gas/NEWS

   1 -*- text -*-
   2
   3 * Added support for Xtensa architecture.
   4
   5 * Support for Intel's iWMMXt processor (an ARM variant) added.
   6
   7 * An assembler test generator has been contributed and an example file that
   8   uses it (gas/testsuite/gas/all/test-gen.c and test-exmaple.c).
   9
  10 * Support for SH2E added.
  11
  12 * GASP has now been removed.
  13
  14 * Support for Texas Instruments TMS320C4x and TMS320C3x series of
  15   DSP's contributed by Michael Hayes and Svein E. Seldal.
  16
  17 * Support for the Ubicom IP2xxx microcontroller added.
  18
  19 Changes in 2.13:
  20
  21 * Support for the Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat. Models for FR400
  22   and FR500 included.
  23
  24 * Support for DLX processor added.
  25
  26 * GASP has now been deprecated and will be removed in a future release.  Use
  27   the macro facilities in GAS instead.
  28
  29 * GASP now correctly parses floating point numbers. Unless the base is
  30   explicitly specified, they are interpreted as decimal numbers regardless of
  31   the currently specified base.
  32
  33 Changes in 2.12:
  34
  35 * Support for Don Knuth's MMIX, by Hans-Peter Nilsson.
  36
  37 * Support for the OpenRISC 32-bit embedded processor by OpenCores.
  38
  39 * The ARM assembler now accepts -march=..., -mcpu=... and -mfpu=... for
  40   specifying the target instruction set.  The old method of specifying the
  41   target processor has been deprecated, but is still accepted for
  42   compatibility.
  43
  44 * Support for the VFP floating-point instruction set has been added to
  45   the ARM assembler.
  46
  47 * New psuedo op: .incbin to include a set of binary data at a given point
  48   in the assembly.  Contributed by Anders Norlander.
  49
  50 * The MIPS assembler now accepts -march/-mtune. -mcpu has been deprecated
  51   but still works for compatability.
  52
  53 * The MIPS assembler no longer issues a warning by default when it
  54   generates a nop instruction from a macro. The new command line option
  55   -n will turn on the warning.
  56
  57 Changes in 2.11:
  58
  59 * Support for PDP-11 and 2.11BSD a.out format, by Lars Brinkhoff.
  60
  61 * x86 gas now supports the full Pentium4 instruction set.
  62
  63 * Support for AMD x86-64 architecture, by Jan Hubicka, SuSE Labs.
  64
  65 * Support for Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12.
  66
  67 * Support for Texas Instruments TMS320C54x (tic54x).
  68
  69 * Support for IA-64.
  70
  71 * Support for i860, by Jason Eckhardt.
  72
  73 * Support for CRIS (Axis Communications ETRAX series).
  74
  75 * x86 gas has a new .arch pseudo op to specify the target CPU architecture.
  76
  77 * x86 gas -q command line option quietens warnings about register size changes
  78   due to suffix, indirect jmp/call without `*', stand-alone prefixes, and
  79   translating various deprecated floating point instructions.
  80
  81 Changes in 2.10:
  82
  83 * Support for the ARM msr instruction was changed to only allow an immediate
  84   operand when altering the flags field.
  85
  86 * Support for ATMEL AVR.
  87
  88 * Support for IBM 370 ELF.  Somewhat experimental.
  89
  90 * Support for numbers with suffixes.
  91
  92 * Added support for breaking to the end of repeat loops.
  93
  94 * Added support for parallel instruction syntax (DOUBLEBAR_PARALLEL).
  95
  96 * New .elseif pseudo-op added.
  97
  98 * New --fatal-warnings option.
  99
 100 * picoJava architecture support added.
 101
 102 * Motorola MCore 210 processor support added.
 103
 104 * A new pseudo-op .intel_syntax has been implemented to allow gas to parse i386
 105   assembly programs with intel syntax.
 106
 107 * New pseudo-ops .func,.endfunc to aid in debugging user-written assembler code.
 108
 109 * Added -gdwarf2 option to generate DWARF 2 debugging information.
 110
 111 * Full 16-bit mode support for i386.
 112
 113 * Greatly improved instruction operand checking for i386.  This change will
 114   produce errors or warnings on incorrect assembly code that previous versions
 115   of gas accepted.  If you get unexpected messages from code that worked with
 116   older versions of gas, please double check the code before reporting a bug.
 117
 118 * Weak symbol support added for COFF targets.
 119
 120 * Mitsubishi D30V support added.
 121
 122 * Texas Instruments c80 (tms320c80) support added.
 123
 124 * i960 ELF support added.
 125
 126 * ARM ELF support added.
 127
 128 Changes in 2.9:
 129
 130 * Texas Instruments c30 (tms320c30) support added.
 131
 132 * The assembler now optimizes the exception frame information generated by egcs
 133   and gcc 2.8.  The new --traditional-format option disables this optimization.
 134
 135 * Added --gstabs option to generate stabs debugging information.
 136
 137 * The -a option takes a new suboption, m (e.g., -alm) to expand macros in a
 138   listing.
 139
 140 * Added -MD option to print dependencies.
 141
 142 Changes in 2.8:
 143
 144 * BeOS support added.
 145
 146 * MIPS16 support added.
 147
 148 * Motorola ColdFire 5200 support added (configure for m68k and use -m5200).
 149
 150 * Alpha/VMS support added.
 151
 152 * m68k options --base-size-default-16, --base-size-default-32,
 153   --disp-size-default-16, and --disp-size-default-32 added.
 154
 155 * The alignment directives now take an optional third argument, which is the
 156   maximum number of bytes to skip.  If doing the alignment would require
 157   skipping more than the given number of bytes, the alignment is not done at
 158   all.
 159
 160 * The ELF assembler has a new pseudo-op, .symver, used for symbol versioning.
 161
 162 * The -a option takes a new suboption, c (e.g., -alc), to skip false
 163   conditionals in listings.
 164
 165 * Added new pseudo-op, .equiv; it's like .equ, except that it is an error if
 166   the symbol is already defined.
 167
 168 Changes in 2.7:
 169
 170 * The PowerPC assembler now allows the use of symbolic register names (r0,
 171   etc.) if -mregnames is used.  Symbolic names preceded by a '%' (%r0, etc.)
 172   can be used any time.  PowerPC 860 move to/from SPR instructions have been
 173   added.
 174
 175 * Alpha Linux (ELF) support added.
 176
 177 * PowerPC ELF support added.
 178
 179 * m68k Linux (ELF) support added.
 180
 181 * i960 Hx/Jx support added.
 182
 183 * i386/PowerPC gnu-win32 support added.
 184
 185 * SCO ELF support added.  For OpenServer 5 targets (i386-unknown-sco3.2v5) the
 186   default is to build COFF-only support.  To get a set of tools that generate
 187   ELF (they'll understand both COFF and ELF), you must configure with
 188   target=i386-unknown-sco3.2v5elf.
 189
 190 * m88k-motorola-sysv3* support added.
 191
 192 Changes in 2.6:
 193
 194 * Gas now directly supports macros, without requiring GASP.
 195
 196 * Gas now has an MRI assembler compatibility mode.  Use -M or --mri to select
 197   MRI mode.  The pseudo-op ``.mri 1'' will switch into the MRI mode until the
 198   ``.mri 0'' is seen; this can be convenient for inline assembler code.
 199
 200 * Added --defsym SYM=VALUE option.
 201
 202 * Added -mips4 support to MIPS assembler.
 203
 204 * Added PIC support to Solaris and SPARC SunOS 4 assembler.
 205
 206 Changes in 2.4:
 207
 208 * Converted this directory to use an autoconf-generated configure script.
 209
 210 * ARM support, from Richard Earnshaw.
 211
 212 * Updated VMS support, from Pat Rankin, including considerably improved
 213   debugging support.
 214
 215 * Support for the control registers in the 68060.
 216
 217 * Handles (ignores) a new directive ".this_GCC_requires_the_GNU_assembler", to
 218   provide for possible future gcc changes, for targets where gas provides some
 219   features not available in the native assembler.  If the native assembler is
 220   used, it should become obvious pretty quickly what the problem is.
 221
 222 * Usage message is available with "--help".
 223
 224 * The GNU Assembler Preprocessor (gasp) is included.  (Actually, it was in 2.3
 225   also, but didn't get into the NEWS file.)
 226
 227 * Weak symbol support for a.out.
 228
 229 * A bug in the listing code which could cause an infinite loop has been fixed.
 230   Bugs in listings when generating a COFF object file have also been fixed.
 231
 232 * Initial i386-svr4 PIC implementation from Eric Youngdale, based on code by
 233   Paul Kranenburg.
 234
 235 * Improved Alpha support.  Immediate constants can have a much larger range
 236   now. Support for the 21164 has been contributed by Digital.
 237
 238 * Updated ns32k (pc532-mach, netbsd532) support from Ian Dall.
 239
 240 Changes in 2.3:
 241
 242 * Mach i386 support, by David Mackenzie and Ken Raeburn.
 243
 244 * RS/6000 and PowerPC support by Ian Taylor.
 245
 246 * VMS command scripts (make-gas.com, config-gas.com) have been worked on a bit,
 247   based on mail received from various people.  The `-h#' option should work
 248   again too.
 249
 250 * HP-PA work, by Jeff Law.  Note, for the PA, gas-2.3 has been designed to work
 251   with gdb-4.12 and gcc-2.6.  As gcc-2.6 has not been released yet, a special
 252   version of gcc-2.5.8 has been patched to work with gas-2.3.  You can retrieve
 253   this special version of gcc-2.5.8 via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu
 254   in the "dist" directory.
 255
 256 * Vax support in gas fixed for BSD, so it builds and seems to run a couple
 257   simple tests okay.  I haven't put it through extensive testing.  (GNU make is
 258   currently required for BSD 4.3 builds.)
 259
 260 * Support for the DEC Alpha, running OSF/1 (ECOFF format).  The gas support is
 261   based on code donated by CMU, which used an a.out-based format.  I'm afraid
 262   the alpha-a.out support is pretty badly mangled, and much of it removed;
 263   making it work will require rewriting it as BFD support for the format anyways.
 264
 265 * Irix 5 support.
 266
 267 * The test suites have been fixed up a bit, so that they should work with a
 268   couple different versions of expect and dejagnu.
 269
 270 * Symbols' values are now handled internally as expressions, permitting more
 271   flexibility in evaluating them in some cases.  Some details of relocation
 272   handling have also changed, and simple constant pool management has been
 273   added, to make the Alpha port easier.
 274
 275 * New option "--statistics" for printing out program run times.  This is
 276   intended to be used with the gcc "-Q" option, which prints out times spent in
 277   various phases of compilation.  (You should be able to get all of them
 278   printed out with "gcc -Q -Wa,--statistics", I think.)
 279
 280 Changes in 2.2:
 281
 282 * RS/6000 AIX and MIPS SGI Irix 5 support has been added.
 283
 284 * Configurations that are still in development (and therefore are convenient to
 285   have listed in configure.in) still get rejected without a minor change to
 286   gas/Makefile.in, so people not doing development work shouldn't get the
 287   impression that support for such configurations is actually believed to be
 288   reliable.
 289
 290 * The program name (usually "as") is printed when a fatal error message is
 291   displayed.  This should prevent some confusion about the source of occasional
 292   messages about "internal errors".
 293
 294 * ELF support is falling into place.  Support for the 386 should be working.
 295   Support for SPARC Solaris is in.  HPPA support from Utah is being integrated.
 296
 297 * Symbol values are maintained as expressions instead of being immediately
 298   boiled down to add-symbol, sub-symbol, and constant.  This permits slightly
 299   more complex calculations involving symbols whose values are not alreadey
 300   known.
 301
 302 * DBX-style debugging info ("stabs") is now supported for COFF formats.
 303   If any stabs directives are seen in the source, GAS will create two new
 304   sections: a ".stab" and a ".stabstr" section.  The format of the .stab
 305   section is nearly identical to the a.out symbol format, and .stabstr is
 306   its string table.  For this to be useful, you must have configured GCC
 307   to generate stabs (by defining DBX_DEBUGGING_INFO), and must have a GDB
 308   that can use the stab sections (4.11 or later).
 309
 310 * LynxOS, on i386 and m68k platforms, is now supported.  SPARC LynxOS
 311   support is in progress.
 312
 313 Changes in 2.1:
 314
 315 * Several small fixes for i386-aix (PS/2) support from Minh Tran-Le have been
 316   incorporated, but not well tested yet.
 317
 318 * Altered the opcode table split for m68k; it should require less VM to compile
 319   with gcc now.
 320
 321 * Some minor adjustments to add (Convergent Technologies') Miniframe support,
 322   suggested by Ronald Cole.
 323
 324 * HPPA support (running OSF only, not HPUX) has been contributed by Utah.  This
 325   includes improved ELF support, which I've started adapting for SPARC Solaris
 326   2.x.  Integration isn't completely, so it probably won't work.
 327
 328 * HP9000/300 support, donated by HP, has been merged in.
 329
 330 * Ian Taylor has finished the MIPS ECOFF (Ultrix, Irix) support.
 331
 332 * Better error messages for unsupported configurations (e.g., hppa-hpux).
 333
 334 * Test suite framework is starting to become reasonable.
 335
 336 Changes in 2.0:
 337
 338 * Mostly bug fixes.
 339
 340 * Some more merging of BFD and ELF code, but ELF still doesn't work.
 341
 342 Changes in 1.94:
 343
 344 * BFD merge is partly done.  Adventurous souls may try giving configure the
 345   "--with-bfd-assembler" option.  Currently, ELF format requires it, a.out
 346   format accepts it; SPARC CPU accepts it.  It's the default only for OS "elf"
 347   or "solaris".  (ELF isn't really supported yet.  It needs work.  I've got
 348   some code from Utah for HP-PA ELF, and from DG for m88k ELF, but they're not
 349   fully merged yet.)
 350
 351 * The 68K opcode table has been split in half.  It should now compile under gcc
 352   without consuming ridiculous amounts of memory.
 353
 354 * A couple data structures have been reduced in size.  This should result in
 355   saving a little bit of space at runtime.
 356
 357 * Support for MIPS, from OSF and Ralph Campbell, has been merged in.  The OSF
 358   code provided ROSE format support, which I haven't merged in yet.  (I can
 359   make it available, if anyone wants to try it out.)  Ralph's code, for BSD
 360   4.4, supports a.out format.  We don't have ECOFF support in just yet; it's
 361   coming.
 362
 363 * Support for the Hitachi H8/500 has been added.
 364
 365 * VMS host and target support should be working now, thanks chiefly to Eric
 366   Youngdale.
 367
 368 Changes in 1.93.01:
 369
 370 * For m68k, support for more processors has been added: 68040, CPU32, 68851.
 371
 372 * For i386, .align is now power-of-two; was number-of-bytes.
 373
 374 * For m68k, "%" is now accepted before register names.  For COFF format, which
 375   doesn't use underscore prefixes for C labels, it is required, so variable "a0"
 376   can be distinguished from the register.
 377
 378 * Last public release was 1.38.  Lots of configuration changes since then, lots
 379   of new CPUs and formats, lots of bugs fixed.
 380
 381 \f
 382 Local variables:
 383 fill-column: 79
 384 End: