binutils/NEWS

   1 -*- text -*-
   2 Changes in 2.18:
   3
   4 * The binutils sources are now released under version 3 of the GNU General
   5   Public License.
   6
   7 * A new tool "windmc" has been added for some targets.  This is a message
   8   compiler which attempts to be compatible with the MS version.
   9
  10 * Add codepage support to the windres tool.  It now supports many new
  11   resource types (e.g. MANIFEST, TOOLBAR, etc).  The output generation
  12   for binary files is done now via bfd itself.  The endianess problems
  13   for different hosts are solved.  Dumps of .res files can now be
  14   re-compiled by windres without lossing resources or compilation errors.
  15   Some problems on dialog resource translations are corrected.
  16
  17 * Add --extract-symbol command line option to objcopy, which will
  18   strip everything out of an ordinary object file or executable except
  19   for its symbol table.  Files containing just symbols can be useful
  20   to some OSes.
  21
  22 Changes in 2.17:
  23
  24 * Add "-x NAME" to readelf in addition to "-x NUMBER".
  25
  26 * Add -i and -t switches to cxxfilt.  -i disables the display of implementation
  27   specific extra demangling information (if any) and -t disables the demangling
  28   of types.
  29
  30 * Add support for the "@<file>" syntax to the command lines of all tools, so
  31   that extra switches can be read from <file>.
  32
  33 * Add "-W/--dwarf" to objdump to display the contents of the DWARF
  34   debug sections.
  35
  36 * Add "-t/--section-details" to readelf to display section details.
  37   "-N/--full-section-name" is deprecated.
  38
  39 * powerpc-linux ld now supports a variant form of PLT and GOT for the security
  40   conscious.  This form will automatically be chosen when ld detects that all
  41   code in regular object files was generated by gcc -msecure-plt.  The old PLT
  42   and GOT may be forced by a new ld option, --bss-plt.
  43
  44 * Add "-i/--inlines" to addr2line to print enclosing scope information
  45   for inlined function chains, back to first non-inlined function.
  46
  47 * Add "-N/--full-section-name" to readelf to display full section name.
  48
  49 * Add "-M entry:<addr>" switch to objdump to specify a function entry address
  50   when disassembling VAX binaries.
  51
  52 * Add "--globalize-symbol <name>" and "--globalize-symbols <filename>" switches
  53   to objcopy to convert local symbols into global symbols.
  54
  55 * gprof now allows input files to have histogram records for
  56   several memory ranges, provided those ranges are disjoint.
  57
  58 Changes in 2.16:
  59
  60 * Add "-g/--section-groups" to readelf to display section groups.
  61
  62 * objcopy recognizes two new options --strip-unneeded-symbol and
  63   --strip-unneeded-symbols, namely for use together with the wildcard
  64   matching the original --strip-symbol/--strip-symbols provided, but
  65   retaining any symbols matching but needed by relocations.
  66
  67 * readelf can now display address ranges from .debug_range sections.  This
  68   happens automatically when a DW_AT_range attribute is encountered.  The
  69   command line switch --debug-dump=Ranges (or -wR) can also be used to display
  70   the contents of the .debug_range section.
  71
  72 * nm and objdump now have a switch "--special-syms" to enable the displaying of
  73   symbols which the target considers to be special.  By default these symbols
  74   are no longer displayed.  Currently the only special symbols are the Mapping
  75   symbols used by the ARM port to mark transitions between text and data and
  76   between ARM and THUMB code.
  77
  78 * dlltool has a switch "--ext-prefix-alias <prefix>" to generate additional
  79   import and export symbols with <preifx> prepended to them.
  80
  81 Changes in 2.15:
  82
  83 * objcopy for MIPS targets now accepts "-M no-aliases" as an option to the
  84   disassembler to print the "raw" mips instruction mnemonic instead of some
  85   pseudo instruction name.  I.E. print "daddu" or "or" instead of "move",
  86   "sll" instead of "nop", etc.
  87
  88 * objcopy and strip can now take wildcard patterns in symbol names specified on
  89   the command line provided that the --wildcard switch is used to enable them.
  90
  91 * readelf can now parse archives.
  92
  93 * objdump now accepts --debugging-tags to print the debug information in a
  94   format compatible with ctags tool.
  95
  96 * objcopy and strip now accept --only-keep-debug to create a file containing
  97   those sections that would be stripped out by --strip-debug.  The idea is that
  98   this can be used in conjunction with the --add-gnu-debuglink switch to create
  99   a two part program distribution - one a stripped executable and the other the
 100   debugging info.
 101
 102 * objcopy now accepts --add-gnu-debuglink=<file> to insert a .gnu_debuglink
 103   section into a (presumably stripped) executable.  This allows the debug
 104   information for the file to be held in a separate file.
 105
 106 * BFD marks the sections .comment and .note as 'n' in the BSD/POSIX
 107   single-character representation.  This can be checked by running nm
 108   with the -a switch.
 109
 110 Changes in 2.14:
 111
 112 * Added --info switch to objcopy and strip.
 113
 114 * Support for Vitesse IQ2000 added by Red Hat.
 115
 116 * Added 'S' encoding to strings to allow the display of 8-bit characters.
 117
 118 * Added --prefix-symbols=<text>, --prefix-sections=<text> and
 119   --prefix-alloc-sections=<text> to objcopy.
 120
 121 * readelf can handle the extensions to the DWARF2 spec used by the Unified
 122   Parallel C compiler.
 123
 124 * BFD no longer declares a "boolean" type, to avoid clashes with other
 125   headers that declare the same.  Users of BFD should replace boolean,
 126   false and true, with int, 0 and 1, or define their own boolean type.
 127
 128 * Support for IP2K added by Denis Chertykov.
 129
 130 Changes in 2.13:
 131
 132 * Support for the Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat. Models for FR400
 133   and FR500 included.
 134
 135 Changes in version 2.12:
 136
 137 * Support for Don Knuth's MMIX, by Hans-Peter Nilsson.
 138
 139 * size: Add --totals to display summary of sizes (Berkeley format only).
 140
 141 * readelf: Add --wide option to not break section header or segment listing
 142   lines to fit into 80 columns.
 143
 144 * strings: Add --encoding to display wide character strings.  By Markus Kuhn.
 145
 146 * objcopy: Add --rename-section to change section names.
 147
 148 * readelf: Support added for DWARF 2.1 extensions.  Support added for
 149   displaying the contents of .debug.macinfo sections.
 150
 151 * New command line switches added to objcopy to allow symbols to be kept as
 152   global symbols, and also to specify files containing lists of such symbols.
 153   by Honda Hiroki.
 154
 155 * Support for OpenRISC by Johan Rydberg.
 156
 157 * New command line switch to objcopy --alt-machine-code which creates a binary
 158   with an alternate machine code if one is defined in the architecture
 159   description.  Only supported for ELF targets.  By Alexandre Oliva.
 160
 161 * New command line switch to objcopy -B (or --binary-architecture) which sets
 162   the architecture of the output file to the given argument.  This option only
 163   makes sense, if the input target is binary.  Otherwise it is ignored.
 164   By Stefan Geuken.
 165
 166 * Support for PDP-11 by Lars Brinkhoff.
 167
 168 Changes in binutils 2.11:
 169
 170 * Add support for ARM v5t and v5te architectures and Intel's XScale ARM
 171   extenstions.
 172
 173 * Add --srec-len and --srec-forceS3 command line switch to objcopy.
 174   By Luciano Gemme.
 175
 176 * Support for the MIPS32, by Anders Norlander.
 177
 178 * Support for the i860, by Jason Eckhardt.
 179
 180 * Support for CRIS (Axis Communications ETRAX series).
 181
 182 Changes in binutils 2.10:
 183
 184 * Support for 64-bit ELF on HPPA.
 185
 186 * New command line switch to objdump --file-start-context which shows the
 187   entire file contents up to the source line first encountered for a given
 188   file.
 189
 190 * New command line switch to objdump -M (or --disassembler-options) which takes
 191   a parameter which can then be interpreted on a per-target basis by the
 192   disassembler.  Used by ARM targets to select register name sets, ISA, APCS or
 193   raw verions.
 194
 195 * objdump support for -mi386:intel which causes disassembly to be displayed
 196   with intel syntax.
 197
 198 * New program: readelf.  This displays the contents of ELF format files,
 199   regardless of target machine.
 200
 201 * objcopy now takes --change-section-lma, --change-section-vma, and
 202   --change-section-address options.  The old --adjust-section-vma option is
 203   equivalent to --change-section-address.  The other --adjust-* options are now
 204   renamed to --change-*, although --adjust-* continues to work.
 205
 206 * objcopy has a --redefine-sym option that lets you rename symbols.
 207
 208 * objcopy now takes a -j/--only-section option to copy only the specified
 209   sections.
 210
 211 * dlltool now supports the IMPORTS command.
 212
 213 * dlltool now takes --export-all-symbols, --no-export-all-symbols,
 214   --exclude-symbols, and --no-default-excludes options.
 215
 216 Changes in binutils 2.9:
 217
 218 * Added windres program, which can be used to manipulate resources in WIN32
 219   files as used on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
 220
 221 * The objcopy --gap-fill and --pad-to options operate on the LMA rather than
 222   the VMA of the sections.
 223
 224 * Added S modifier to ar to not build a symbol table.
 225
 226 Changes in binutils 2.8:
 227
 228 * The objdump disassembly format has been changed, and hopefully improved.  Use
 229   the new --prefix-addresses option to get the old format.  There are also new
 230   --disassemble-zeroes and --no-show-raw-insn options which affect disassembler
 231   output.
 232
 233 * Formats may now be specified as configuration triplets.  For example,
 234   objdump -b i386-pc-linux.  The triplets are not passed through config.sub,
 235   so they must be in canonical form.
 236
 237 * Added new addr2line program.  This uses the debugging information to convert
 238   an address into a file name and line number within a program.
 239
 240 * Added --change-leading-char argument to objcopy.
 241
 242 * Added --weaken argument to objcopy.
 243
 244 * objdump --dynamic-reloc now works on ELF executables and shared libraries.
 245
 246 * Added --adjust-vma option to objdump.
 247
 248 * Added -C/--demangle option to objdump.
 249
 250 * Added -p/--preserve-dates option to strip and objcopy.
 251
 252 Changes in binutils 2.7:
 253
 254 * Added --enable-shared and --enable-commonbfdlib options to configure.
 255
 256 * Added --debugging argument to objdump and objcopy.
 257
 258 * Added --defined-only argument to nm.
 259
 260 * Added --remove-leading-char argument to objcopy.
 261
 262 * The objdump --line-numbers option is now meaningful with --reloc.
 263
 264 * Added --line-numbers option to nm.
 265
 266 * Added --endian/-EB/-EL option to objdump.
 267
 268 * Added support for Alpha OpenVMS/AXP.
 269
 270 Changes in binutils 2.6:
 271
 272 * Added -N/--strip-symbol and -K/--keep-symbol arguments to strip and objcopy.
 273
 274 * Added several arguments to objcopy to provide some control over how the new
 275   file is laid out in memory.  Also added binary output format to BFD to permit
 276   generating plain binary files.
 277
 278 * Added --start-address and --stop-address options to objdump.
 279
 280 * ar and ranlib now work on AIX.  The tools are now built by default on AIX.
 281
 282 Changes in binutils 2.5:
 283
 284 * Changed objdump -dr to dump the relocs interspersed with the assembly
 285   listing, for a more useful listing of relocatable files.
 286
 287 * Changed objdump -d/--disassemble to only disassemble SEC_CODE sections.
 288   Added -D/--disassemble-all option to disassemble all sections.
 289
 290 * Added --size-sort option to nm.
 291
 292 * strip and objcopy should now be able to handle dynamically linked ELF
 293   executables.
 294
 295 Changes in binutils 2.4:
 296
 297 * Support for HP-PA (by Jeff Law), i386 Mach (by David Mackenzie), RS/6000 and
 298   PowerPC (except ar and ranlib; by Ian Taylor).
 299
 300 * Support for Irix 5.
 301
 302 * Programs `strip' and `objcopy' will not attempt to write dynamically linked
 303   ELF output files, since BFD currently can't create them properly.
 304
 305 Changes in binutils 2.3:
 306
 307 * A new --stabs argument has been added to objdump to dump stabs sections in
 308   ELF and COFF files.
 309
 310 * A new program, nlmconv, has been added.  It can convert object files into
 311   Novell NetWare Loadable Modules.
 312
 313 * The strings program has been added.
 314
 315 Changes in binutils 2.2:
 316
 317 * The 'copy' program has been renamed to 'objcopy', for consistency with
 318   'objdump', and because 'copy' might more plausibly be used as a synonym for
 319   'cp'.
 320
 321 * The new stand-alone program c++filt is a filter that converts encoded
 322   (mangled) C++ assembly-level identifiers to user-level names.  (Note: This
 323   may get moved to the gcc distribution.)
 324
 325 * nm -o on an archive now prefixes each line with the archive name, matching
 326   the output from BSD nm.
 327
 328 * ar (and ld) can now read (but not write) BSD4.4-style archives.
 329
 330 * New support for H8500, Z8000, and the Hitach SH.
 331
 332 * Dis-assembler interface changed to allow sharing with gdb.
 333
 334 * There is new Elf code, but it is not yet ready for general use.
 335
 336 * There is the beginnings of a test suite.
 337
 338 Changes in binutils 2.1:
 339
 340 * There is now support for writing ECOFF files, so ld and the other utilities
 341   should work on Risc/Ultrix and Irix.  Please let us know how well this works.
 342
 343 * ar now automatically creates a symbol table (a __.SYMDEF member, in the BSD
 344   version), if there are any object files in the archive.  So running ranlib is
 345   now redundant (unless the non-standard q command is used).  This is required
 346   for Posix.2 conformance.
 347
 348 * The archive-reading code now reads both BSD-style and SYSV-style archives
 349   independently of the selected target format.  This is to encourage people to
 350   switch to SYSV-format, which has a number of advantages.
 351
 352 * The strip and copy programs now have options to remove debug-symbols only
 353   and/or local symbols only.  They now also support long options.
 354
 355 \f
 356 Local variables:
 357 fill-column: 79
 358 End: