1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB 7.1
6 * Windows Thread Information Block access.
8 On Windows targets, GDB now supports displaying the Windows Thread
9 Information Block (TIB) structure. This structure is visible either
10 by using the new command `info w32 thread-information-block' or, by
11 dereferencing the new convenience variable named `$_tlb', a
12 thread-specific pointer to the TIB. This feature is also supported
13 when remote debugging using GDBserver.
19 Return the address of the Windows Thread Information Block of a given thread.
21 * The source command now accepts a -s option to force searching for the
22 script in the source search path even if the script name specifies
25 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
27 - GDBserver now support tracepoints. The feature is currently
28 supported by the i386-linux and amd64-linux builds.
30 - GDBserver now supports x86_64 Windows 64-bit debugging.
32 * GDB now sends xmlRegisters= in qSupported packet to indicate that
33 it understands register description.
35 * The --batch flag now disables pagination and queries.
37 * X86 general purpose registers
39 GDB now supports reading/writing byte, word and double-word x86
40 general purpose registers directly. This means you can use, say,
41 $ah or $ax to refer, respectively, to the byte register AH and
42 16-bit word register AX that are actually portions of the 32-bit
43 register EAX or 64-bit register RAX.
45 * The `commands' command now accepts a range of breakpoints to modify.
46 A plain `commands' following a command that creates multiple
47 breakpoints affects all the breakpoints set by that command. This
48 applies to breakpoints set by `rbreak', and also applies when a
49 single `break' command creates multiple breakpoints (e.g.,
50 breakpoints on overloaded c++ functions).
52 * The `rbreak' command now accepts a filename specification as part of
53 its argument, limiting the functions selected by the regex to those
54 in the specified file.
56 * Support for remote debugging Windows and SymbianOS shared libraries
57 from Unix hosts has been improved. Non Windows GDB builds now can
58 understand target reported file names that follow MS-DOS based file
59 system semantics, such as file names that include drive letters and
60 use the backslash character as directory separator. This makes it
61 possible to transparently use the "set sysroot" and "set
62 solib-search-path" on Unix hosts to point as host copies of the
63 target's shared libraries. See the new command "set
64 target-file-system-kind" described below, and the "Commands to
65 specify files" section in the user manual for more information.
69 set target-file-system-kind unix|dos-based|auto
70 show target-file-system-kind
71 Set or show the assumed file system kind for target reported file
74 save breakpoints <filename>
75 Save all current breakpoint definitions to a file suitable for use
76 in a later debugging session. To read the saved breakpoint
77 definitions, use the `source' command.
79 `save tracepoints' is a new alias for `save-tracepoints'. The latter
84 ** The GDB Python API now has access to breakpoints, symbols, symbol
85 tables, program spaces, and frame's code blocks. Additionally, GDB
86 Parameters can now be created from the API, and manipulated via
89 ** New functions gdb.target_charset, gdb.target_wide_charset,
90 gdb.progspaces, and gdb.current_progspace.
92 ** Pretty-printers are now also looked up in the current program space.
94 ** GDB now looks for names of Python scripts to auto-load in a
95 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts', in addition to looking
96 for a OBJFILE-gdb.py script when OBJFILE is read by the debugger.
98 * Tracepoint actions were unified with breakpoint commands. In particular,
99 there are no longer differences in "info break" output for breakpoints and
100 tracepoints and the "commands" command can be used for both tracepoints and
105 ARM Symbian arm*-*-symbianelf*
107 * D language support.
108 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the D programming
111 *** Changes in GDB 7.1
117 GDB now supports importing of namespaces in C++. This enables the
118 user to inspect variables from imported namespaces. Support for
119 namepace aliasing has also been added. So, if a namespace is
120 aliased in the current scope (e.g. namepace C=A; ) the user can
121 print variables using the alias (e.g. (gdb) print C::x).
125 All known bugs relating to the printing of virtual base class were
126 fixed. It is now possible to call overloaded static methods using a
131 The C++ cast operators static_cast<>, dynamic_cast<>, const_cast<>,
132 and reinterpret_cast<> are now handled by the C++ expression parser.
136 Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze-*-*
141 Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze
144 * Multi-program debugging.
146 GDB now has support for multi-program (a.k.a. multi-executable or
147 multi-exec) debugging. This allows for debugging multiple inferiors
148 simultaneously each running a different program under the same GDB
149 session. See "Debugging Multiple Inferiors and Programs" in the
150 manual for more information. This implied some user visible changes
151 in the multi-inferior support. For example, "info inferiors" now
152 lists inferiors that are not running yet or that have exited
153 already. See also "New commands" and "New options" below.
155 * New tracing features
157 GDB's tracepoint facility now includes several new features:
159 ** Trace state variables
161 GDB tracepoints now include support for trace state variables, which
162 are variables managed by the target agent during a tracing
163 experiment. They are useful for tracepoints that trigger each
164 other, so for instance one tracepoint can count hits in a variable,
165 and then a second tracepoint has a condition that is true when the
166 count reaches a particular value. Trace state variables share the
167 $-syntax of GDB convenience variables, and can appear in both
168 tracepoint actions and condition expressions. Use the "tvariable"
169 command to create, and "info tvariables" to view; see "Trace State
170 Variables" in the manual for more detail.
174 GDB now includes an option for defining fast tracepoints, which
175 targets may implement more efficiently, such as by installing a jump
176 into the target agent rather than a trap instruction. The resulting
177 speedup can be by two orders of magnitude or more, although the
178 tradeoff is that some program locations on some target architectures
179 might not allow fast tracepoint installation, for instance if the
180 instruction to be replaced is shorter than the jump. To request a
181 fast tracepoint, use the "ftrace" command, with syntax identical to
182 the regular trace command.
184 ** Disconnected tracing
186 It is now possible to detach GDB from the target while it is running
187 a trace experiment, then reconnect later to see how the experiment
188 is going. In addition, a new variable disconnected-tracing lets you
189 tell the target agent whether to continue running a trace if the
190 connection is lost unexpectedly.
194 GDB now has the ability to save the trace buffer into a file, and
195 then use that file as a target, similarly to you can do with
196 corefiles. You can select trace frames, print data that was
197 collected in them, and use tstatus to display the state of the
198 tracing run at the moment that it was saved. To create a trace
199 file, use "tsave <filename>", and to use it, do "target tfile
202 ** Circular trace buffer
204 You can ask the target agent to handle the trace buffer as a
205 circular buffer, discarding the oldest trace frames to make room for
206 newer ones, by setting circular-trace-buffer to on. This feature may
207 not be available for all target agents.
212 The disassemble command, when invoked with two arguments, now requires
213 the arguments to be comma-separated.
216 The info variables command now displays variable definitions. Files
217 which only declare a variable are not shown.
220 The source command is now capable of sourcing Python scripts.
221 This feature is dependent on the debugger being build with Python
224 Related to this enhancement is also the introduction of a new command
225 "set script-extension" (see below).
227 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
229 record save [<FILENAME>]
230 Save a file (in core file format) containing the process record
231 execution log for replay debugging at a later time.
233 record restore <FILENAME>
234 Restore the process record execution log that was saved at an
235 earlier time, for replay debugging.
237 add-inferior [-copies <N>] [-exec <FILENAME>]
240 clone-inferior [-copies <N>] [ID]
241 Make a new inferior ready to execute the same program another
247 maint info program-spaces
248 List the program spaces loaded into GDB.
250 set remote interrupt-sequence [Ctrl-C | BREAK | BREAK-g]
251 show remote interrupt-sequence
252 Allow the user to select one of ^C, a BREAK signal or BREAK-g
253 as the sequence to the remote target in order to interrupt the execution.
254 Ctrl-C is a default. Some system prefers BREAK which is high level of
255 serial line for some certain time. Linux kernel prefers BREAK-g, a.k.a
256 Magic SysRq g. It is BREAK signal and character 'g'.
258 set remote interrupt-on-connect [on | off]
259 show remote interrupt-on-connect
260 When interrupt-on-connect is ON, gdb sends interrupt-sequence to
261 remote target when gdb connects to it. This is needed when you debug
264 set remotebreak [on | off]
266 Deprecated. Use "set/show remote interrupt-sequence" instead.
268 tvariable $NAME [ = EXP ]
269 Create or modify a trace state variable.
272 List trace state variables and their values.
274 delete tvariable $NAME ...
275 Delete one or more trace state variables.
278 Evaluate the given expressions without collecting anything into the
279 trace buffer. (Valid in tracepoint actions only.)
281 ftrace FN / FILE:LINE / *ADDR
282 Define a fast tracepoint at the given function, line, or address.
284 * New expression syntax
286 GDB now parses the 0b prefix of binary numbers the same way as GCC does.
287 GDB now parses 0b101010 identically with 42.
291 set follow-exec-mode new|same
292 show follow-exec-mode
293 Control whether GDB reuses the same inferior across an exec call or
294 creates a new one. This is useful to be able to restart the old
295 executable after the inferior having done an exec call.
297 set default-collect EXPR, ...
299 Define a list of expressions to be collected at each tracepoint.
300 This is a useful way to ensure essential items are not overlooked,
301 such as registers or a critical global variable.
303 set disconnected-tracing
304 show disconnected-tracing
305 If set to 1, the target is instructed to continue tracing if it
306 loses its connection to GDB. If 0, the target is to stop tracing
309 set circular-trace-buffer
310 show circular-trace-buffer
311 If set to on, the target is instructed to use a circular trace buffer
312 and discard the oldest trace frames instead of stopping the trace due
313 to a full trace buffer. If set to off, the trace stops when the buffer
314 fills up. Some targets may not support this.
316 set script-extension off|soft|strict
317 show script-extension
318 If set to "off", the debugger does not perform any script language
319 recognition, and all sourced files are assumed to be GDB scripts.
320 If set to "soft" (the default), files are sourced according to
321 filename extension, falling back to GDB scripts if the first
323 If set to "strict", files are sourced according to filename extension.
325 set ada trust-PAD-over-XVS on|off
326 show ada trust-PAD-over-XVS
327 If off, activate a workaround against a bug in the debugging information
328 generated by the compiler for PAD types (see gcc/exp_dbug.ads in
329 the GCC sources for more information about the GNAT encoding and
330 PAD types in particular). It is always safe to set this option to
331 off, but this introduces a slight performance penalty. The default
334 * Python API Improvements
336 ** GDB provides the new class gdb.LazyString. This is useful in
337 some pretty-printing cases. The new method gdb.Value.lazy_string
338 provides a simple way to create objects of this type.
340 ** The fields returned by gdb.Type.fields now have an
341 `is_base_class' attribute.
343 ** The new method gdb.Type.range returns the range of an array type.
345 ** The new method gdb.parse_and_eval can be used to parse and
346 evaluate an expression.
351 Define a trace state variable.
354 Get the current value of a trace state variable.
357 Set desired tracing behavior upon disconnection.
360 Set the trace buffer to be linear or circular.
363 Get data about the tracepoints currently in use.
367 Process record now works correctly with hardware watchpoints.
369 Multiple bug fixes have been made to the mips-irix port, making it
370 much more reliable. In particular:
371 - Debugging threaded applications is now possible again. Previously,
372 GDB would hang while starting the program, or while waiting for
373 the program to stop at a breakpoint.
374 - Attaching to a running process no longer hangs.
375 - An error occurring while loading a core file has been fixed.
376 - Changing the value of the PC register now works again. This fixes
377 problems observed when using the "jump" command, or when calling
378 a function from GDB, or even when assigning a new value to $pc.
379 - With the "finish" and "return" commands, the return value for functions
380 returning a small array is now correctly printed.
381 - It is now possible to break on shared library code which gets executed
382 during a shared library init phase (code executed while executing
383 their .init section). Previously, the breakpoint would have no effect.
384 - GDB is now able to backtrace through the signal handler for
385 non-threaded programs.
387 PIE (Position Independent Executable) programs debugging is now supported.
388 This includes debugging execution of PIC (Position Independent Code) shared
389 libraries although for that, it should be possible to run such libraries as an
392 *** Changes in GDB 7.0
394 * GDB now has an interface for JIT compilation. Applications that
395 dynamically generate code can create symbol files in memory and register
396 them with GDB. For users, the feature should work transparently, and
397 for JIT developers, the interface is documented in the GDB manual in the
398 "JIT Compilation Interface" chapter.
400 * Tracepoints may now be conditional. The syntax is as for
401 breakpoints; either an "if" clause appended to the "trace" command,
402 or the "condition" command is available. GDB sends the condition to
403 the target for evaluation using the same bytecode format as is used
404 for tracepoint actions.
406 * "disassemble" command with a /r modifier, print the raw instructions
407 in hex as well as in symbolic form.
409 * Process record and replay
411 In a architecture environment that supports ``process record and
412 replay'', ``process record and replay'' target can record a log of
413 the process execution, and replay it with both forward and reverse
416 * Reverse debugging: GDB now has new commands reverse-continue, reverse-
417 step, reverse-next, reverse-finish, reverse-stepi, reverse-nexti, and
418 set execution-direction {forward|reverse}, for targets that support
421 * GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on MIPS/Linux systems. This
422 feature is available with a native GDB running on kernel version
425 * GDB now has support for multi-byte and wide character sets on the
426 target. Strings whose character type is wchar_t, char16_t, or
427 char32_t are now correctly printed. GDB supports wide- and unicode-
428 literals in C, that is, L'x', L"string", u'x', u"string", U'x', and
429 U"string" syntax. And, GDB allows the "%ls" and "%lc" formats in
430 `printf'. This feature requires iconv to work properly; if your
431 system does not have a working iconv, GDB can use GNU libiconv. See
432 the installation instructions for more information.
434 * GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
435 remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
436 with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
437 the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
439 * "info sharedlibrary" now takes an optional regex of libraries to show,
440 and it now reports if a shared library has no debugging information.
442 * Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
443 now complete on file names.
445 * When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
446 completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
447 For instance, consider:
449 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
450 # struct example variable;
453 If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
454 completions will be "f1" and "f2".
456 * Inlined functions are now supported. They show up in backtraces, and
457 the "step", "next", and "finish" commands handle them automatically.
459 * GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
460 operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
463 * GDB now supports inspecting extra signal information, exported by
464 the new $_siginfo convenience variable. The feature is currently
465 implemented on linux ARM, i386 and amd64.
467 * GDB can now display the VFP floating point registers and NEON vector
468 registers on ARM targets. Both ARM GNU/Linux native GDB and gdbserver
469 can provide these registers (requires Linux 2.6.30 or later). Remote
470 and simulator targets may also provide them.
475 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
478 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
479 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
480 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
483 Kill the process with the specified process ID. Use this in preference
484 to `k' when multiprocess protocol extensions are supported.
487 Obtains additional operating system information
491 Read or write additional signal information.
493 * Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
495 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
496 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
497 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
499 * The "disassemble" command now supports an optional /m modifier to print mixed
502 * GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
503 DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
505 * The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
506 and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
507 `set/show sh calling-convention'.
509 * GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
510 with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
512 * 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
514 * Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
516 * Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
517 which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
519 * The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
520 list of section offsets.
522 * On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
523 conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
524 have also been fixed.
526 * GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
527 From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
528 are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
530 * GDB now parses C++ symbol and type names more flexibly. For
533 template<typename T> class C { };
536 GDB will now correctly handle all of:
538 ptype C<char const *>
540 ptype C<const char *>
543 * New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
545 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
546 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
548 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
549 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
550 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
552 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
553 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
555 - Support for the sparc64-linux-gnu target is now included in
558 - The amd64-linux build of gdbserver now supports debugging both
559 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
561 - The i386-linux, amd64-linux, and i386-win32 builds of gdbserver
562 now support hardware watchpoints, and will use them automatically
567 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
568 available is determined at configure time.
570 New GDB commands can now be written in Python.
572 * Ada tasking support
574 Ada tasks can now be inspected in GDB. The following commands have
578 Print the list of Ada tasks.
580 Print detailed information about task number N.
582 Print the task number of the current task.
584 Switch the context of debugging to task number N.
586 * Support for user-defined prefixed commands. The "define" command can
587 add new commands to existing prefixes, e.g. "target".
589 * Multi-inferior, multi-process debugging.
591 GDB now has generalized support for multi-inferior debugging. See
592 "Debugging Multiple Inferiors" in the manual for more information.
593 Although availability still depends on target support, the command
594 set is more uniform now. The GNU/Linux specific multi-forks support
595 has been migrated to this new framework. This implied some user
596 visible changes; see "New commands" and also "Removed commands"
599 * Target descriptions can now describe the target OS ABI. See the
600 "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for more
603 * Target descriptions can now describe "compatible" architectures
604 to indicate that the target can execute applications for a different
605 architecture in addition to those for the main target architecture.
606 See the "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for
609 * Multi-architecture debugging.
611 GDB now includes general supports for debugging applications on
612 hybrid systems that use more than one single processor architecture
613 at the same time. Each such hybrid architecture still requires
614 specific support to be added. The only hybrid architecture supported
615 in this version of GDB is the Cell Broadband Engine.
617 * GDB now supports integrated debugging of Cell/B.E. applications that
618 use both the PPU and SPU architectures. To enable support for hybrid
619 Cell/B.E. debugging, you need to configure GDB to support both the
620 powerpc-linux or powerpc64-linux and the spu-elf targets, using the
621 --enable-targets configure option.
623 * Non-stop mode debugging.
625 For some targets, GDB now supports an optional mode of operation in
626 which you can examine stopped threads while other threads continue
627 to execute freely. This is referred to as non-stop mode, with the
628 old mode referred to as all-stop mode. See the "Non-Stop Mode"
629 section in the user manual for more information.
631 To be able to support remote non-stop debugging, a remote stub needs
632 to implement the non-stop mode remote protocol extensions, as
633 described in the "Remote Non-Stop" section of the user manual. The
634 GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been adjusted to support these
635 extensions on linux targets.
637 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
639 catch syscall [NAME(S) | NUMBER(S)]
640 Catch system calls. Arguments, which should be names of system
641 calls or their numbers, mean catch only those syscalls. Without
642 arguments, every syscall will be caught. When the inferior issues
643 any of the specified syscalls, GDB will stop and announce the system
644 call, both when it is called and when its call returns. This
645 feature is currently available with a native GDB running on the
646 Linux Kernel, under the following architectures: x86, x86_64,
647 PowerPC and PowerPC64.
649 find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
651 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
653 maint set python print-stack
654 maint show python print-stack
655 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
658 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
663 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
667 Show operating system information about processes.
670 List the inferiors currently under GDB's control.
673 Switch focus to inferior number NUM.
676 Detach from inferior number NUM.
679 Kill inferior number NUM.
684 show spu stop-on-load
685 Control whether to stop for new SPE threads during Cell/B.E. debugging.
687 set spu auto-flush-cache
688 show spu auto-flush-cache
689 Control whether to automatically flush the software-managed cache
690 during Cell/B.E. debugging.
692 set sh calling-convention
693 show sh calling-convention
694 Control the calling convention used when calling SH target functions.
698 Control display of timestamps with GDB debugging output.
700 set disassemble-next-line
701 show disassemble-next-line
702 Control display of disassembled source lines or instructions when
705 set remote noack-packet
706 show remote noack-packet
707 Set/show the use of remote protocol QStartNoAckMode packet. See above
708 under "New remote packets."
710 set remote query-attached-packet
711 show remote query-attached-packet
712 Control use of remote protocol `qAttached' (query-attached) packet.
714 set remote read-siginfo-object
715 show remote read-siginfo-object
716 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:read' (read-siginfo-object)
719 set remote write-siginfo-object
720 show remote write-siginfo-object
721 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:write' (write-siginfo-object)
724 set remote reverse-continue
725 show remote reverse-continue
726 Control use of remote protocol 'bc' (reverse-continue) packet.
728 set remote reverse-step
729 show remote reverse-step
730 Control use of remote protocol 'bs' (reverse-step) packet.
732 set displaced-stepping
733 show displaced-stepping
734 Control displaced stepping mode. Displaced stepping is a way to
735 single-step over breakpoints without removing them from the debuggee.
736 Also known as "out-of-line single-stepping".
740 Control display of debugging info for displaced stepping.
742 maint set internal-error
743 maint show internal-error
744 Control what GDB does when an internal error is detected.
746 maint set internal-warning
747 maint show internal-warning
748 Control what GDB does when an internal warning is detected.
753 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
755 set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
756 show multiple-symbols
757 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
758 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
759 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
761 set breakpoint always-inserted
762 show breakpoint always-inserted
763 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
764 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
765 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
767 set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
768 show arm fallback-mode
769 set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
771 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
772 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
773 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
774 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
776 set disable-randomization
777 show disable-randomization
778 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
779 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
780 multiple debugging sessions.
784 Control whether other threads are stopped or not when some thread hits
789 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
790 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
791 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
792 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
794 set target-wide-charset
795 show target-wide-charset
796 The target-wide-charset is the name of the character set that GDB
797 uses when printing characters whose type is wchar_t.
799 set tcp auto-retry (on|off)
801 set tcp connect-timeout
802 show tcp connect-timeout
803 These commands allow GDB to retry failed TCP connections to a remote stub
804 with a specified timeout period; this is useful if the stub is launched
805 in parallel with GDB but may not be ready to accept connections immediately.
807 set libthread-db-search-path
808 show libthread-db-search-path
809 Control list of directories which GDB will search for appropriate
812 set schedule-multiple (on|off)
813 show schedule-multiple
814 Allow GDB to resume all threads of all processes or only threads of
819 Use more aggressive caching for accesses to the stack. This improves
820 performance of remote debugging (particularly backtraces) without
821 affecting correctness.
823 set interactive-mode (on|off|auto)
824 show interactive-mode
825 Control whether GDB runs in interactive mode (on) or not (off).
826 When in interactive mode, GDB waits for the user to answer all
827 queries. Otherwise, GDB does not wait and assumes the default
828 answer. When set to auto (the default), GDB determines which
829 mode to use based on the stdin settings.
834 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `info
835 inferiors' command. To list checkpoints, you can still use the
836 `info checkpoints' command, which was an alias for the `info forks'
840 Replaced by the new `inferior' command. To switch between
841 checkpoints, you can still use the `restart' command, which was an
842 alias for the `fork' command.
845 This is removed, since some targets don't have a notion of
846 processes. To switch between processes, you can still use the
847 `inferior' command using GDB's own inferior number.
850 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `kill
851 inferior' command. To delete a checkpoint, you can still use the
852 `delete checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `delete
856 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `detach
857 inferior' command. To detach a checkpoint, you can still use the
858 `detach checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `detach
861 * New native configurations
863 x86/x86_64 Darwin i[34567]86-*-darwin*
865 x86_64 MinGW x86_64-*-mingw*
869 Lattice Mico32 lm32-*
870 x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
871 x86_64 DICOS x86_64-*-dicos*
874 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports x86 Windows CE
875 (mingw32ce) debugging.
881 These commands were actually not implemented on any target.
883 *** Changes in GDB 6.8
885 * New native configurations
887 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
888 Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
892 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
893 Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
895 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
897 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
898 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
899 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
900 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
902 * GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
903 (mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
905 * Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
908 * GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
909 including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
910 and in inlined functions.
912 * GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
913 accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
914 more than one contiguous range of addresses.
916 * Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
918 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
919 registers on PowerPC targets.
921 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
922 targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
924 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
925 commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
927 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
928 extended-remote mode.
930 * hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
931 The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
932 error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
933 The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
935 * GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
936 building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
937 target architectures.
939 * GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
940 Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
941 now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
942 stored in two consecutive float registers.
944 * The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
947 * Improved support for debugging Ada
948 Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
950 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
951 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
952 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
953 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
955 - Improved command completion in Ada
958 * GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
963 set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
964 show print frame-arguments
965 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
966 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
971 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
978 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
987 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
990 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
994 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
996 *** Changes in GDB 6.7
998 * Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
999 bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
1000 Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
1002 * When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
1003 symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
1004 -Bsymbolic linker option.
1006 * When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
1007 recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
1010 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
1011 frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
1013 * GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
1014 32-bit or 64-bit register values.
1016 * Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
1018 * GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
1019 target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
1020 a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
1022 * Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
1023 automatically displayed as character or string data.
1025 * The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
1026 arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
1029 * Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
1030 for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
1031 only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
1033 * GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
1036 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
1037 ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
1038 has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
1040 * GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
1042 * GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
1044 * The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
1045 layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
1046 segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
1048 * The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
1049 immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
1051 * The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
1052 "library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
1053 packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
1054 where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
1055 Windows and SymbianOS).
1057 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
1058 (DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
1060 * GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
1061 according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
1067 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
1068 when debugging using remote targets.
1070 set mem inaccessible-by-default
1071 show mem inaccessible-by-default
1072 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
1073 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
1074 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
1075 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
1076 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
1078 set breakpoint auto-hw
1079 show breakpoint auto-hw
1080 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
1081 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
1082 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
1083 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
1084 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
1085 including "next" and "finish".
1088 catch exception unhandled
1089 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
1092 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
1096 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
1097 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
1098 an alias to "set sysroot".
1101 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
1102 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
1105 * New native configurations
1107 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
1110 unset tdesc filename
1112 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
1113 not query the target for its built-in description.
1117 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
1118 MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
1119 Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
1121 * New remote packets
1124 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
1125 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
1127 qXfer:features:read:
1128 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
1133 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
1134 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
1136 qXfer:libraries:read:
1137 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
1138 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
1139 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
1140 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
1144 Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
1152 i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
1153 i[34567]86-*-netware*
1154 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
1155 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
1157 i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
1160 i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
1161 i[34567]86-*-unixware*
1170 * Other removed features
1177 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
1184 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
1189 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
1190 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
1195 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
1196 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
1198 Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
1200 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
1201 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
1202 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
1203 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
1205 MIPS ".pdr" sections
1207 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
1208 in debugging information.
1212 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
1213 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
1215 set mips stack-arg-size
1216 set mips saved-gpreg-size
1218 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
1220 *** Changes in GDB 6.6
1225 Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
1227 * GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
1228 (mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
1229 running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
1231 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
1232 Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
1235 * The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
1236 broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
1238 * The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
1239 stub provides the required support.
1241 * Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
1242 longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
1247 unset substitute-path
1248 show substitute-path
1249 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
1250 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
1251 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
1252 between compilation and debugging.
1256 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
1257 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
1258 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
1262 The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
1264 Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
1265 an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
1267 The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
1269 * New remote packets
1272 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
1273 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
1274 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
1275 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
1279 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
1280 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
1282 qXfer:memory-map:read:
1283 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
1284 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
1289 Erase and program a flash memory device.
1291 * Removed remote packets
1294 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
1295 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
1297 *** Changes in GDB 6.5
1301 Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
1303 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
1307 init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
1308 only if it doesn't already have a value.
1310 The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
1312 checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
1314 restart <n> Return the program state to a
1315 previously saved state.
1317 info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
1319 delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
1321 set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
1322 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
1324 info forks List forks of the user program that
1325 are available to be debugged.
1327 fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
1328 forks of the user program that are
1329 available to be debugged.
1331 delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
1332 that are available to be debugged (and
1333 kill the forked process).
1335 detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
1336 that are available to be debugged (and
1337 allow the process to continue).
1341 Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
1343 * Improved Windows host support
1345 GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
1346 native console support, and remote communications using either
1347 network sockets or serial ports.
1349 * Improved Modula-2 language support
1351 GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
1352 basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
1353 pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
1354 printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
1355 written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
1356 GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
1360 The ARM rdi-share module.
1362 The Netware NLM debug server.
1364 *** Changes in GDB 6.4
1366 * New native configurations
1368 OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
1369 OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
1373 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
1375 * New command line options
1377 --batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
1378 --return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
1379 the child (debugged) program exited with.
1380 --eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
1381 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
1382 specified multiple times and in conjunction
1383 with the --command (-x) option.
1385 * Deprecated commands removed
1387 The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
1391 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
1392 othernames set arm disassembler
1393 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
1394 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
1395 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
1398 * New BSD user-level threads support
1400 It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
1401 library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
1404 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1405 FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
1406 OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
1408 Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
1409 are not yet supported.
1411 * New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
1412 (Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
1414 * REMOVED configurations and files
1416 VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
1417 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
1418 National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
1420 * New "set print array-indexes" command
1422 After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
1423 when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
1426 * VAX floating point support
1428 GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
1430 * User-defined command support
1432 In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
1433 to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
1434 section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
1436 *** Changes in GDB 6.3:
1438 * New command line option
1440 GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
1443 * GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
1445 GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
1446 information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
1447 by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
1448 proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
1449 to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
1451 * Internationalization
1453 When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
1454 internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
1455 continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
1459 Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
1460 implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
1461 into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
1463 * New native configurations
1465 GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
1469 GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
1470 packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
1472 * END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
1474 GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
1475 The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
1476 features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
1479 GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
1480 compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
1481 continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
1491 powerpc bdm protocol
1493 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
1494 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
1496 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1498 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1499 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1500 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1501 permanently REMOVED.
1510 *** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
1512 * MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
1514 When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
1515 heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
1518 * MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
1520 When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
1521 fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
1522 IRIX long double values).
1526 A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
1527 command. This problem has been fixed.
1529 *** Changes in GDB 6.2:
1531 * Fix for ``many threads''
1533 On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
1534 rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
1537 ptrace: No such process.
1538 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
1540 This problem has been fixed.
1542 * "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
1544 Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
1547 * New ``start'' command.
1549 This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
1551 * New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
1553 Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
1554 live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
1555 platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
1557 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1558 FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
1559 NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
1560 NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
1561 NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
1562 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
1563 OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
1564 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
1565 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
1567 * Signal trampoline code overhauled
1569 Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
1570 These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
1571 of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
1572 call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
1573 signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
1575 Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
1576 features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
1577 include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
1579 * Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
1581 * New native configurations
1583 GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
1584 OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
1585 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
1586 OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
1587 OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
1588 NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
1589 OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
1591 * END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
1593 GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
1594 The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
1595 including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
1596 migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
1597 compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
1598 work, was also included.
1600 GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
1601 module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
1611 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
1612 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
1614 * REMOVED configurations and files
1616 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
1617 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
1618 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
1619 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
1620 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
1621 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
1622 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
1623 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
1624 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
1625 sonymips mips-sony-*
1626 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
1628 *** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
1630 * TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
1632 The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
1633 GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
1634 command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
1635 program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
1638 * Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
1640 Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
1641 libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
1642 cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
1643 GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
1644 shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
1645 the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
1648 Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
1650 * Fixed ISO-C build problems
1652 The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
1653 non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
1654 compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
1656 * Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
1658 Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
1659 wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
1661 * Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
1663 The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
1664 permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
1665 systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
1667 * Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
1669 Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
1670 has been updated to use constant array sizes.
1672 * Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
1674 GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
1675 its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
1676 panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
1678 * Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
1680 When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
1681 by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
1682 not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
1684 *** Changes in GDB 6.1:
1686 * Removed --with-mmalloc
1688 Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
1689 conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
1691 * Changes in AMD64 configurations
1693 The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
1694 the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
1695 and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
1696 you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
1698 * Revised SPARC target
1700 The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
1701 FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
1702 support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
1703 from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
1704 (Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
1708 GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
1709 names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
1710 with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
1713 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
1715 GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
1716 arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
1719 * C++ nested types and namespaces
1721 GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
1722 improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
1723 is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
1724 Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
1725 namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
1726 "Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
1727 frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
1728 if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
1729 GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
1731 * New native configurations
1733 NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
1734 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
1735 OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
1736 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
1737 OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
1739 * New debugging protocols
1741 M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
1743 * "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
1745 The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
1746 and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
1747 tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
1749 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1751 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1752 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1753 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1754 permanently REMOVED.
1756 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
1757 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
1758 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
1759 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
1760 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
1761 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
1762 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
1763 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
1764 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
1765 sonymips mips-sony-*
1766 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
1768 * REMOVED configurations and files
1770 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
1771 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
1772 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1773 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1774 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1775 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
1776 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1777 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
1778 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
1779 386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
1780 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
1781 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
1782 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
1783 SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
1784 SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
1785 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1786 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
1788 *** Changes in GDB 6.0:
1792 Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
1793 integrated into GDB.
1795 * New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
1797 DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
1798 information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
1799 By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
1802 The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
1803 have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
1804 DWARF 2 CFI support.
1808 GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
1809 file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
1810 remote protocol documentation for details.
1812 * All targets using the new architecture framework.
1814 All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
1815 architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
1816 to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
1819 * GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
1821 GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
1822 per-thread variables.
1824 * GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
1826 GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
1827 GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
1829 * Separate debug info.
1831 GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
1832 automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
1833 of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
1834 system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
1835 and optional debug files.
1837 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
1839 DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
1840 describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
1843 GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
1844 for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
1848 A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
1849 Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
1850 considered "useable".
1852 * GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
1854 The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
1855 commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
1858 * GDB supports logging output to a file
1860 There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
1861 used to capture GDB's output to a file.
1863 * The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
1865 The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
1866 disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
1869 * d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
1871 The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
1872 registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
1876 A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
1877 be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
1878 session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
1879 "--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
1880 data, for more informative profiling results.
1882 * Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
1884 The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
1885 option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
1886 "mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
1888 Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
1891 Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
1892 Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
1893 Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
1894 in a subsequent -var-update.
1896 * New native configurations.
1898 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1900 * Multi-arched targets.
1902 HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
1903 Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
1905 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1907 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1908 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1909 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1910 permanently REMOVED.
1912 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1913 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1914 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1915 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
1916 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1917 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
1918 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
1919 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
1920 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
1921 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
1922 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1923 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
1925 * REMOVED configurations and files
1928 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1929 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
1930 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1931 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1932 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
1933 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1935 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
1936 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1937 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1938 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1939 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1940 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1942 * MIPS $fp behavior changed
1944 The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
1945 the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
1946 context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
1947 address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
1948 The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
1950 *** Changes in GDB 5.3:
1952 * GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
1954 When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
1955 `/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
1956 in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
1957 library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
1958 shared libs like mad''.
1960 * ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
1962 Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
1963 the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
1964 arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
1965 powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
1967 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
1969 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
1970 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
1973 The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
1974 invocations in expression, and shows the result.
1976 The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
1977 macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
1979 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
1980 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
1981 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
1982 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
1984 * Multi-arched targets.
1986 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
1987 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
1989 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
1990 Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
1991 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
1995 Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
1998 * New native configurations
2000 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
2001 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
2002 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
2003 UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
2005 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2007 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2008 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2009 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2010 permanently REMOVED.
2012 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
2013 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2014 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
2015 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
2016 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2017 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
2018 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
2019 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
2020 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
2021 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
2023 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
2024 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
2026 * OBSOLETE languages
2028 CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
2030 * REMOVED configurations and files
2032 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
2033 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2034 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2035 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2036 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2038 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
2040 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
2042 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
2043 commands. The default is 1024.
2045 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
2047 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
2049 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
2051 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
2052 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
2053 from a file into memory (restore).
2055 * Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
2057 The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
2058 including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
2059 of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
2061 *** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
2069 gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
2070 mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
2071 Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
2073 gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
2074 dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
2075 Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
2077 Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
2078 Surprisingly enough, it works now.
2079 By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
2081 i386 hardware watchpoint support:
2082 avoid misses on second run for some targets.
2083 By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
2085 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
2087 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
2089 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
2090 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
2091 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
2092 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
2093 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
2094 (notably embedded) targets.
2096 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
2098 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
2099 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
2100 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
2101 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
2103 * New command line option
2105 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
2107 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
2109 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
2110 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
2111 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
2112 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
2113 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
2114 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
2115 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
2116 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
2117 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
2118 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
2120 * Changes in ARM configurations.
2122 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
2123 configuration is fully multi-arch.
2125 * New native configurations
2127 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
2128 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
2129 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
2130 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
2134 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
2136 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2138 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2139 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2140 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2141 permanently REMOVED.
2143 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
2144 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2145 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2146 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2147 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2149 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
2151 * REMOVED configurations and files
2153 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2155 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2156 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2157 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
2158 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
2159 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
2160 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
2161 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
2162 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
2163 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
2164 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
2165 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
2167 * Changes to command line processing
2169 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
2170 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
2172 * Changes to key bindings
2174 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
2176 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
2178 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
2180 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
2183 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
2185 Numerous documentation fixes.
2187 Numerous testsuite fixes.
2189 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
2191 * New native configurations
2193 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
2194 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
2195 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
2196 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
2197 ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
2198 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
2202 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
2204 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
2206 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2208 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
2209 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
2210 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
2211 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
2212 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2214 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
2215 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2216 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2217 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
2218 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
2219 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
2220 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
2221 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
2223 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
2224 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
2226 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2227 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2228 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2229 permanently REMOVED.
2231 * REMOVED configurations and files
2233 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
2234 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
2236 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
2240 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
2242 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
2243 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
2248 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
2250 * The MI enabled by default.
2252 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
2253 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
2254 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
2255 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
2256 which is now deprecated.
2258 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
2260 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
2261 main features are supported:
2263 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
2265 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
2268 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
2270 - a Pascal expression parser.
2272 However, some important features are not yet supported.
2274 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
2276 - there are some problems with boolean types;
2278 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
2279 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
2281 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
2283 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
2285 * Changes in completion.
2287 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
2288 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
2289 users expect at the shell prompt.
2291 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
2292 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
2293 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
2294 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
2295 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
2296 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
2297 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
2299 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
2301 * New platform-independent commands:
2303 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
2304 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
2305 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
2307 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
2309 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
2310 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
2311 many threads as your system allows you to have.
2313 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
2315 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
2316 multi-threaded programs though.
2318 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
2320 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
2322 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
2323 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
2326 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
2328 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
2329 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
2330 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
2331 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
2332 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
2335 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
2336 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
2337 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
2339 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
2341 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
2342 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
2344 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
2345 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
2348 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
2349 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
2350 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
2351 a given linear address.
2353 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
2354 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
2355 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
2357 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
2359 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
2361 * Changes in documentation.
2363 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
2364 Documentation License.
2366 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
2369 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
2371 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
2374 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
2375 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
2376 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
2378 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
2380 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
2381 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
2382 contents of this file.
2386 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
2388 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
2390 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
2392 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
2393 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
2394 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
2395 greater level of detail.
2397 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
2399 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
2400 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
2401 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
2404 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
2406 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
2407 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
2408 machines ``out of the box''.
2410 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
2411 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
2412 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
2413 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
2414 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
2416 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
2417 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
2418 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
2419 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
2420 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
2422 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
2423 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
2426 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
2429 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
2430 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
2431 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
2432 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
2434 * New native configurations
2436 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
2437 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
2441 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
2442 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
2443 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
2444 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2446 * OBSOLETE configurations
2448 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
2449 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
2451 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
2454 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
2455 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
2456 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
2457 be permanently REMOVED.
2459 * Gould support removed
2461 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
2463 * New features for SVR4
2465 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
2466 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
2467 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
2469 * Many C++ enhancements
2471 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
2472 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
2474 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
2476 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
2477 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
2478 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
2479 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
2481 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
2482 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
2484 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
2486 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
2487 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
2488 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
2490 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
2491 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
2493 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
2495 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
2496 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
2497 include ``set remote P-packet''.
2499 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
2501 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
2502 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
2503 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
2505 * ``apropos'' command added.
2507 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
2508 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
2509 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
2513 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
2514 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
2515 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
2516 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
2517 enabled by configuring with:
2519 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
2521 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
2523 * New native configurations
2525 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
2526 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
2527 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
2531 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
2532 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
2533 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
2535 * OBSOLETE configurations
2537 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
2539 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
2540 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
2541 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
2542 be permanently REMOVED.
2546 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
2547 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
2548 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
2549 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
2550 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
2551 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
2552 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
2557 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
2559 * set extension-language
2561 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
2562 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
2563 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
2564 set extension-language .c c++
2565 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
2566 and their associated languages.
2568 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
2570 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
2571 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
2572 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
2576 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
2577 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
2579 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
2580 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
2582 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
2583 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
2584 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
2585 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
2586 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
2587 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
2588 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
2589 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
2591 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
2592 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
2593 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
2594 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
2598 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
2599 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
2600 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
2601 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
2602 for xdb and dbx commands.
2606 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
2607 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
2608 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
2610 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
2611 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
2612 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
2614 * Debugging across forks
2616 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
2621 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
2622 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
2623 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
2625 * GDB remote protocol additions
2627 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
2628 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
2629 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
2630 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
2632 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
2633 full 64-bit address. The command
2635 set remoteaddresssize 32
2637 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
2638 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
2641 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
2642 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
2644 maint packet heythere
2646 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
2647 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
2650 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
2651 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
2652 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
2654 * Tracing can collect general expressions
2656 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
2657 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
2658 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
2660 * mask-address variable for Mips
2662 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
2663 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
2664 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
2666 * Higher serial baud rates
2668 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
2669 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
2670 to achieve all of these rates.)
2674 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
2675 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
2678 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
2680 * New native configurations
2682 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
2683 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
2684 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
2685 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
2686 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2687 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
2688 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
2692 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
2693 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
2694 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
2695 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
2696 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
2697 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
2698 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
2699 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
2700 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
2701 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2702 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
2704 * New debugging protocols
2706 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
2707 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
2708 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
2709 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
2710 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
2711 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
2715 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
2716 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
2721 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
2722 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
2724 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
2726 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
2727 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
2728 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
2730 * Live range splitting
2732 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
2733 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
2734 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
2738 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
2739 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
2743 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
2744 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
2745 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
2750 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
2755 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
2756 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
2757 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
2758 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
2759 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
2760 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
2764 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
2765 the symbol at the specified address.
2769 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
2770 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
2771 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
2772 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
2773 file tracepoint.c for more details.
2777 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
2778 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
2779 of most MIPS variants.
2783 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
2784 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
2785 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
2789 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
2790 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
2791 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
2792 the possible architectures.
2794 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
2796 * New native configurations
2798 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
2799 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
2800 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
2801 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
2802 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2803 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
2807 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
2808 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
2809 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
2810 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
2811 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
2813 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2817 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
2818 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
2819 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
2820 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
2821 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
2825 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
2827 * Windows 95/NT native
2829 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
2830 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
2831 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
2832 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
2833 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
2835 * dont-repeat command
2837 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
2838 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
2839 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
2840 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
2842 * Send break instead of ^C
2844 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
2845 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
2846 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
2848 * Remote protocol timeout
2850 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
2851 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
2852 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
2854 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
2856 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
2857 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
2858 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
2859 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
2860 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
2862 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
2863 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
2864 automatically on hpux10.
2866 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
2868 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
2870 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
2872 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
2873 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
2874 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
2875 every character. The default value is 1050.
2877 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
2879 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
2880 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
2881 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
2882 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
2883 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
2884 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
2886 * Speedups for remote debugging
2888 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
2889 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
2890 and more efficient S-record downloading.
2892 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
2894 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
2895 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
2897 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
2899 * Psymtabs for XCOFF
2901 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
2902 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
2904 * Remote targets use caching
2906 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
2907 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
2908 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
2909 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
2910 off' turns the the data cache off.
2912 * Remote targets may have threads
2914 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
2915 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
2916 gdb/remote.c for details.
2920 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
2921 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
2922 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
2923 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
2924 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
2925 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
2926 sequence is something like
2928 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
2930 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
2934 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
2935 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
2936 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
2937 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
2938 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
2939 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
2940 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
2941 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
2945 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
2946 but does simplify configuration and building.
2950 GDB now supports hpux10.
2952 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
2954 * New native configurations
2956 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
2957 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
2958 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
2959 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
2963 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2964 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
2965 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
2966 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
2969 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
2971 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
2972 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
2973 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
2974 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
2975 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
2977 * Arguments to user-defined commands
2979 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
2980 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
2983 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
2985 To execute the command use:
2988 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
2989 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
2990 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
2992 * New `if' and `while' commands
2994 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
2995 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
2996 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
2997 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
2998 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
2999 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
3000 if the expression is zero.
3002 * Fortran source language mode
3004 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
3005 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
3006 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
3007 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
3010 * Better HPUX support
3012 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
3013 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
3014 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
3015 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
3016 that behavior do the following before running the program:
3022 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
3023 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
3029 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
3030 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
3033 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
3034 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
3036 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
3038 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
3039 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
3040 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
3041 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
3042 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
3043 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
3045 * New DOS host serial code
3047 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
3048 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
3051 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
3053 * New "complete" command
3055 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
3056 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
3058 * Trailing space optional in prompt
3060 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
3061 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
3063 * Breakpoint hit counts
3065 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
3066 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
3067 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
3068 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
3069 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
3072 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
3074 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
3075 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
3076 arrays actually contain only short strings.
3078 * Shared library breakpoints
3080 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
3081 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
3083 * Hardware watchpoints
3085 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
3086 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
3088 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
3092 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
3093 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
3095 * Improved Irix 5 support
3097 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
3099 * Improved HPPA support
3101 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
3103 * New native configurations
3105 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
3106 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
3107 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
3108 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
3112 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
3113 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
3116 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
3118 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
3119 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
3123 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
3124 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
3126 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
3128 * Irix 5 is now supported
3132 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
3133 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
3134 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
3135 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
3136 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
3139 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
3141 * User visible changes:
3145 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
3146 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
3147 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
3148 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
3149 debugging info for the mips target).
3151 * DEC Alpha native support
3153 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
3154 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
3155 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
3156 Alpha-specific notes.
3158 * Preliminary thread implementation
3160 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
3162 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
3164 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
3165 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
3168 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
3170 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
3171 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
3172 call methods, ...etc.
3174 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
3176 * User visible changes:
3178 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
3179 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
3180 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
3181 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
3183 Filename completion now works.
3185 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
3186 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
3187 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
3189 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
3190 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
3191 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
3192 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
3193 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
3197 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
3198 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
3201 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
3205 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
3206 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
3207 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
3211 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
3212 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
3213 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
3214 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
3215 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
3219 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
3220 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
3221 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
3223 * New targets supported
3225 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
3226 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
3227 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
3228 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
3229 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
3231 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
3232 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
3233 GO32 memory extender.
3235 * New remote protocols
3237 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
3239 * New source languages supported
3241 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
3242 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
3243 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
3246 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
3248 * HP Precision Architecture supported
3250 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
3251 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
3252 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
3253 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
3254 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
3255 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
3257 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
3259 * Faster and better demangling
3261 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
3262 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
3263 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
3264 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
3265 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
3266 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
3269 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
3270 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
3271 compiler does not actually implement.
3273 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
3275 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
3276 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
3277 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
3278 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
3279 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
3280 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
3283 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
3284 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
3286 * Improved configure script
3288 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
3289 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
3290 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
3291 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
3293 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
3294 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
3295 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
3296 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
3297 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
3298 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
3300 * Documentation improvements
3302 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
3303 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
3304 before submitting changes.
3306 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
3307 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
3308 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
3309 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
3310 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
3312 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
3313 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
3314 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
3315 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
3316 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
3317 around this problem.
3321 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
3322 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
3323 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
3326 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
3327 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
3329 * New native hosts supported
3331 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
3332 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
3334 * New targets supported
3336 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
3338 * New file formats supported
3340 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
3341 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
3345 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
3347 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
3348 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
3350 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
3351 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
3352 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
3354 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
3355 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
3357 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
3358 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
3359 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
3362 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
3363 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
3364 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
3365 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
3366 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
3368 * Internal improvements
3370 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
3371 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
3373 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
3374 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
3375 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
3376 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
3377 shared code that handles any of them.
3379 * New command line options
3381 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
3385 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
3386 General Public License.
3388 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
3390 * Host/native/target split
3392 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
3393 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
3394 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
3395 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
3396 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
3398 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
3399 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
3400 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
3401 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
3402 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
3403 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
3404 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
3406 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
3407 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
3408 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
3410 * New hosts supported
3412 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
3413 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
3414 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
3416 * New targets supported
3418 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
3419 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
3421 * New native hosts supported
3423 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
3424 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
3425 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
3427 * New file formats supported
3429 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
3430 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
3431 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
3435 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
3436 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
3437 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
3439 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
3441 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
3442 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
3443 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
3444 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
3448 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
3449 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
3450 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
3452 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
3456 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
3457 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
3460 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
3461 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
3463 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
3464 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
3465 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
3466 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
3467 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
3468 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
3470 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
3471 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
3472 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
3473 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
3477 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
3478 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
3479 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
3480 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
3481 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
3483 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
3484 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
3485 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
3486 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
3490 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
3491 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
3492 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
3493 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
3494 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
3495 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
3496 each instruction being stepped through.
3498 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
3499 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
3501 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
3502 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
3503 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
3504 processor with a serial port.
3508 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
3509 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
3510 supported, and what files each one uses.
3514 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
3515 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
3516 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
3517 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
3519 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
3520 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
3521 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
3522 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
3526 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
3527 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
3528 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
3529 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
3530 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
3531 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
3533 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
3536 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
3538 * Better support for C++ function names
3540 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
3541 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
3542 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
3543 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
3544 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
3546 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
3547 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
3548 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
3549 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
3550 for the list of formats.
3552 * G++ symbol mangling problem
3554 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
3555 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
3556 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
3557 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
3558 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
3559 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
3562 * New 'maintenance' command
3564 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
3565 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
3566 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
3568 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
3569 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
3570 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
3571 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
3572 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
3573 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
3575 The following commands are new:
3577 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
3578 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
3579 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
3581 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
3583 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
3584 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
3585 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
3586 read after argv processing.
3588 * New hosts supported
3590 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
3592 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
3594 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
3595 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
3596 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
3597 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
3598 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
3601 * New targets supported
3603 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
3605 * More smarts about finding #include files
3607 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
3608 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
3609 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
3610 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
3611 the one that contains your sources.
3613 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
3614 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
3615 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
3617 * Interesting infernals change
3619 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
3620 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
3621 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
3622 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
3624 * Bug fixes (of course!)
3626 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
3627 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
3628 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
3630 See the ChangeLog for details.
3632 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
3634 * New machines supported (host and target)
3636 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
3638 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
3640 * New malloc package
3642 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
3643 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
3644 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
3645 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
3646 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
3647 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
3651 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
3652 'help info proc' for details.
3654 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
3656 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
3657 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
3660 * File name changes for MS-DOS
3662 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
3663 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
3664 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
3665 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
3666 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
3667 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
3669 * Cross byte order fixes
3671 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
3672 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
3674 * New -mapped and -readnow options
3676 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
3677 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
3678 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
3679 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
3680 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
3681 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
3682 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
3683 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
3684 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
3685 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
3687 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
3688 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
3689 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
3690 slower, but makes future operations faster.
3692 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
3693 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
3694 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
3697 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
3699 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
3700 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
3701 shared across multiple host platforms.
3703 * longjmp() handling
3705 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
3706 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
3707 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
3708 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
3712 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
3713 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
3718 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
3719 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
3720 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
3722 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
3724 * New machines supported (host and target)
3726 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
3728 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
3729 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
3731 * New machines supported (target)
3733 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
3737 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
3738 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
3739 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
3741 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
3742 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
3743 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
3744 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
3745 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
3748 * New features for SVR4
3750 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
3751 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
3752 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
3754 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
3755 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
3756 it prints the address mappings of the process.
3758 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
3759 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
3761 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
3763 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
3764 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
3765 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
3766 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
3767 same code linked statically.
3771 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
3772 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
3773 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
3774 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
3775 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
3776 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
3780 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
3781 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
3782 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
3785 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
3787 * New machines supported (host and target)
3789 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
3790 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
3791 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
3793 * Almost SCO Unix support
3795 We had hoped to support:
3796 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
3797 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
3798 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
3799 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
3801 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
3803 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
3804 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
3805 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
3806 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
3811 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
3812 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
3813 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
3817 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
3818 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
3819 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
3821 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
3823 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
3824 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
3825 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
3827 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
3828 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
3829 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
3830 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
3833 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
3834 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
3835 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
3836 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
3839 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
3840 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
3843 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
3844 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
3845 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
3848 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
3850 * Improved configuration
3852 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
3853 Porting BFD is simpler.
3857 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
3858 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
3859 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
3860 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
3864 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
3866 * New host supported (not target)
3868 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
3871 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
3873 * Multiple source language support
3875 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
3876 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
3877 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
3878 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
3879 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
3880 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
3884 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
3885 currently under development at the State University of New York at
3886 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
3887 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
3889 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
3890 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
3891 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
3893 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
3894 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
3898 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
3899 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
3900 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
3901 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
3904 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
3906 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
3907 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
3908 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
3909 examining core files.
3913 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
3916 * New machines supported (host and target)
3918 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
3919 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
3920 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
3922 * New hosts supported (not targets)
3924 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
3926 * New targets supported (not hosts)
3928 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
3929 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
3930 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
3932 * New remote interfaces
3938 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
3942 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
3944 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
3945 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
3946 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
3947 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
3948 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
3949 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
3950 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
3951 stub on the target system.
3953 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
3955 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
3956 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
3957 object file types such as a.out and coff.
3959 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
3960 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
3963 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
3965 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
3966 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
3968 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
3969 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
3970 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
3972 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
3973 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
3974 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
3975 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
3977 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
3978 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
3979 it is already running. Default is ON.
3981 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
3982 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
3983 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
3984 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
3987 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
3988 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
3989 or the value of the environment variable
3992 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
3993 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
3996 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
3997 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
3998 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
4000 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
4001 history expansion will be performed on
4002 command line input. The default is OFF.
4004 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
4005 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
4006 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
4008 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
4009 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
4010 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
4013 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
4014 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
4015 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
4018 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
4019 ``set width'' instead.
4021 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
4022 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
4023 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
4024 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
4026 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
4029 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
4032 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
4035 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
4038 * Support for Epoch Environment.
4040 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
4041 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
4042 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
4046 * Support for Shared Libraries
4048 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
4049 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
4050 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
4051 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
4052 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
4053 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
4054 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
4055 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
4057 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
4058 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
4059 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
4061 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
4066 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
4067 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
4068 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
4069 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
4070 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
4071 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
4073 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
4075 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
4077 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4078 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4079 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4082 * C++ multiple inheritance
4084 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
4087 * C++ exception handling
4089 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
4090 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
4091 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
4094 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
4095 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
4096 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
4098 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
4099 current stack frame.
4102 * Minor command changes
4104 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
4105 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
4106 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
4108 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
4109 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
4110 frames without printing.
4112 * New directory command
4114 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
4115 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
4116 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
4117 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
4118 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
4120 * Configuring GDB for compilation
4122 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
4125 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
4126 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
4127 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
4128 where the program that you are debugging will run.