.
1425
ab38a727
PA
1426* Support for remote debugging Windows and SymbianOS shared libraries
1427 from Unix hosts has been improved. Non Windows GDB builds now can
1428 understand target reported file names that follow MS-DOS based file
1429 system semantics, such as file names that include drive letters and
1430 use the backslash character as directory separator. This makes it
1431 possible to transparently use the "set sysroot" and "set
1432 solib-search-path" on Unix hosts to point as host copies of the
1433 target's shared libraries. See the new command "set
1434 target-file-system-kind" described below, and the "Commands to
1435 specify files" section in the user manual for more information.
1436
6149aea9
PA
1437* New commands
1438
f1421989
HZ
1439eval template, expressions...
1440 Convert the values of one or more expressions under the control
1441 of the string template to a command line, and call it.
1442
ab38a727
PA
1443set target-file-system-kind unix|dos-based|auto
1444show target-file-system-kind
1445 Set or show the assumed file system kind for target reported file
1446 names.
1447
6149aea9
PA
1448save breakpoints <filename>
1449 Save all current breakpoint definitions to a file suitable for use
1450 in a later debugging session. To read the saved breakpoint
1451 definitions, use the `source' command.
1452
1453`save tracepoints' is a new alias for `save-tracepoints'. The latter
1454is now deprecated.
1455
0fb4aa4b
PA
1456info static-tracepoint-markers
1457 Display information about static tracepoint markers in the target.
1458
1459strace FN | FILE:LINE | *ADDR | -m MARKER_ID
1460 Define a static tracepoint by probing a marker at the given
1461 function, line, address, or marker ID.
1462
ca11e899
SS
1463set observer on|off
1464show observer
1465 Enable and disable observer mode.
1466
1467set may-write-registers on|off
1468set may-write-memory on|off
1469set may-insert-breakpoints on|off
1470set may-insert-tracepoints on|off
1471set may-insert-fast-tracepoints on|off
1472set may-interrupt on|off
1473 Set individual permissions for GDB effects on the target. Note that
1474 some of these settings can have undesirable or surprising
1475 consequences, particularly when changed in the middle of a session.
1476 For instance, disabling the writing of memory can prevent
1477 breakpoints from being inserted, cause single-stepping to fail, or
1478 even crash your program, if you disable after breakpoints have been
1479 inserted. However, GDB should not crash.
1480
1481set record memory-query on|off
1482show record memory-query
1483 Control whether to stop the inferior if memory changes caused
1484 by an instruction cannot be recorded.
1485
53a71c06
CR
1486* Changed commands
1487
1488disassemble
1489 The disassemble command now supports "start,+length" form of two arguments.
1490
f3e9a817
PM
1491* Python scripting
1492
9279c692
JB
1493** GDB now provides a new directory location, called the python directory,
1494 where Python scripts written for GDB can be installed. The location
1495 of that directory is <data-directory>/python, where <data-directory>
1496 is the GDB data directory. For more details, see section `Scripting
1497 GDB using Python' in the manual.
1498
adc36818 1499** The GDB Python API now has access to breakpoints, symbols, symbol
595939de
PM
1500 tables, program spaces, inferiors, threads and frame's code blocks.
1501 Additionally, GDB Parameters can now be created from the API, and
1502 manipulated via set/show in the CLI.
f870a310 1503
fa33c3cd 1504** New functions gdb.target_charset, gdb.target_wide_charset,
07ca107c
DE
1505 gdb.progspaces, gdb.current_progspace, and gdb.string_to_argv.
1506
1507** New exception gdb.GdbError.
fa33c3cd
DE
1508
1509** Pretty-printers are now also looked up in the current program space.
f3e9a817 1510
967cf477
DE
1511** Pretty-printers can now be individually enabled and disabled.
1512
8a1ea21f
DE
1513** GDB now looks for names of Python scripts to auto-load in a
1514 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts', in addition to looking
1515 for a OBJFILE-gdb.py script when OBJFILE is read by the debugger.
1516
a7bdde9e
VP
1517* Tracepoint actions were unified with breakpoint commands. In particular,
1518there are no longer differences in "info break" output for breakpoints and
1519tracepoints and the "commands" command can be used for both tracepoints and
1520regular breakpoints.
1521
05071a4d
PA
1522* New targets
1523
1524ARM Symbian arm*-*-symbianelf*
1525
6aecb9c2
JB
1526* D language support.
1527 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the D programming
1528 language.
1529
431e49aa
TJB
1530* GDB now supports the extended ptrace interface for PowerPC which is
1531 available since Linux kernel version 2.6.34. This automatically enables
1532 any hardware breakpoints and additional hardware watchpoints available in
1533 the processor. The old ptrace interface exposes just one hardware
1534 watchpoint and no hardware breakpoints.
1535
1536* GDB is now able to use the Data Value Compare (DVC) register available on
1537 embedded PowerPC processors to implement in hardware simple watchpoint
1538 conditions of the form:
1539
1540 watch ADDRESS|VARIABLE if ADDRESS|VARIABLE == CONSTANT EXPRESSION
1541
1542 This works in native GDB running on Linux kernels with the extended ptrace
1543 interface mentioned above.
1544
bfbf3774 1545*** Changes in GDB 7.1
abc7453d 1546
4eef138c
TT
1547* C++ Improvements
1548
1549 ** Namespace Support
71dee663
SW
1550
1551 GDB now supports importing of namespaces in C++. This enables the
1552 user to inspect variables from imported namespaces. Support for
1553 namepace aliasing has also been added. So, if a namespace is
1554 aliased in the current scope (e.g. namepace C=A; ) the user can
1555 print variables using the alias (e.g. (gdb) print C::x).
1556
4eef138c
TT
1557 ** Bug Fixes
1558
1559 All known bugs relating to the printing of virtual base class were
1560 fixed. It is now possible to call overloaded static methods using a
1561 qualified name.
1562
1563 ** Cast Operators
1564
1565 The C++ cast operators static_cast<>, dynamic_cast<>, const_cast<>,
1566 and reinterpret_cast<> are now handled by the C++ expression parser.
1567
2d1c1221
ME
1568* New targets
1569
1570Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze-*-*
34207b9e 1571Renesas RX rx-*-elf
2d1c1221
ME
1572
1573* New Simulators
1574
1575Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze
34207b9e 1576Renesas RX rx
2d1c1221 1577
6c95b8df
PA
1578* Multi-program debugging.
1579
1580 GDB now has support for multi-program (a.k.a. multi-executable or
1581 multi-exec) debugging. This allows for debugging multiple inferiors
1582 simultaneously each running a different program under the same GDB
1583 session. See "Debugging Multiple Inferiors and Programs" in the
1584 manual for more information. This implied some user visible changes
1585 in the multi-inferior support. For example, "info inferiors" now
1586 lists inferiors that are not running yet or that have exited
1587 already. See also "New commands" and "New options" below.
1588
d5551862
SS
1589* New tracing features
1590
1591 GDB's tracepoint facility now includes several new features:
1592
1593 ** Trace state variables
f61e138d
SS
1594
1595 GDB tracepoints now include support for trace state variables, which
1596 are variables managed by the target agent during a tracing
1597 experiment. They are useful for tracepoints that trigger each
1598 other, so for instance one tracepoint can count hits in a variable,
1599 and then a second tracepoint has a condition that is true when the
1600 count reaches a particular value. Trace state variables share the
1601 $-syntax of GDB convenience variables, and can appear in both
1602 tracepoint actions and condition expressions. Use the "tvariable"
1603 command to create, and "info tvariables" to view; see "Trace State
1604 Variables" in the manual for more detail.
7a697b8d 1605
d5551862 1606 ** Fast tracepoints
7a697b8d
SS
1607
1608 GDB now includes an option for defining fast tracepoints, which
1609 targets may implement more efficiently, such as by installing a jump
1610 into the target agent rather than a trap instruction. The resulting
1611 speedup can be by two orders of magnitude or more, although the
1612 tradeoff is that some program locations on some target architectures
1613 might not allow fast tracepoint installation, for instance if the
1614 instruction to be replaced is shorter than the jump. To request a
1615 fast tracepoint, use the "ftrace" command, with syntax identical to
1616 the regular trace command.
1617
d5551862
SS
1618 ** Disconnected tracing
1619
1620 It is now possible to detach GDB from the target while it is running
1621 a trace experiment, then reconnect later to see how the experiment
1622 is going. In addition, a new variable disconnected-tracing lets you
1623 tell the target agent whether to continue running a trace if the
1624 connection is lost unexpectedly.
1625
00bf0b85
SS
1626 ** Trace files
1627
1628 GDB now has the ability to save the trace buffer into a file, and
1629 then use that file as a target, similarly to you can do with
1630 corefiles. You can select trace frames, print data that was
1631 collected in them, and use tstatus to display the state of the
1632 tracing run at the moment that it was saved. To create a trace
1633 file, use "tsave <filename>", and to use it, do "target tfile
1634 <name>".
4daf5ac0
SS
1635
1636 ** Circular trace buffer
1637
1638 You can ask the target agent to handle the trace buffer as a
1639 circular buffer, discarding the oldest trace frames to make room for
1640 newer ones, by setting circular-trace-buffer to on. This feature may
1641 not be available for all target agents.
1642
21a0512e
PP
1643* Changed commands
1644
1645disassemble
1646 The disassemble command, when invoked with two arguments, now requires
1647 the arguments to be comma-separated.
1648
0fe7935b
DJ
1649info variables
1650 The info variables command now displays variable definitions. Files
1651 which only declare a variable are not shown.
1652
fb2e7cb4
JB
1653source
1654 The source command is now capable of sourcing Python scripts.
1655 This feature is dependent on the debugger being build with Python
1656 support.
1657
1658 Related to this enhancement is also the introduction of a new command
1659 "set script-extension" (see below).
1660
6c95b8df
PA
1661* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
1662
399cd161
MS
1663record save [<FILENAME>]
1664 Save a file (in core file format) containing the process record
1665 execution log for replay debugging at a later time.
1666
1667record restore <FILENAME>
1668 Restore the process record execution log that was saved at an
1669 earlier time, for replay debugging.
1670
6c95b8df
PA
1671add-inferior [-copies <N>] [-exec <FILENAME>]
1672 Add a new inferior.
1673
1674clone-inferior [-copies <N>] [ID]
1675 Make a new inferior ready to execute the same program another
1676 inferior has loaded.
1677
1678remove-inferior ID
1679 Remove an inferior.
1680
1681maint info program-spaces
1682 List the program spaces loaded into GDB.
1683
9a7071a8
JB
1684set remote interrupt-sequence [Ctrl-C | BREAK | BREAK-g]
1685show remote interrupt-sequence
1686 Allow the user to select one of ^C, a BREAK signal or BREAK-g
1687 as the sequence to the remote target in order to interrupt the execution.
1688 Ctrl-C is a default. Some system prefers BREAK which is high level of
1689 serial line for some certain time. Linux kernel prefers BREAK-g, a.k.a
1690 Magic SysRq g. It is BREAK signal and character 'g'.
1691
1692set remote interrupt-on-connect [on | off]
1693show remote interrupt-on-connect
1694 When interrupt-on-connect is ON, gdb sends interrupt-sequence to
1695 remote target when gdb connects to it. This is needed when you debug
1696 Linux kernel.
1697
1698set remotebreak [on | off]
1699show remotebreak
1700Deprecated. Use "set/show remote interrupt-sequence" instead.
1701
f61e138d
SS
1702tvariable $NAME [ = EXP ]
1703 Create or modify a trace state variable.
1704
1705info tvariables
1706 List trace state variables and their values.
1707
1708delete tvariable $NAME ...
1709 Delete one or more trace state variables.
1710
6da95a67
SS
1711teval EXPR, ...
1712 Evaluate the given expressions without collecting anything into the
1713 trace buffer. (Valid in tracepoint actions only.)
1714
7a697b8d
SS
1715ftrace FN / FILE:LINE / *ADDR
1716 Define a fast tracepoint at the given function, line, or address.
1717
b0f02ee9
JK
1718* New expression syntax
1719
1720 GDB now parses the 0b prefix of binary numbers the same way as GCC does.
1721 GDB now parses 0b101010 identically with 42.
1722
6c95b8df
PA
1723* New options
1724
1725set follow-exec-mode new|same
1726show follow-exec-mode
1727 Control whether GDB reuses the same inferior across an exec call or
1728 creates a new one. This is useful to be able to restart the old
1729 executable after the inferior having done an exec call.
1730
236f1d4d
SS
1731set default-collect EXPR, ...
1732show default-collect
1733 Define a list of expressions to be collected at each tracepoint.
1734 This is a useful way to ensure essential items are not overlooked,
1735 such as registers or a critical global variable.
1736
d5551862
SS
1737set disconnected-tracing
1738show disconnected-tracing
1739 If set to 1, the target is instructed to continue tracing if it
1740 loses its connection to GDB. If 0, the target is to stop tracing
1741 upon disconnection.
1742
4daf5ac0
SS
1743set circular-trace-buffer
1744show circular-trace-buffer
1745 If set to on, the target is instructed to use a circular trace buffer
1746 and discard the oldest trace frames instead of stopping the trace due
1747 to a full trace buffer. If set to off, the trace stops when the buffer
1748 fills up. Some targets may not support this.
1749
fb2e7cb4
JB
1750set script-extension off|soft|strict
1751show script-extension
1752 If set to "off", the debugger does not perform any script language
1753 recognition, and all sourced files are assumed to be GDB scripts.
1754 If set to "soft" (the default), files are sourced according to
1755 filename extension, falling back to GDB scripts if the first
1756 evaluation failed.
1757 If set to "strict", files are sourced according to filename extension.
1758
2b71fc8e
JB
1759set ada trust-PAD-over-XVS on|off
1760show ada trust-PAD-over-XVS
1761 If off, activate a workaround against a bug in the debugging information
1762 generated by the compiler for PAD types (see gcc/exp_dbug.ads in
1763 the GCC sources for more information about the GNAT encoding and
1764 PAD types in particular). It is always safe to set this option to
1765 off, but this introduces a slight performance penalty. The default
1766 is on.
1767
de2e5182
TT
1768* Python API Improvements
1769
1770 ** GDB provides the new class gdb.LazyString. This is useful in
1771 some pretty-printing cases. The new method gdb.Value.lazy_string
1772 provides a simple way to create objects of this type.
1773
1774 ** The fields returned by gdb.Type.fields now have an
1775 `is_base_class' attribute.
1776
1777 ** The new method gdb.Type.range returns the range of an array type.
1778
1779 ** The new method gdb.parse_and_eval can be used to parse and
1780 evaluate an expression.
1781
f61e138d
SS
1782* New remote packets
1783
1784QTDV
1785 Define a trace state variable.
1786
1787qTV
1788 Get the current value of a trace state variable.
1789
d5551862
SS
1790QTDisconnected
1791 Set desired tracing behavior upon disconnection.
1792
4daf5ac0
SS
1793QTBuffer:circular
1794 Set the trace buffer to be linear or circular.
1795
d5551862
SS
1796qTfP, qTsP
1797 Get data about the tracepoints currently in use.
1798
2d483d34
MS
1799* Bug fixes
1800
1801Process record now works correctly with hardware watchpoints.
1802
6e0e5977
JB
1803Multiple bug fixes have been made to the mips-irix port, making it
1804much more reliable. In particular:
1805 - Debugging threaded applications is now possible again. Previously,
1806 GDB would hang while starting the program, or while waiting for
1807 the program to stop at a breakpoint.
1808 - Attaching to a running process no longer hangs.
1809 - An error occurring while loading a core file has been fixed.
1810 - Changing the value of the PC register now works again. This fixes
1811 problems observed when using the "jump" command, or when calling
1812 a function from GDB, or even when assigning a new value to $pc.
1813 - With the "finish" and "return" commands, the return value for functions
1814 returning a small array is now correctly printed.
1815 - It is now possible to break on shared library code which gets executed
1816 during a shared library init phase (code executed while executing
1817 their .init section). Previously, the breakpoint would have no effect.
1818 - GDB is now able to backtrace through the signal handler for
1819 non-threaded programs.
1820
93c26624
JK
1821PIE (Position Independent Executable) programs debugging is now supported.
1822This includes debugging execution of PIC (Position Independent Code) shared
1823libraries although for that, it should be possible to run such libraries as an
1824executable program.
1825
abc7453d 1826*** Changes in GDB 7.0
75feb17d 1827
4efc6507
DE
1828* GDB now has an interface for JIT compilation. Applications that
1829dynamically generate code can create symbol files in memory and register
1830them with GDB. For users, the feature should work transparently, and
1831for JIT developers, the interface is documented in the GDB manual in the
1832"JIT Compilation Interface" chapter.
1833
782b2b07
SS
1834* Tracepoints may now be conditional. The syntax is as for
1835breakpoints; either an "if" clause appended to the "trace" command,
1836or the "condition" command is available. GDB sends the condition to
1837the target for evaluation using the same bytecode format as is used
1838for tracepoint actions.
1839
53a71c06
CR
1840* The disassemble command now supports: an optional /r modifier, print the
1841raw instructions in hex as well as in symbolic form, and an optional /m
1842modifier to print mixed source+assembly.
e6158f16 1843
e7a8dbfb
HZ
1844* Process record and replay
1845
1846 In a architecture environment that supports ``process record and
1847 replay'', ``process record and replay'' target can record a log of
1848 the process execution, and replay it with both forward and reverse
1849 execute commands.
1850
64644d9b
MS
1851* Reverse debugging: GDB now has new commands reverse-continue, reverse-
1852step, reverse-next, reverse-finish, reverse-stepi, reverse-nexti, and
1853set execution-direction {forward|reverse}, for targets that support
1854reverse execution.
1855
b9412953
DD
1856* GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on MIPS/Linux systems. This
1857feature is available with a native GDB running on kernel version
18582.6.28 or later.
1859
6c7a06a3
TT
1860* GDB now has support for multi-byte and wide character sets on the
1861target. Strings whose character type is wchar_t, char16_t, or
1862char32_t are now correctly printed. GDB supports wide- and unicode-
1863literals in C, that is, L'x', L"string", u'x', u"string", U'x', and
1864U"string" syntax. And, GDB allows the "%ls" and "%lc" formats in
1865`printf'. This feature requires iconv to work properly; if your
1866system does not have a working iconv, GDB can use GNU libiconv. See
1867the installation instructions for more information.
1868
f1838a98
UW
1869* GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
1870remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
1871with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
1872the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
1873
55333a84
DE
1874* "info sharedlibrary" now takes an optional regex of libraries to show,
1875and it now reports if a shared library has no debugging information.
1876
7f6a6314
PM
1877* Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
1878now complete on file names.
1879
65d12d83
TT
1880* When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
1881completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
1882For instance, consider:
1883
1884 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
1885 # struct example variable;
1886 (gdb) p variable.
1887
1888If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
1889completions will be "f1" and "f2".
1890
edb3359d
DJ
1891* Inlined functions are now supported. They show up in backtraces, and
1892the "step", "next", and "finish" commands handle them automatically.
1893
2fae03e8
TT
1894* GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
1895operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
1896macros.
1897
47a3467a 1898* GDB now supports inspecting extra signal information, exported by
58d6951d
DJ
1899the new $_siginfo convenience variable. The feature is currently
1900implemented on linux ARM, i386 and amd64.
1901
1902* GDB can now display the VFP floating point registers and NEON vector
1903registers on ARM targets. Both ARM GNU/Linux native GDB and gdbserver
1904can provide these registers (requires Linux 2.6.30 or later). Remote
1905and simulator targets may also provide them.
47a3467a 1906
08388c79
DE
1907* New remote packets
1908
1909qSearch:memory:
1910 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
1911
a6f3e723
SL
1912QStartNoAckMode
1913 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
1914 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
1915 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
1916
d7713ae0
EZ
1917vKill
1918 Kill the process with the specified process ID. Use this in preference
1919 to `k' when multiprocess protocol extensions are supported.
1920
07e059b5
VP
1921qXfer:osdata:read
1922 Obtains additional operating system information
1923
47a3467a
PA
1924qXfer:siginfo:read
1925qXfer:siginfo:write
1926 Read or write additional signal information.
1927
060871df
PA
1928* Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
1929
1930 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
1931 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
1932 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
1933
c055b101 1934* GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
a0ef4274 1935DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
c055b101
CV
1936
1937* The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
a0ef4274
DJ
1938and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
1939`set/show sh calling-convention'.
c055b101 1940
31fffb02
CS
1941* GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
1942with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
1943
88d8a8e0
JB
1944* 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
1945
7f99b190
JB
1946* Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
1947
ccd213ac
DJ
1948* Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
1949which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
1950
1fddbabb 1951* The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
31fffb02 1952list of section offsets.
1fddbabb 1953
a0ef4274
DJ
1954* On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
1955conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
1956have also been fixed.
1957
bfb8797a 1958* GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
158c7665
PH
1959From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
1960are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
bfb8797a 1961
71c25dea
TT
1962* GDB now parses C++ symbol and type names more flexibly. For
1963example, given:
1964
1965 template<typename T> class C { };
1966 C<char const *> c;
1967
1968GDB will now correctly handle all of:
1969
1970 ptype C<char const *>
1971 ptype C<char const*>
1972 ptype C<const char *>
1973 ptype C<const char*>
1974
ccd213ac
DJ
1975* New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
1976
1977 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
1978 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
1979
7ae0e2a2
UW
1980 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
1981 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
1982 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
1983
a6f3e723
SL
1984 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
1985 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
1986
da8bd9a3
DJ
1987 - Support for the sparc64-linux-gnu target is now included in
1988 gdbserver.
1989
d70e31dd
DE
1990 - The amd64-linux build of gdbserver now supports debugging both
1991 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
1992
1993 - The i386-linux, amd64-linux, and i386-win32 builds of gdbserver
1994 now support hardware watchpoints, and will use them automatically
1995 as appropriate.
1996
d57a3c85
TJB
1997* Python scripting
1998
1999 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
2000 available is determined at configure time.
2001
d8906c6f
TJB
2002 New GDB commands can now be written in Python.
2003
aadc346a
JB
2004* Ada tasking support
2005
2006 Ada tasks can now be inspected in GDB. The following commands have
2007 been introduced:
2008
2009 info tasks
2010 Print the list of Ada tasks.
2011 info task N
2012 Print detailed information about task number N.
2013 task
2014 Print the task number of the current task.
2015 task N
2016 Switch the context of debugging to task number N.
2017
adb483fe
DJ
2018* Support for user-defined prefixed commands. The "define" command can
2019add new commands to existing prefixes, e.g. "target".
2020
2277426b
PA
2021* Multi-inferior, multi-process debugging.
2022
2023 GDB now has generalized support for multi-inferior debugging. See
2024 "Debugging Multiple Inferiors" in the manual for more information.
2025 Although availability still depends on target support, the command
2026 set is more uniform now. The GNU/Linux specific multi-forks support
2027 has been migrated to this new framework. This implied some user
2028 visible changes; see "New commands" and also "Removed commands"
2029 below.
2030
08d16641
PA
2031* Target descriptions can now describe the target OS ABI. See the
2032"Target Description Format" section in the user manual for more
2033information.
2034
e35359c5
UW
2035* Target descriptions can now describe "compatible" architectures
2036to indicate that the target can execute applications for a different
2037architecture in addition to those for the main target architecture.
2038See the "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for
2039more information.
2040
85e747d2
UW
2041* Multi-architecture debugging.
2042
2043 GDB now includes general supports for debugging applications on
2044 hybrid systems that use more than one single processor architecture
2045 at the same time. Each such hybrid architecture still requires
2046 specific support to be added. The only hybrid architecture supported
2047 in this version of GDB is the Cell Broadband Engine.
2048
2049* GDB now supports integrated debugging of Cell/B.E. applications that
2050use both the PPU and SPU architectures. To enable support for hybrid
2051Cell/B.E. debugging, you need to configure GDB to support both the
2052powerpc-linux or powerpc64-linux and the spu-elf targets, using the
2053--enable-targets configure option.
2054
11ade57a
PA
2055* Non-stop mode debugging.
2056
2057 For some targets, GDB now supports an optional mode of operation in
2058 which you can examine stopped threads while other threads continue
2059 to execute freely. This is referred to as non-stop mode, with the
2060 old mode referred to as all-stop mode. See the "Non-Stop Mode"
2061 section in the user manual for more information.
2062
2063 To be able to support remote non-stop debugging, a remote stub needs
2064 to implement the non-stop mode remote protocol extensions, as
2065 described in the "Remote Non-Stop" section of the user manual. The
2066 GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been adjusted to support these
2067 extensions on linux targets.
2068
d7713ae0 2069* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
75feb17d 2070
a96d9b2e
SDJ
2071catch syscall [NAME(S) | NUMBER(S)]
2072 Catch system calls. Arguments, which should be names of system
2073 calls or their numbers, mean catch only those syscalls. Without
2074 arguments, every syscall will be caught. When the inferior issues
2075 any of the specified syscalls, GDB will stop and announce the system
2076 call, both when it is called and when its call returns. This
2077 feature is currently available with a native GDB running on the
2078 Linux Kernel, under the following architectures: x86, x86_64,
2079 PowerPC and PowerPC64.
2080
08388c79
DE
2081find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
2082 val1 [, val2, ...]
2083 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
2084
d57a3c85
TJB
2085maint set python print-stack
2086maint show python print-stack
2087 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
2088
2089python [CODE]
2090 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
2091
d7713ae0
EZ
2092macro define
2093macro list
2094macro undef
2095 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
2096 interactively.
2097
2098info os processes
2099 Show operating system information about processes.
2100
2277426b
PA
2101info inferiors
2102 List the inferiors currently under GDB's control.
2103
2104inferior NUM
2105 Switch focus to inferior number NUM.
2106
2107detach inferior NUM
2108 Detach from inferior number NUM.
2109
2110kill inferior NUM
2111 Kill inferior number NUM.
2112
d7713ae0
EZ
2113* New options
2114
3285f3fe
UW
2115set spu stop-on-load
2116show spu stop-on-load
2117 Control whether to stop for new SPE threads during Cell/B.E. debugging.
2118
ff1a52c6
UW
2119set spu auto-flush-cache
2120show spu auto-flush-cache
2121 Control whether to automatically flush the software-managed cache
2122 during Cell/B.E. debugging.
2123
d7713ae0
EZ
2124set sh calling-convention
2125show sh calling-convention
2126 Control the calling convention used when calling SH target functions.
2127
e0a3ce09 2128set debug timestamp
75feb17d 2129show debug timestamp
d7713ae0
EZ
2130 Control display of timestamps with GDB debugging output.
2131
2132set disassemble-next-line
2133show disassemble-next-line
2134 Control display of disassembled source lines or instructions when
2135 the debuggee stops.
2136
2137set remote noack-packet
2138show remote noack-packet
2139 Set/show the use of remote protocol QStartNoAckMode packet. See above
2140 under "New remote packets."
2141
2142set remote query-attached-packet
2143show remote query-attached-packet
2144 Control use of remote protocol `qAttached' (query-attached) packet.
2145
2146set remote read-siginfo-object
2147show remote read-siginfo-object
2148 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:read' (read-siginfo-object)
2149 packet.
2150
2151set remote write-siginfo-object
2152show remote write-siginfo-object
2153 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:write' (write-siginfo-object)
2154 packet.
2155
40ab02ce
MS
2156set remote reverse-continue
2157show remote reverse-continue
2158 Control use of remote protocol 'bc' (reverse-continue) packet.
2159
2160set remote reverse-step
2161show remote reverse-step
2162 Control use of remote protocol 'bs' (reverse-step) packet.
2163
d7713ae0
EZ
2164set displaced-stepping
2165show displaced-stepping
2166 Control displaced stepping mode. Displaced stepping is a way to
2167 single-step over breakpoints without removing them from the debuggee.
2168 Also known as "out-of-line single-stepping".
2169
2170set debug displaced
2171show debug displaced
2172 Control display of debugging info for displaced stepping.
2173
2174maint set internal-error
2175maint show internal-error
2176 Control what GDB does when an internal error is detected.
2177
2178maint set internal-warning
2179maint show internal-warning
2180 Control what GDB does when an internal warning is detected.
75feb17d 2181
ccd213ac
DJ
2182set exec-wrapper
2183show exec-wrapper
2184unset exec-wrapper
2185 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
fa4727a6 2186
aad4b048
JB
2187set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
2188show multiple-symbols
2189 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
2190 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
2191 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
2192
74960c60
VP
2193set breakpoint always-inserted
2194show breakpoint always-inserted
2195 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
2196 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
2197 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
2198
0428b8f5
DJ
2199set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
2200show arm fallback-mode
2201set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
2202show arm force-mode
2203 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
2204 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
2205 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
2206 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
2207
10568435
JK
2208set disable-randomization
2209show disable-randomization
2210 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
2211 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
2212 multiple debugging sessions.
2213
d7713ae0
EZ
2214set non-stop
2215show non-stop
2216 Control whether other threads are stopped or not when some thread hits
2217 a breakpoint.
2218
b3eb342c 2219set target-async
d7713ae0 2220show target-async
b3eb342c
VP
2221 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
2222 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
2223 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
2224 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
2225
6c7a06a3
TT
2226set target-wide-charset
2227show target-wide-charset
2228 The target-wide-charset is the name of the character set that GDB
2229 uses when printing characters whose type is wchar_t.
2230
84603566
SL
2231set tcp auto-retry (on|off)
2232show tcp auto-retry
2233set tcp connect-timeout
2234show tcp connect-timeout
2235 These commands allow GDB to retry failed TCP connections to a remote stub
2236 with a specified timeout period; this is useful if the stub is launched
2237 in parallel with GDB but may not be ready to accept connections immediately.
2238
17a37d48
PP
2239set libthread-db-search-path
2240show libthread-db-search-path
2241 Control list of directories which GDB will search for appropriate
2242 libthread_db.
2243
d4db2f36
PA
2244set schedule-multiple (on|off)
2245show schedule-multiple
2246 Allow GDB to resume all threads of all processes or only threads of
2247 the current process.
2248
4e5d721f
DE
2249set stack-cache
2250show stack-cache
2251 Use more aggressive caching for accesses to the stack. This improves
2252 performance of remote debugging (particularly backtraces) without
2253 affecting correctness.
2254
910c5da8
JB
2255set interactive-mode (on|off|auto)
2256show interactive-mode
2257 Control whether GDB runs in interactive mode (on) or not (off).
2258 When in interactive mode, GDB waits for the user to answer all
2259 queries. Otherwise, GDB does not wait and assumes the default
2260 answer. When set to auto (the default), GDB determines which
2261 mode to use based on the stdin settings.
2262
2277426b
PA
2263* Removed commands
2264
2265info forks
2266 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `info
2267 inferiors' command. To list checkpoints, you can still use the
2268 `info checkpoints' command, which was an alias for the `info forks'
2269 command.
2270
2271fork NUM
2272 Replaced by the new `inferior' command. To switch between
2273 checkpoints, you can still use the `restart' command, which was an
2274 alias for the `fork' command.
2275
2276process PID
2277 This is removed, since some targets don't have a notion of
2278 processes. To switch between processes, you can still use the
2279 `inferior' command using GDB's own inferior number.
2280
2281delete fork NUM
2282 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `kill
2283 inferior' command. To delete a checkpoint, you can still use the
2284 `delete checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `delete
2285 fork' command.
2286
2287detach fork NUM
2288 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `detach
2289 inferior' command. To detach a checkpoint, you can still use the
2290 `detach checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `detach
2291 fork' command.
2292
a80b95ba
TG
2293* New native configurations
2294
2295x86/x86_64 Darwin i[34567]86-*-darwin*
2296
b8bfd3ed
JB
2297x86_64 MinGW x86_64-*-mingw*
2298
75a2d5e7
TT
2299* New targets
2300
c28c63d8 2301Lattice Mico32 lm32-*
75a2d5e7 2302x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
4c1d2973 2303x86_64 DICOS x86_64-*-dicos*
5f814c3b 2304S+core 3 score-*-*
75a2d5e7 2305
6de3146c
PA
2306* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports x86 Windows CE
2307 (mingw32ce) debugging.
2308
d5cbbe6e
JB
2309* Removed commands
2310
2311catch load
2312catch unload
2313 These commands were actually not implemented on any target.
2314
75feb17d 2315*** Changes in GDB 6.8
f9ed52be 2316
af5ca30d
NH
2317* New native configurations
2318
2319NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
94a0e877 2320Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
af5ca30d
NH
2321
2322* New targets
2323
2324NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
94a0e877 2325Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
af5ca30d 2326
7a404eba
PA
2327* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
2328
2329 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
2330 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
2331 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
2332 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
2333
430ebac9
PA
2334* GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
2335(mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
2336
fe6fbf8b 2337* Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
8d5f9c6f 2338is resolved.
fe6fbf8b
VP
2339
2340* GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
8d5f9c6f
DJ
2341including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
2342and in inlined functions.
fe6fbf8b 2343
10665d76
JB
2344* GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
2345accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
2346more than one contiguous range of addresses.
2347
7cc46491
DJ
2348* Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
2349
d71340b8
DJ
2350* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
2351registers on PowerPC targets.
2352
523c4513
DJ
2353* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
2354targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
2355
a6b151f1
DJ
2356* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
2357commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
2358
2d717e4f
DJ
2359* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
2360extended-remote mode.
2361
24a836bd 2362* hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
d001be7a
DJ
2363The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
2364error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
2365The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
24a836bd 2366
d0c678e6
UW
2367* GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
2368building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
2369target architectures.
2370
d64a946d
TJB
2371* GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
2372Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
2373now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
2374stored in two consecutive float registers.
2375
ee163bf5
VP
2376* The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
2377breakpoints now.
2378
b93b6ca7 2379* Improved support for debugging Ada
d001be7a
DJ
2380Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
2381include:
b93b6ca7
JB
2382 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
2383 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
2384 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
2385 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
2386 of an assignment
2387 - Improved command completion in Ada
2388 - Several bug fixes
2389
d001be7a
DJ
2390* GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
2391process.
2392
a6b151f1
DJ
2393* New commands
2394
6d53d0af
JB
2395set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
2396show print frame-arguments
2397 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
2398 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
2399
a6b151f1
DJ
2400remote put
2401remote get
2402remote delete
2403 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
2404
2405* New MI commands
2406
2407-target-file-put
2408-target-file-get
2409-target-file-delete
2410 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
2411
2412* New remote packets
2413
2414vFile:open:
2415vFile:close:
2416vFile:pread:
2417vFile:pwrite:
2418vFile:unlink:
2419 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
d0c678e6 2420
2d717e4f
DJ
2421vAttach
2422 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
2423 mode.
2424
2425vRun
2426 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
2427
8d5f9c6f 2428*** Changes in GDB 6.7
6dd09645 2429
19d378fc
MS
2430* Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
2431bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
2432Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
2433
3a40aaa0
UW
2434* When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
2435symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
2436-Bsymbolic linker option.
2437
a6ec25f2
BW
2438* When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
2439recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
2440is not supported.
2441
6dd09645
JB
2442* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
2443frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
2444
c9bb8148
DJ
2445* GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
244632-bit or 64-bit register values.
2447
0d5de010
DJ
2448* Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
2449
23181151
DJ
2450* GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
2451target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
2452a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
2453
ea37ba09
DJ
2454* Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
2455automatically displayed as character or string data.
2456
2457* The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
2458arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
2459as strings.
e1f48ead 2460
123dc839
DJ
2461* Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
2462for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
8d5f9c6f 2463only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
123dc839 2464
05a4558a
DJ
2465* GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
2466iWMMXt coprocessor.
fb1e4ffc 2467
7c963485
PA
2468* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
2469ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
2470has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
2471
b18be20d
DJ
2472* GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
2473
0ca420ce
UW
2474* GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
2475
31d99776
DJ
2476* The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
2477layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
2478segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
2479
a4642986
MR
2480* The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
2481immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
2482
cfa9d6d9
DJ
2483* The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
2484"library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
2485packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
2486where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
2487Windows and SymbianOS).
255e7678
DJ
2488
2489* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
2490(DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
f5db8714
JK
2491
2492* GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
2493according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
cfa9d6d9 2494
c9bb8148
DJ
2495* New commands
2496
23776285
MR
2497set remoteflow
2498show remoteflow
2499 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
2500 when debugging using remote targets.
2501
c9bb8148
DJ
2502set mem inaccessible-by-default
2503show mem inaccessible-by-default
2504 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
2505 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
2506 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
2507 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
2508 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
2509
2510set breakpoint auto-hw
2511show breakpoint auto-hw
2512 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
2513 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
2514 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
2515 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
2516 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
2517 including "next" and "finish".
2518
0e420bd8
JB
2519catch exception
2520catch exception unhandled
2521 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
2522
2523catch assert
2524 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
2525
f822c95b
DJ
2526set sysroot
2527show sysroot
2528 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
2529 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
2530 an alias to "set sysroot".
2531
83cc5c53
UW
2532info spu
2533 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
2534 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
2535 architecture.
2536
bd372731
MK
2537* New native configurations
2538
2539OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
2540
23181151
DJ
2541set tdesc filename
2542unset tdesc filename
2543show tdesc filename
2544 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
2545 not query the target for its built-in description.
2546
c9bb8148
DJ
2547* New targets
2548
54fe9172 2549OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
c9bb8148 2550MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
c077150c 2551Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
c9bb8148 2552
6dd09645
JB
2553* New remote packets
2554
2555QPassSignals:
2556 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
2557 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
2558
23181151
DJ
2559qXfer:features:read:
2560 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
2561 features.
6dd09645 2562
83cc5c53
UW
2563qXfer:spu:read:
2564qXfer:spu:write:
2565 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
2566 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
2567
cfa9d6d9
DJ
2568qXfer:libraries:read:
2569 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
2570 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
2571 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
2572 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
2573
483367ee
DJ
2574* Removed targets
2575
2576Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
2577
d08950c4
UW
2578alpha*-*-osf1*
2579alpha*-*-osf2*
7ce59000 2580d10v-*-*
483367ee
DJ
2581hppa*-*-hiux*
2582i[34567]86-ncr-*
2583i[34567]86-*-dgux*
2584i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
2585i[34567]86-*-netware*
2586i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
2587i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
2588i[34567]86-*-sco*
2589i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
2590i[34567]86-*-sysv4*
2591i[34567]86-*-sysv5*
2592i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
2593i[34567]86-*-unixware*
2594i[34567]86-*-sysv*
2595i[34567]86-*-isc*
2596m68*-cisco*-*
2597m68*-tandem-*
ad527d2e 2598mips*-*-pe
483367ee 2599rs6000-*-lynxos*
ad527d2e 2600sh*-*-pe
483367ee 2601
7ce59000
DJ
2602* Other removed features
2603
2604target abug
2605target cpu32bug
2606target est
2607target rom68k
2608
2609 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
2610
ea35711c
DJ
2611target hms
2612target e7000
2613target sh3
2614target sh3e
2615
2616 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
2617 H8/300.
2618
2619target ocd
2620
2621 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
2622 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
2623 interfaces.
2624
7ce59000
DJ
2625DWARF 1 support
2626
2627 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
2628 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
2629
54d61198
DJ
2630Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
2631
2632 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
2633 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
2634 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
2635 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
2636
ea35711c
DJ
2637MIPS ".pdr" sections
2638
2639 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
2640 in debugging information.
2641
2642Scheme support
2643
2644 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
2645 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
2646
1a69e1e4
DJ
2647set mips stack-arg-size
2648set mips saved-gpreg-size
2649
2650 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
2651
6dd09645 2652*** Changes in GDB 6.6
e374b601 2653
ca3bf3bd
DJ
2654* New targets
2655
2656Xtensa xtensa-elf
9c309e77 2657Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
ca3bf3bd 2658
6aec2e11
DJ
2659* GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
2660(mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
2661running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
2662
2663* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
2664Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
2665supported.
2666
17218d91
DJ
2667* The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
2668broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
2669
9ebce043
DJ
2670* The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
2671stub provides the required support.
2672
7d3d3ece
DJ
2673* Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
2674longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
2675
4f8253f3
JB
2676* New commands
2677
2678set substitute-path
2679unset substitute-path
2680show substitute-path
2681 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
2682 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
2683 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
2684 between compilation and debugging.
2685
9fa66fd7
AS
2686set trace-commands
2687show trace-commands
2688 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
2689 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
2690 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
2691
1f5befc1
DJ
2692* REMOVED features
2693
2694The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
2695
2ec3381a
DJ
2696Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
2697an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
2698
3d00d119
DJ
2699The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
2700
be2a5f71
DJ
2701* New remote packets
2702
2703qSupported:
2704 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
2705 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
2706 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
2707 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
2708 target.
2709
0876f84a
DJ
2710qXfer:auxv:read:
2711 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
2712 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
2713
9ebce043
DJ
2714qXfer:memory-map:read:
2715 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
2716 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
2717
2718vFlashErase:
2719vFlashWrite:
2720vFlashDone:
2721 Erase and program a flash memory device.
2722
0876f84a
DJ
2723* Removed remote packets
2724
2725qPart:auxv:read:
2726 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
2727 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
2728
e374b601 2729*** Changes in GDB 6.5
53e5f3cf 2730
96309189
MS
2731* New targets
2732
2733Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
2734
2735Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
2736
53e5f3cf
AS
2737* New commands
2738
2739init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
2740 only if it doesn't already have a value.
2741
ac264b3b
MS
2742The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
2743
2744checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
2745
2746restart <n> Return the program state to a
2747 previously saved state.
2748
2749info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
2750
2751delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
2752
2753set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
2754 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
2755
2756info forks List forks of the user program that
2757 are available to be debugged.
2758
2759fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
2760 forks of the user program that are
2761 available to be debugged.
2762
2763delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
2764 that are available to be debugged (and
2765 kill the forked process).
2766
2767detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
2768 that are available to be debugged (and
2769 allow the process to continue).
2770
3950dc3f
NS
2771* New architecture
2772
2773Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
2774
0ea3f30e
DJ
2775* Improved Windows host support
2776
2777GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
2778native console support, and remote communications using either
2779network sockets or serial ports.
2780
f79daebb
GM
2781* Improved Modula-2 language support
2782
2783GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
2784basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
2785pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
2786printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
2787written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
2788GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
2789
acab6ab2
MM
2790* REMOVED features
2791
2792The ARM rdi-share module.
2793
f4267320
DJ
2794The Netware NLM debug server.
2795
53e5f3cf 2796*** Changes in GDB 6.4
156a53ca 2797
e0ecbda1
MK
2798* New native configurations
2799
02a677ac 2800OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
e0ecbda1
MK
2801OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
2802
d64a6579
KB
2803* New targets
2804
2805Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
2806
b33a6190
AS
2807* New command line options
2808
2809--batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
2810--return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
2811 the child (debugged) program exited with.
2812--eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
2813 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
2814 specified multiple times and in conjunction
2815 with the --command (-x) option.
2816
11dced61
AC
2817* Deprecated commands removed
2818
2819The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
2820removed:
2821
2822 Command Replacement
2823 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
2824 othernames set arm disassembler
2825 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
2826 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
2827 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
2828 regs info registers
2829
6fe85783
MK
2830* New BSD user-level threads support
2831
2832It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
2833library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
2834configurations are:
2835
2836FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
2837FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
2838OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
2839
2840Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
2841are not yet supported.
2842
5260ca71
MS
2843* New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
2844(Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
2845
e84ecc99
AC
2846* REMOVED configurations and files
2847
2848VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
9445aa30 2849Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
9445aa30 2850National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
156a53ca 2851
31e35378
JB
2852* New "set print array-indexes" command
2853
2854After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
2855when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
2856behavior.
2857
e85e5c83
MK
2858* VAX floating point support
2859
2860GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
2861
d91e9901
AS
2862* User-defined command support
2863
2864In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
2865to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
2866section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
2867
f2cb65ca
MC
2868*** Changes in GDB 6.3:
2869
f47b1503
AS
2870* New command line option
2871
2872GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
2873debugging.
2874
f2cb65ca
MC
2875* GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
2876
2877GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
2878information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
2879by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
2880proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
2881to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
860660cb 2882
d08c0230
AC
2883* Internationalization
2884
2885When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
2886internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
2887continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
2888
117ea3cf
PH
2889* Ada
2890
2891Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
2892implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
2893into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
2894
d08c0230
AC
2895* New native configurations
2896
2897GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
2898
2899* Remote 'p' packet
2900
2901GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
2902packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
2903
2904* END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
2905
2906GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
2907The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
2908features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
2909i386 application).
2910
2911GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
2912compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
2913continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
2914configurations:
2915
2916hppa-*-hpux
2917ia64-*-aix
2918mips-*-irix*
2919*-*-lynx
2920mips-*-linux-gnu
2921sds protocol
2922xdr protocol
2923powerpc bdm protocol
2924
2925Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
2926made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
2927
2928* OBSOLETE configurations and files
2929
2930Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2931been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2932configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2933permanently REMOVED.
2934
2935h8300-*-*
2936mcore-*-*
2937mn10300-*-*
2938ns32k-*-*
2939sh64-*-*
2940v850-*-*
2941
ebb7c577
AC
2942*** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
2943
2944* MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
2945
2946When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
2947heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
2948been fixed.
2949
2950* MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
2951
2952When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
2953fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
2954IRIX long double values).
2955
2956* VAX and "next"
2957
2958A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
2959command. This problem has been fixed.
2960
860660cb 2961*** Changes in GDB 6.2:
faae5abe 2962
0dea2468
AC
2963* Fix for ``many threads''
2964
2965On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
2966rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
2967error message:
2968
2969 ptrace: No such process.
2970 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
2971
2972This problem has been fixed.
2973
2c07db7a
AC
2974* "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
2975
2976Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
2977GDB to dump core).
2978
c23968a2
JB
2979* New ``start'' command.
2980
2981This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
2982
71009278
MK
2983* New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
2984
2985Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
2986live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
2987platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
2988
2989FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
2990FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
2991NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
2992NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
2993NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
2994OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2995OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
2996OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
2997OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
2998
3c0b7db2
AC
2999* Signal trampoline code overhauled
3000
3001Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
3002These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
3003of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
3004call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
3005signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
3006
73cc75f3
AC
3007Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
3008features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
3009include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
3c0b7db2 3010
7243600a
BF
3011* Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
3012
6f606e1c
MK
3013* New native configurations
3014
97dc871c 3015GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
0e56aeaf 3016OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
bf2ca189
MK
3017OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
3018OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
d195bc9f 3019OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 3020NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
9f076e7a 3021OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 3022
a1b461bf
AC
3023* END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
3024
3025GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
3026The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
3027including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
3028migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
3029compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
3030work, was also included.
3031
3032GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
3033module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
3034
3035h8300-*-*
3036mcore-*-*
3037mn10300-*-*
3038ns32k-*-*
3039sh64-*-*
3040v850-*-*
3041xstormy16-*-*
3042
3043Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
3044made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
3045
3c7012f5
AC
3046* REMOVED configurations and files
3047
3048Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
3049Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
3050Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
3051Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
3052Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
3053AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
3054Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
3055decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
3056riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
3057sonymips mips-sony-*
3058sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
3059
e5fe55f7
AC
3060*** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
3061
3062* TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
3063
3064The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
3065GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
3066command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
3067program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
3068with GDB".
3069
3070* Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
3071
3072Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
3073libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
3074cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
3075GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
3076shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
3077the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
3078are created.
3079
3080Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
3081
3082* Fixed ISO-C build problems
3083
3084The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
3085non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
3086compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
3087
3088* Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
3089
3090Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
3091wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
3092
3093* Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
3094
3095The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
3096permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
3097systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
3098
3099* Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
3100
3101Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
3102has been updated to use constant array sizes.
3103
3104* Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
3105
3106GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
3107its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
3108panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
3109
3110* Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
3111
3112When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
3113by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
3114not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
3115
faae5abe 3116*** Changes in GDB 6.1:
f2c06f52 3117
9175c9a3
MC
3118* Removed --with-mmalloc
3119
3120Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
3121conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
3122
3cc87ec0
MK
3123* Changes in AMD64 configurations
3124
3125The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
3126the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
3127and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
3128you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
3129
f0424ef6
MK
3130* Revised SPARC target
3131
3132The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
3133FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
03cebad2
MK
3134support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
3135from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
3136(Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
f0424ef6 3137
59659be2
ILT
3138* New C++ demangler
3139
3140GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
3141names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
3142with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
3143programs.
3144
9e08b29b
DJ
3145* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
3146
3147GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
3148arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
3149encountered these.
3150
8dfe8985
DC
3151* C++ nested types and namespaces
3152
3153GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
3154improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
3155is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
3156Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
3157namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
3158"Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
3159frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
3160if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
3161GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
3162
cced5e27
MK
3163* New native configurations
3164
3165NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
27d1e716 3166OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2031c21a 3167OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
f2cab569
MK
3168OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
3169OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
cced5e27 3170
b4b4b794
KI
3171* New debugging protocols
3172
3173M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
3174
7989c619
AC
3175* "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
3176
3177The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
3178and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
3179tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
3180
5994185b
AC
3181* OBSOLETE configurations and files
3182
3183Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
3184been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
3185configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
3186permanently REMOVED.
3187
3188Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
3189Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
3190Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
3191Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
3192Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
3193AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
3194Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
0748d941
AC
3195decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
3196riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
3197sonymips mips-sony-*
3198sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
5994185b 3199
0ddabb4c
AC
3200* REMOVED configurations and files
3201
3202SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
3203SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4a8269c0
AC
3204Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
3205Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
3206H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
3207HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
3208HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
3209HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
3210PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
cf7c5c23 3211386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
4a8269c0
AC
3212Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
3213 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
3214 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f0424ef6
MK
3215SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
3216SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
4a8269c0
AC
3217Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
3218Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
0ddabb4c 3219
c7f1390e
DJ
3220*** Changes in GDB 6.0:
3221
1fe43d45
AC
3222* Objective-C
3223
3224Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
3225integrated into GDB.
3226
e6beb428
AC
3227* New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
3228
3229DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
3230information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
3231By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
3232backtraces.
3233
3234The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
3235have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
3236DWARF 2 CFI support.
3237
3238* Hosted file I/O.
3239
3240GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
3241file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
3242remote protocol documentation for details.
3243
3244* All targets using the new architecture framework.
3245
3246All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
3247architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
3248to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
3249ppc32 on ppc64).
3250
3251* GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
3252
3253GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
3254per-thread variables.
3255
3256* GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
3257
3258GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
3259GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
3260
3261* Separate debug info.
3262
3263GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
3264automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
3265of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
3266system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
3267and optional debug files.
3268
3269* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
3270
3271DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
3272describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
3273debugger.
3274
3275GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
3276for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
3277
3278* Java
3279
3280A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
3281Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
3282considered "useable".
3283
85f8f974
DJ
3284* GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
3285
3286The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
3287commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
3288kernel.
3289
0fac0b41
DJ
3290* GDB supports logging output to a file
3291
3292There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
3293used to capture GDB's output to a file.
f2c06f52 3294
6ad8ae5c
DJ
3295* The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
3296
3297The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
3298disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
3299command.
3300
e286caf2 3301* d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
5f601589
AC
3302
3303The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
3304registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
3305
d28f9cdf
DJ
3306* Profiling support
3307
3308A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
3309be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
3310session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
3311"--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
3312data, for more informative profiling results.
3313
da0f9dcd
AC
3314* Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
3315
3316The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
3317option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
b68767c1 3318"mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
da0f9dcd
AC
3319
3320Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
3321removed.
3322
fb9b6b35
JJ
3323Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
3324Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
3325Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
3326 in a subsequent -var-update.
3327
954a4db8
MK
3328* New native configurations.
3329
3330FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
3331
6760f9e6
JB
3332* Multi-arched targets.
3333
b4263afa 3334HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
85a453d5 3335Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
6760f9e6 3336
1b831c93
AC
3337* OBSOLETE configurations and files
3338
3339Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
3340been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
3341configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
3342permanently REMOVED.
3343
8b0e5691 3344Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
67f16606 3345Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
fd2299bd 3346H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
56056df7
AC
3347HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
3348HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
3349HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
78c43945 3350PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2fbce691
AC
3351Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
3352 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
3353 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f81824a9
AC
3354Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
3355Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
fd2299bd 3356
5835abe7
NC
3357* REMOVED configurations and files
3358
3359V850EA ISA
1b831c93
AC
3360Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
3361IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
3362i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
3363i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
3364i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
3365HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
3366 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
3367 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
3368Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
3369Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
3370Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
3371OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
3372I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5835abe7 3373
a094c6fb
AC
3374* MIPS $fp behavior changed
3375
3376The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
3377the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
3378context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
3379address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
3380The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
3381
299ffc64 3382*** Changes in GDB 5.3:
37057839 3383
46248966
AC
3384* GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
3385
3386When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
3387`/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
3388in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
3389library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
3390shared libs like mad''.
3391
b9d14705 3392* ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
6da02953 3393
b9d14705
DJ
3394Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
3395the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
3396arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
3397powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
6da02953 3398
e0e9281e
JB
3399* GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
3400
3401GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
3402and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
3403they expand.
3404
dd73b9bb
AC
3405The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
3406invocations in expression, and shows the result.
3407
3408The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
3409macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
3410
e0e9281e
JB
3411Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
3412information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
3413your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
3414information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
3415
2250ee0c
CV
3416* Multi-arched targets.
3417
6e3ba3b8
JT
3418DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
3419DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
2250ee0c 3420NEC V850 v850-*-*
6e3ba3b8 3421National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
a1789893
GS
3422Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
3423Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
2250ee0c 3424
cd9bfe15 3425* New targets.
e33ce519 3426
456f8b9d
DB
3427Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
3428
e33ce519 3429
da8ca43d
JT
3430* New native configurations
3431
3432Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
029923d4 3433SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
45888261 3434MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
9ce5c36a 3435UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
da8ca43d 3436
cd9bfe15
AC
3437* OBSOLETE configurations and files
3438
3439Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
3440been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
3441configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
3442permanently REMOVED.
3443
92eb23c5 3444Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
a99a9e1b 3445OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1c7cc583 3446IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
7a3085c1 3447Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
7fb623f7 3448Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
eb4c54a2 3449Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
d8ee244c
MK
3450i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
3451i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
3452i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
822e978b
AC
3453HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
3454 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
3455 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
4d210288 3456I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
92eb23c5 3457
db034ac5
AC
3458* OBSOLETE languages
3459
3460CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
3461
cd9bfe15
AC
3462* REMOVED configurations and files
3463
3464AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
3465A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
3466AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
3467AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
3468AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
3469
3470testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
3471
20f01a46
DH
3472* New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
3473
3474This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
3475commands. The default is 1024.
3476
a5941fbf
MK
3477* Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
3478
3479Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
3480
89743e04
MS
3481* New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
3482
3483These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
3484to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
3485from a file into memory (restore).
37057839 3486
9fb14e79
JB
3487* Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
3488
3489The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
3490including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
3491of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
3492
2037aebb
AC
3493*** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
3494
3495* New targets.
3496
3497Atmel AVR avr*-*-*
3498
3499* Bug fixes
3500
3501gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
3502mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
3503Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
3504
3505gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
3506dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
3507Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
3508
3509Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
3510Surprisingly enough, it works now.
3511By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
3512
3513i386 hardware watchpoint support:
3514avoid misses on second run for some targets.
3515By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
3516
37057839 3517*** Changes in GDB 5.2:
eb7cedd9 3518
1a703748
MS
3519* New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
3520
3521This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
3522really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
3523In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
3524target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
3525This can be a significant performance improvement on some
3526(notably embedded) targets.
3527
cefd4ef5
MS
3528* New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
3529
55241689
AC
3530This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
3531process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
3532GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
3533hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
cefd4ef5 3534
352ed7b4
MS
3535* New command line option
3536
3537GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
3538
3539* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
3540
3541There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
3542command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
3543a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
3544be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
3545open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
3546issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
3547a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
3548it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
3549GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
3550is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
3551
fe419ffc
RE
3552* Changes in ARM configurations.
3553
3554Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
3555configuration is fully multi-arch.
3556
eb7cedd9
MK
3557* New native configurations
3558
fe419ffc 3559ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
eb7cedd9 3560x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
55241689 3561AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
768f0842 3562Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
eb7cedd9 3563
c9f63e6b
CV
3564* New targets
3565
3566Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
3567
9b4ff276
AC
3568* OBSOLETE configurations and files
3569
3570Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
3571been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
3572configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
3573permanently REMOVED.
3574
3575AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
3576A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
3577AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
3578AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
3579AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
3580
b4ceaee6 3581testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
9b4ff276 3582
e2caac18
AC
3583* REMOVED configurations and files
3584
3585TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
7bc65f05 3586WDC 65816 w65-*-*
7768dd6c
AC
3587PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
3588PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
3589PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
5e734e1f 3590Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1406caf7
AC
3591Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
3592 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
7e24f0b1 3593SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
9b567150 3594Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
3680c638
AC
3595Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
3596ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
a752853e 3597Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
e2caac18 3598
c2a727fa
TT
3599* Changes to command line processing
3600
3601The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
3602for the inferior from gdb's command line.
3603
467d8519
TT
3604* Changes to key bindings
3605
3606There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
3607
7072a954
AC
3608*** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
3609
3610Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
3611
3612Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
3613corrupted.
3614
3615Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
3616
3617Numerous documentation fixes.
3618
3619Numerous testsuite fixes.
3620
34f47bc4 3621*** Changes in GDB 5.1:
139760b7
MK
3622
3623* New native configurations
3624
3625Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
3626x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
55241689 3627MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
e23194cb
EZ
3628MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
3629ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
55241689 3630s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
139760b7 3631
bf64bfd6
AC
3632* New targets
3633
def90278 3634Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
24be5c34 3635CRIS cris-axis
55241689 3636UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
def90278 3637
17e78a56 3638* OBSOLETE configurations and files
bf64bfd6
AC
3639
3640x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
9b9c068d 3641Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
bb19ff3b
AC
3642Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
3643 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
76f4ea53
AC
3644TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
3645WDC 65816 w65-*-*
4a1968f4 3646Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1b2b2c16
AC
3647PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
3648PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
3649PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
24f89b68 3650SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
514e603d
AC
3651Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
3652ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
d036b4d9 3653Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
bf64bfd6 3654
17e78a56
AC
3655stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
3656kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
3657
7fcca85b
AC
3658Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
3659been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
3660configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
3661permanently REMOVED.
3662
a196c81c 3663* REMOVED configurations and files
7fcca85b
AC
3664
3665Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
3666Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
3667Pyramid pyramid-*-*
3668ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
3669Tahoe tahoe-*-*
a196c81c 3670ser-ocd.c *-*-*
bf64bfd6 3671
6d6b80e5 3672* GDB has been converted to ISO C.
e23194cb 3673
6d6b80e5 3674GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
e23194cb
EZ
3675sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
3676present.
3677
bf64bfd6
AC
3678* Other news:
3679
e23194cb
EZ
3680* "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
3681
3682* The MI enabled by default.
3683
3684The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
3685revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
3686engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
3687using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
3688which is now deprecated.
3689
3690* Support for debugging Pascal programs.
3691
3692GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
3693main features are supported:
3694
3695 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
3696
3697 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
3698 extension;
3699
3700 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
3701
3702 - a Pascal expression parser.
3703
3704However, some important features are not yet supported.
3705
3706 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
3707
3708 - there are some problems with boolean types;
3709
3710 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
3711 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
3712
3713 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
3714
3715 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
3716
3717* Changes in completion.
3718
3719Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
3720to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
3721users expect at the shell prompt.
3722
3723Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
3724`breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
3725program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
3726files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
3727be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
3728considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
3729name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
3730
3731`set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
3732
3733* New platform-independent commands:
3734
3735It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
3736hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
3737documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
3738
3739* Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
3740
d7275149
MK
3741Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
3742revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
3743many threads as your system allows you to have.
3744
e23194cb
EZ
3745Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
3746
d7275149
MK
3747Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
3748multi-threaded programs though.
e23194cb
EZ
3749
3750* Changes in MIPS configurations.
bf64bfd6
AC
3751
3752Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
3753
e23194cb
EZ
3754GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
3755debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
3756supported.)
3757
3758* Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
3759
3760Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
3761breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
3762implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
3763put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
3764and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
3765registers.
3766
3767The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
3768debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
3769watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
3770
3771* Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
3772
3773New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
3774the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
3775
3776New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
3777display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
3778IDT.
3779
3780New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
3781from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
3782New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
3783a given linear address.
3784
3785GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
3786program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
3787which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
3788
3789DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
3790
6c56c069
EZ
3791It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
3792
e23194cb
EZ
3793* Changes in documentation.
3794
3795All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
3796Documentation License.
3797
3798Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
3799manual.
3800
3801TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
3802
3803Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
3804manual.
3805
3806The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
3807documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
3808hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
3809
5d6640b1
AC
3810* GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
3811
3812The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
3813``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
3814contents of this file.
3815
1a1d8446
AC
3816* gdba.el deleted
3817
3818GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
139760b7 3819
9debab2f 3820*** Changes in GDB 5.0:
7a292a7a 3821
c63ce875
EZ
3822* Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
3823
3824Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
3825programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
3826displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
3827greater level of detail.
3828
3829* Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
3830
3831It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
3832bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
3833on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
3834written.
3835
3836* Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
3837
3838The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
3839necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
3840machines ``out of the box''.
3841
3842The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
3843possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
3844signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
3845would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
3846interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
3847
3848It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
3849standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
3850even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
3851and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
3852terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
3853
3854The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
3855enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
3856also works.
3857
3858DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
3859GDB.
3860
3861It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
3862directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
3863times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
3864breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
3865
ed9a39eb
JM
3866* New native configurations
3867
3868ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
afc05dd4 3869PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
ed9a39eb 3870
7a292a7a
SS
3871* New targets
3872
96baa820 3873Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
adf40b2e
JM
3874x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
3875PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
7a292a7a
SS
3876TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
3877
085dd6e6
JM
3878* OBSOLETE configurations
3879
3880Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
3881Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
9846de1b 3882Pyramid pyramid-*-*
ed9a39eb 3883ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
104c1213 3884Tahoe tahoe-*-*
7a292a7a 3885
9debab2f
AC
3886Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
3887but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
3888these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
3889be permanently REMOVED.
3890
5330533d
SS
3891* Gould support removed
3892
3893Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
3894
bc9e5bbf
AC
3895* New features for SVR4
3896
3897On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
3898without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
3899load symbols from the running process's executable file.
3900
3901* Many C++ enhancements
3902
3903C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
3904in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
3905
adf40b2e
JM
3906* Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
3907
3908A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
3909sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
3910with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
3911``|<program> <args>'' vis:
3912
3913 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
3914 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
3915
43e526b9
JM
3916* MIPS 64 remote protocol
3917
3918A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
3919expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
3920instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
3921
3922The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
3923added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
3924
96baa820
JM
3925* ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
3926
3927The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
3928``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
3929include ``set remote P-packet''.
3930
11cf8741
JM
3931* Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
3932
3933The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
3934accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
3935``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
3936
7876dd43
DB
3937* ``apropos'' command added.
3938
3939The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
3940documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
3941try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
3942
bc9e5bbf
AC
3943* New MI interface
3944
3945A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
3946interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
7162c0ca
EZ
3947process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
3948"GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
3949enabled by configuring with:
bc9e5bbf
AC
3950
3951 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
3952
c906108c
SS
3953*** Changes in GDB-4.18:
3954
3955* New native configurations
3956
3957HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
3958HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
55241689 3959M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
c906108c
SS
3960
3961* New targets
3962
3963Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
3964Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
3965Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
3966
3967* OBSOLETE configurations
3968
3969Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
3970
3971Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
3972but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
3973these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
3974be permanently REMOVED.
3975
3976* ANSI/ISO C
3977
3978As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
3979buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
3980containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
3981use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
3982available. If this is not true, please report the affected
3983configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
3984information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
3985already.
3986
3987* Readline 2.2
3988
3989GDB now uses readline 2.2.
3990
3991* set extension-language
3992
3993You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
3994languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
3995you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
3996 set extension-language .c c++
3997The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
3998and their associated languages.
3999
4000* Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
4001
4002When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
4003you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
4004PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
4005
4006 set processor NAME
4007
4008sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
4009following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
4010
4011 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
4012 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
4013 403 IBM PowerPC 403
4014 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
4015 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
4016 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
4017 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
4018 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
4019 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
4020 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
4021 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
4022
4023At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
4024special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
4025registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
4026only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
4027
4028* HP-UX support
4029
4030Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
4031more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
4032library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
4033support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
4034for xdb and dbx commands.
4035
4036* Catchpoints
4037
4038HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
4039generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
4040to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
4041
4042This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
4043argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
4044output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
4045
4046* Debugging across forks
4047
4048On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
4049in the inferior.
4050
4051* TUI
4052
4053HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
4054it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
4055configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
4056
4057* GDB remote protocol additions
4058
4059A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
4060Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
4061fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
4062allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
4063
4064For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
4065full 64-bit address. The command
4066
4067 set remoteaddresssize 32
4068
4069can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
4070the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
4071will be discarded.
4072
4073In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
4074command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
4075
4076 maint packet heythere
4077
4078sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
4079disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
4080time.
4081
4082The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
4083target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
4084downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
4085
4086* Tracing can collect general expressions
4087
4088You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
4089further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
4090doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
4091
4092* mask-address variable for Mips
4093
4094For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
4095a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
4096of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
4097
4098* Higher serial baud rates
4099
4100GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
4101230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
4102to achieve all of these rates.)
4103
4104* i960 simulator
4105
4106The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
4107builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
4108
4109
4110*** Changes in GDB-4.17:
4111
4112* New native configurations
4113
4114Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
4115Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
4116Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
4117PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
4118PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
4119Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
4120Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
4121
4122* New targets
4123
4124Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
4125Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
4126Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
4127Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
4128MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
4129MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
4130MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
4131Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
4132Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
4133Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
4134NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
4135
4136* New debugging protocols
4137
4138ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
4139M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
4140DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
4141PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
4142PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
4143Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
4144
4145* DWARF 2
4146
4147All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
4148format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
4149information.
4150
4151* Java frontend
4152
4153GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
4154only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
4155
4156* solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
4157
4158For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
4159loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
4160locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
4161
4162* Live range splitting
4163
4164GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
4165range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
4166more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
4167
4168* Hurd support
4169
4170GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
4171updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
4172
4173* ARM Thumb support
4174
4175GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
4176instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
4177instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
4178accordingly.
4179
4180* MIPS16 support
4181
4182GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
4183instruction set.
4184
4185* Overlay support
4186
4187GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
4188linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
4189will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
4190control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
4191additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
4192in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
4193
4194* info symbol
4195
4196The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
4197the symbol at the specified address.
4198
4199* Trace support
4200
4201The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
4202asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
4203extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
4204includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
4205file tracepoint.c for more details.
4206
4207* MIPS simulator
4208
4209Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
4210by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
4211of most MIPS variants.
4212
4213* Sparc simulator
4214
4215Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
4216by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
4217Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
4218
4219* set architecture
4220
4221For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
4222basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
4223architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
4224the possible architectures.
4225
4226*** Changes in GDB-4.16:
4227
4228* New native configurations
4229
4230Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
4231M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
4232PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
4233PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
4234PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
4235RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
4236
4237* New targets
4238
4239ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
4240I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
4241MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
4242MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
4243PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
4244Hitachi SH3 sh-*-*
4245Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
4246
4247* PowerPC simulator
4248
4249The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
4250contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
4251PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
4252basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
4253performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
4254
4255* Solaris 2.5
4256
4257GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
4258
4259* Windows 95/NT native
4260
4261GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
4262To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
4263which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
4264Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
4265ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
4266
4267* dont-repeat command
4268
4269If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
4270command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
4271useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
4272extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
4273
4274* Send break instead of ^C
4275
4276The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
4277rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
4278GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
4279
4280* Remote protocol timeout
4281
4282The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
4283that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
4284to read from the target. The default value is 2.
4285
4286* Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
4287
4288By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
4289loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
4290stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
4291when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
4292in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
4293
4294Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
4295/usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
4296automatically on hpux10.
4297
4298* Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
4299
4300Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
4301
4302* Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
4303
4304When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
4305may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
4306the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
4307every character. The default value is 1050.
4308
4309* Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
4310
4311If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
4312a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
4313replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
4314details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
4315remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
4316to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
4317
4318* Speedups for remote debugging
4319
4320GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
4321the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
4322and more efficient S-record downloading.
4323
4324* Memory use reductions and statistics collection
4325
4326GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
4327Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
4328
4329*** Changes in GDB-4.15:
4330
4331* Psymtabs for XCOFF
4332
4333The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
4334can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
4335
4336* Remote targets use caching
4337
4338Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
4339remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
4340it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
4341debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
4342off' turns the the data cache off.
4343
4344* Remote targets may have threads
4345
4346The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
4347in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
4348gdb/remote.c for details.
4349
4350* NetROM support
4351
4352If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
4353support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
4354acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
4355write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
4356support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
4357another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
4358sequence is something like
4359
4360 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
4361 load <prog>
4362 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
4363
4364* Macintosh host
4365
4366GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
4367may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
4368it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
4369available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
4370device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
4371directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
4372scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
4373mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
4374
4375* Autoconf
4376
4377GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
4378but does simplify configuration and building.
4379
4380* hpux10
4381
4382GDB now supports hpux10.
4383
4384*** Changes in GDB-4.14:
4385
4386* New native configurations
4387
4388x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
4389x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
4390NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
4391Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
4392
4393* New targets
4394
4395A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
4396HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
4397CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
4398PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
4399WDC 65816 w65-*-*
4400
4401* Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
4402
4403GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
4404possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
4405filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
4406the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
4407if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
4408
4409* Arguments to user-defined commands
4410
4411User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
4412Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
4413trivial example:
4414define adder
4415 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
4416
4417To execute the command use:
4418adder 1 2 3
4419
4420Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
4421Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
4422use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
4423
4424* New `if' and `while' commands
4425
4426This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
4427commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
4428expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
4429execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
4430terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
4431`else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
4432if the expression is zero.
4433
4434* Fortran source language mode
4435
4436GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
4437Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
4438variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
4439with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
4440Fortran compilers.
4441
4442* Better HPUX support
4443
4444Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
4445running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
4446processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
4447for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
4448that behavior do the following before running the program:
4449
4450 adb -w a.out
4451 __dld_flags?W 0x5
4452 control-d
4453
4454This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
4455To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
4456
4457 adb -w a.out
4458 __dld_flags?W 0x4
4459 control-d
4460
4461You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
4462the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
4463external linkage.
4464
4465GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
4466HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
4467
4468* Target byte order now dynamically selectable
4469
4470You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
4471commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
4472current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
4473"set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
4474associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
4475configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
4476
4477* New DOS host serial code
4478
4479This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
4480no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
4481a PC's serial port.
4482
4483*** Changes in GDB-4.13:
4484
4485* New "complete" command
4486
4487This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
4488were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
4489
4490* Trailing space optional in prompt
4491
4492"set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
4493allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
4494
4495* Breakpoint hit counts
4496
4497"info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
4498has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
4499can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
4500to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
4501less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
4502that breakpoint.
4503
4504* Ability to stop printing at NULL character
4505
4506"set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
4507an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
4508arrays actually contain only short strings.
4509
4510* Shared library breakpoints
4511
4512In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
4513breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
4514
4515* Hardware watchpoints
4516
4517There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
4518targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
4519
55241689 4520Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
c906108c
SS
4521
4522* Annotations
4523
4524Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
4525and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
4526
4527* Improved Irix 5 support
4528
4529GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
4530
4531* Improved HPPA support
4532
4533GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
4534
4535* New native configurations
4536
4537Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
4538HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
4539Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
4540RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
4541
4542* New targets
4543
4544OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
4545MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
4546Sparc64 sparc64-*-*
4547
4548* Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
4549
4550There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
4551This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
4552
4553* Fixes
4554
4555As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
4556and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
4557
4558*** Changes in GDB-4.12:
4559
4560* Irix 5 is now supported
4561
4562* HPPA support
4563
4564GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
4565to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
4566GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
4567of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
4568can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
4569
4570
4571*** Changes in GDB-4.11:
4572
4573* User visible changes:
4574
4575* Remote Debugging
4576
4577The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
4578target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
4579debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
4580integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
4581debugging info for the mips target).
4582
4583* DEC Alpha native support
4584
4585GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
4586debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
4587work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
4588Alpha-specific notes.
4589
4590* Preliminary thread implementation
4591
4592GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
4593
4594* LynxOS native and target support for 386
4595
4596This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
4597to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
4598for details).
4599
4600* Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
4601
4602This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
4603mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
4604call methods, ...etc.
4605
4606*** Changes in GDB-4.10:
4607
4608 * User visible changes:
4609
4610Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
4611supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
4612other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
4613somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
4614
4615Filename completion now works.
4616
4617When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
4618arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
4619addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
4620
4621All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
4622vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
4623should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
4624your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
4625to be on the far side of a thin network line.
4626
4627 * DEC alpha support
4628
4629This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
4630cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
4631
4632
4633*** Changes in GDB-4.9:
4634
4635 * Testsuite
4636
4637This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
4638The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
4639via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
4640
4641 * C++ demangling
4642
4643'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
4644emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
4645Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
4646disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
4647use gdb with AT&T cfront.
4648
4649 * Simulators
4650
4651GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
4652So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
4653Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
4654
4655 * New targets supported
4656
4657H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
4658H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
4659SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
4660Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
4661IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
4662
4663Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
4664version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
4665GO32 memory extender.
4666
4667 * New remote protocols
4668
4669MIPS remote debugging protocol.
4670
4671 * New source languages supported
4672
4673This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
4674used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
4675into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
4676
4677
4678*** Changes in GDB-4.8:
4679
4680 * HP Precision Architecture supported
4681
4682GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
4683version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
4684University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
4685compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
4686format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
4687(as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
4688
4689Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
4690
4691 * Faster and better demangling
4692
4693We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
4694demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
4695character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
4696only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
4697This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
4698increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
4699symbol lookups.
4700
4701`Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
4702from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
4703compiler does not actually implement.
4704
4705 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
4706
4707In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
4708inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
4709recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
4710very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
4711The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
4712circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
4713fix.
4714
4715The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
4716release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
4717
4718 * Improved configure script
4719
4720The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
4721you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
4722host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
4723done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
4724
4725We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
4726version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
4727`--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
4728The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
4729only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
4730We hope to make this the default in a future release.
4731
4732 * Documentation improvements
4733
4734There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
4735produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
4736before submitting changes.
4737
4738The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
4739M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
4740`info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
4741you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
4742a future texinfo-X.Y release.
4743
4744*NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
4745We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
4746been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
4747or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
4748`texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
4749around this problem.
4750
4751 * New features
4752
4753GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
4754the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
4755`print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
4756the target program.
4757
4758The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
4759how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
4760
4761 * New native hosts supported
4762
4763HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
4764386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
4765
4766 * New targets supported
4767
4768AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
4769
4770 * New file formats supported
4771
4772BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
4773HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
4774
4775 * Major bug fixes
4776
4777Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
4778
4779We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
4780printf_filtered("%s") problems.
4781
4782We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
4783for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
4784release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
4785
4786You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
4787will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
4788
4789We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
4790for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
4791especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
4792libraries.
4793
4794The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
4795information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
4796command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
4797any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
4798when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
4799
4800 * Internal improvements
4801
4802GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
4803debugging of multiple languages in the future.
4804
4805GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
4806Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
4807symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
4808contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
4809shared code that handles any of them.
4810
4811 * New command line options
4812
4813We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
4814
4815 * Mmalloc licensing
4816
4817The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
4818General Public License.
4819
4820*** Changes in GDB-4.7:
4821
4822 * Host/native/target split
4823
4824GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
4825hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
4826target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
4827local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
4828ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
4829
4830The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
4831GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
4832is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
4833code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
4834any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
4835built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
4836handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
4837
4838GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
4839It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
4840plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
4841
4842 * New hosts supported
4843
4844HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
4845386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
4846386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
4847
4848 * New targets supported
4849
4850Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
485168030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
4852
4853 * New native hosts supported
4854
4855386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
4856 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
4857386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
4858
4859 * New file formats supported
4860
4861BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
4862supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
4863format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
4864
4865 * New commands
4866
4867`show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
4868`show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
4869These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
4870
4871`info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
4872
4873You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
4874scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
4875prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
4876executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
4877
4878 * C++ improvements
4879
4880We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
4881info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
4882symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
4883
4884Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
4885
4886 * Major bug fixes
4887
4888The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
4889fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
4890by the compiler.
4891
4892We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
4893support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
4894
4895John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
4896slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
4897that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
4898purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
4899the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
4900mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
4901
4902Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
4903about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
4904completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
4905we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
4906
4907 * AMD 29k support
4908
4909A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
4910specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
4911calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
4912usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
4913in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
4914
4915We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
4916Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
4917of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
4918resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
4919
4920 * Remote interfaces
4921
4922We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
4923with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
4924message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
4925This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
4926needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
4927breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
4928each instruction being stepped through.
4929
4930The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
4931registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
4932
4933There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
4934find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
4935Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
4936processor with a serial port.
4937
4938 * Configuration
4939
4940Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
4941`table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
4942supported, and what files each one uses.
4943
4944 * Library changes
4945
4946There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
4947disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
4948Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
4949disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
4950
4951The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
4952Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
4953can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
4954grants all the rights from the General Public License.
4955
4956 * Documentation
4957
4958The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
4959reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
4960as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
4961encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
4962system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
4963bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
4964
4965And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
4966
4967
4968*** Changes in GDB-4.6:
4969
4970 * Better support for C++ function names
4971
4972GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
4973names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
4974(using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
4975single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
4976Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
4977
4978GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
4979the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
4980You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
4981lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
4982for the list of formats.
4983
4984 * G++ symbol mangling problem
4985
4986Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
4987C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
4988directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
4989can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
4990usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
4991about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
4992this problem.)
4993
4994 * New 'maintenance' command
4995
4996All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
4997the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
4998can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
4999
5000 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
5001 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
5002 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
5003 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
5004 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
5005 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
5006
5007The following commands are new:
5008
5009 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
5010 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
5011 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
5012
5013 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
5014
5015We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
5016(e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
5017be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
5018read after argv processing.
5019
5020 * New hosts supported
5021
5022Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
5023
55241689 5024GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
c906108c
SS
5025
5026We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
5027is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
5028for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
5029masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
5030fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
5031It costs extra.
5032
5033 * New targets supported
5034
5035Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
5036
5037 * More smarts about finding #include files
5038
5039GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
5040all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
5041greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
5042especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
5043the one that contains your sources.
5044
5045We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
5046breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
5047try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
5048
5049 * Interesting infernals change
5050
5051GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
5052section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
5053target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
5054stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
5055
5056 * Bug fixes (of course!)
5057
5058There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
5059 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
5060 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
5061
5062See the ChangeLog for details.
5063
5064*** Changes in GDB-4.5:
5065
5066 * New machines supported (host and target)
5067
5068IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
5069
5070SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
5071
5072 * New malloc package
5073
5074GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
5075Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
5076capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
5077This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
5078pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
5079more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
5080
5081 * info proc
5082
5083The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
5084'help info proc' for details.
5085
5086 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
5087
5088The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
5089Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
5090possible.
5091
5092 * File name changes for MS-DOS
5093
5094Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
5095support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
5096conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
5097environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
5098that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
5099in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
5100
5101 * Cross byte order fixes
5102
5103Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
5104targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
5105
5106 * New -mapped and -readnow options
5107
5108If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
5109system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
5110`symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
5111program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
5112called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
5113Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
5114and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
5115the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
5116option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
5117starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
5118
5119You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
5120the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
5121information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
5122slower, but makes future operations faster.
5123
5124The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
5125build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
5126A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
5127use is:
5128
5129 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
5130
5131The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
5132It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
5133shared across multiple host platforms.
5134
5135 * longjmp() handling
5136
5137GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
5138siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
5139all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
5140platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
5141
5142 * Solaris 2.0
5143
5144Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
5145this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
5146reading symbols.
5147
5148 * Bug fixes
5149
5150As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
5151People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
5152crashes and trashed symbol tables.
5153
5154*** Changes in GDB-4.4:
5155
5156 * New machines supported (host and target)
5157
5158SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
5159 (except core files)
5160BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
5161Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
5162
5163 * New machines supported (target)
5164
5165AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
5166
5167 * C++ support
5168
5169GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
5170The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
5171per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
5172
5173GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
5174`ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
5175extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
5176good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
5177will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
5178released.
5179
5180 * New features for SVR4
5181
5182GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
5183shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
5184only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
5185
5186The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
5187on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
5188it prints the address mappings of the process.
5189
5190If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
5191bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
5192
5193 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
5194
5195Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
5196now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
5197skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
5198make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
5199same code linked statically.
5200
5201 * New Getopt
5202
5203GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
5204version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
5205continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
5206Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
5207added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
5208future by other options that begin with the same letter.
5209
5210 * Bugs fixed
5211
5212The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
5213Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
5214See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
5215
5216
5217*** Changes in GDB-4.3:
5218
5219 * New machines supported (host and target)
5220
5221Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
5222NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
5223Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
5224
5225 * Almost SCO Unix support
5226
5227We had hoped to support:
5228SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
5229(except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
5230that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
5231about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
5232
5233 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
5234
5235GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
5236debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
5237is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
5238send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
5239reqired (if any).
5240
5241 * New Readline
5242
5243GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
5244is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
5245required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
5246
5247 * Bugs fixed
5248
5249The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
5250Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
5251See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
5252
5253 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
5254
5255GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
5256supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
5257symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
5258
5259Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
5260mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
5261debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
5262mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
5263version 2.
5264
5265Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
5266really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
5267line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
5268variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
5269situation somewhat.
5270
5271When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
5272However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
5273methods.
5274
5275We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
5276DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
5277encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
5278
5279
5280*** Changes in GDB-4.2:
5281
5282 * Improved configuration
5283
5284Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
5285Porting BFD is simpler.
5286
5287 * Stepping improved
5288
5289The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
5290of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
5291in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
5292function that has debugging information is called within the line.
5293
5294 * Bug fixing
5295
5296Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
5297
5298 * New host supported (not target)
5299
5300Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
5301
5302
5303*** Changes in GDB-4.1:
5304
5305 * Multiple source language support
5306
5307GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
5308It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
5309and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
5310language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
5311You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
5312`set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
5313
5314 * GDB and Modula-2
5315
5316GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
5317currently under development at the State University of New York at
5318Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
5319continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
5320
5321Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
5322debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
5323symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
5324
5325There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
5326in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
5327
5328 * set write on/off
5329
5330GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
5331a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
5332the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
5333by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
5334effect immediately.
5335
5336 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
5337
5338When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
5339shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
5340The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
5341examining core files.
5342
5343 * set listsize
5344
5345You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
5346The default is 10.
5347
5348 * New machines supported (host and target)
5349
5350SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
5351Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
5352Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
5353
5354 * New hosts supported (not targets)
5355
5356IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
5357
5358 * New targets supported (not hosts)
5359
5360AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
5361AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
5362Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
5363
5364 * New remote interfaces
5365
5366AMD 29000 Adapt
5367AMD 29000 Minimon
5368
5369
5370*** Changes in GDB-4.0:
5371
5372 * New Facilities
5373
5374Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
5375
5376Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
5377target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
5378is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
5379remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
5380remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
5381also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
5382using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
5383stub on the target system.
5384
5385New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
5386
5387GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
5388library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
5389object file types such as a.out and coff.
5390
5391There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
5392refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
5393
5394
5395 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
5396
5397All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
5398by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
5399
5400For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
5401``Show prompt'' produces the response:
5402Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
5403
5404What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
5405print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
5406will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
5407all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
5408
5409confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
5410 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
5411 it is already running. Default is ON.
5412
5413editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
5414 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
5415 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
5416 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
5417 Default is ON.
5418
5419history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
5420 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
5421 or the value of the environment variable
5422 GDBHISTFILE.
5423
5424history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
5425 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
5426 HISTSIZE.
5427
5428history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
5429 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
5430 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
5431
5432history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
5433 history expansion will be performed on
5434 command line input. The default is OFF.
5435
5436radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
5437 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
5438 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
5439
5440height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
5441 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
5442 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
5443 variable TERM.
5444
5445width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
5446 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
5447 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
5448 variable TERM.
5449
5450Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
5451``set width'' instead.
5452
5453print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
5454 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
5455 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
5456 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
5457
5458print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
5459 is OFF.
5460
5461print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
5462 "raw" form if off.
5463
5464print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
5465 like instructions.
5466
5467print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
5468
5469
5470 * Support for Epoch Environment.
5471
5472The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
5473new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
5474are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
5475window.
5476
5477
5478 * Support for Shared Libraries
5479
5480GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
5481Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
5482before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
5483happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
5484At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
5485from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
5486shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
5487It can be abbreviated ``share''.
5488
5489sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
5490 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
5491 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
5492
5493info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
5494
5495
5496 * Watchpoints
5497
5498A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
5499expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
5500tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
5501quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
5502problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
5503more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
5504
5505watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
5506
5507info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
5508
5509delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
5510disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
5511enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
5512
5513
5514 * C++ multiple inheritance
5515
5516When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
5517for C++ programs.
5518
5519 * C++ exception handling
5520
5521Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
5522ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
5523the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
5524handler's context).
5525
5526catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
5527 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
5528 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
5529
5530info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
5531 current stack frame.
5532
5533
5534 * Minor command changes
5535
5536The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
5537command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
5538is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
5539
5540The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
5541at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
5542frames without printing.
5543
5544 * New directory command
5545
5546'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
5547The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
5548about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
5549with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
5550find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
5551
5552 * Configuring GDB for compilation
5553
5554For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
5555for more details.
5556
5557GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
5558two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
5559Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
5560where the program that you are debugging will run.
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