1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB 6.0:
8 The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
9 FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
10 support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped.
14 GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
15 names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
16 with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
19 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
21 GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
22 arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
25 * New native configurations
27 NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
29 * New debugging protocols
31 M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
33 * "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
35 The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
36 and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
37 tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
39 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
41 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
42 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
43 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
46 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
47 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
48 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
49 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
50 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
51 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
52 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
53 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
54 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
56 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
58 * REMOVED configurations and files
60 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
61 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
62 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
63 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
64 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
65 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
66 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
67 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
68 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
69 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
70 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
71 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
72 SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
73 SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
74 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
75 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
77 *** Changes in GDB 6.0:
81 Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
84 * New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
86 DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
87 information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
88 By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
91 The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
92 have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
97 GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
98 file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
99 remote protocol documentation for details.
101 * All targets using the new architecture framework.
103 All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
104 architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
105 to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
108 * GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
110 GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
111 per-thread variables.
113 * GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
115 GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
116 GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
118 * Separate debug info.
120 GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
121 automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
122 of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
123 system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
124 and optional debug files.
126 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
128 DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
129 describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
132 GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
133 for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
137 A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
138 Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
139 considered "useable".
141 * GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
143 The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
144 commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
147 * GDB supports logging output to a file
149 There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
150 used to capture GDB's output to a file.
152 * The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
154 The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
155 disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
158 * d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
160 The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
161 registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
165 A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
166 be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
167 session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
168 "--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
169 data, for more informative profiling results.
171 * Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
173 The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
174 option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
175 "mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
177 Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
180 Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
181 Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
182 Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
183 in a subsequent -var-update.
185 * New native configurations.
187 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
189 * Multi-arched targets.
191 HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
192 Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
194 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
196 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
197 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
198 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
201 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
202 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
203 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
204 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
205 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
206 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
207 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
208 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
209 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
210 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
211 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
212 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
214 * REMOVED configurations and files
217 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
218 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
219 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
220 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
221 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
222 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
224 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
225 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
226 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
227 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
228 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
229 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
231 * MIPS $fp behavior changed
233 The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
234 the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
235 context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
236 address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
237 The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
239 *** Changes in GDB 5.3:
241 * GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
243 When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
244 `/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
245 in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
246 library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
247 shared libs like mad''.
249 * ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
251 Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
252 the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
253 arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
254 powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
256 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
258 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
259 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
262 The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
263 invocations in expression, and shows the result.
265 The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
266 macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
268 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
269 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
270 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
271 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
273 * Multi-arched targets.
275 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
276 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
278 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
279 Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
280 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
284 Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
287 * New native configurations
289 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
290 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
291 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
292 UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
294 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
296 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
297 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
298 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
301 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
302 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
303 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
304 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
305 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
306 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
307 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
308 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
309 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
310 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
312 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
313 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
317 CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
319 * REMOVED configurations and files
321 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
322 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
323 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
324 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
325 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
327 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
329 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
331 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
332 commands. The default is 1024.
334 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
336 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
338 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
340 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
341 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
342 from a file into memory (restore).
344 * Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
346 The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
347 including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
348 of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
350 *** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
358 gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
359 mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
360 Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
362 gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
363 dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
364 Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
366 Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
367 Surprisingly enough, it works now.
368 By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
370 i386 hardware watchpoint support:
371 avoid misses on second run for some targets.
372 By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
374 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
376 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
378 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
379 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
380 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
381 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
382 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
383 (notably embedded) targets.
385 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
387 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
388 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
389 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
390 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
392 * New command line option
394 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
396 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
398 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
399 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
400 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
401 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
402 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
403 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
404 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
405 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
406 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
407 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
409 * Changes in ARM configurations.
411 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
412 configuration is fully multi-arch.
414 * New native configurations
416 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
417 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
418 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
419 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
423 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
425 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
427 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
428 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
429 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
432 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
433 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
434 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
435 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
436 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
438 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
440 * REMOVED configurations and files
442 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
444 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
445 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
446 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
447 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
448 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
449 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
450 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
451 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
452 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
453 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
454 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
456 * Changes to command line processing
458 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
459 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
461 * Changes to key bindings
463 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
465 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
467 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
469 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
472 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
474 Numerous documentation fixes.
476 Numerous testsuite fixes.
478 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
480 * New native configurations
482 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
483 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
484 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
485 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
487 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
491 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
493 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
495 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
497 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
498 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
499 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
500 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
501 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
503 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
504 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
505 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
506 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
507 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
508 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
509 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
510 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
512 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
513 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
515 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
516 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
517 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
520 * REMOVED configurations and files
522 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
523 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
525 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
529 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
531 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
532 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
537 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
539 * The MI enabled by default.
541 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
542 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
543 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
544 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
545 which is now deprecated.
547 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
549 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
550 main features are supported:
552 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
554 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
557 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
559 - a Pascal expression parser.
561 However, some important features are not yet supported.
563 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
565 - there are some problems with boolean types;
567 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
568 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
570 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
572 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
574 * Changes in completion.
576 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
577 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
578 users expect at the shell prompt.
580 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
581 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
582 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
583 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
584 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
585 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
586 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
588 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
590 * New platform-independent commands:
592 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
593 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
594 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
596 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
598 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
599 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
600 many threads as your system allows you to have.
602 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
604 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
605 multi-threaded programs though.
607 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
609 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
611 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
612 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
615 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
617 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
618 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
619 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
620 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
621 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
624 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
625 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
626 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
628 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
630 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
631 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
633 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
634 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
637 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
638 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
639 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
640 a given linear address.
642 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
643 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
644 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
646 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
648 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
650 * Changes in documentation.
652 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
653 Documentation License.
655 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
658 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
660 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
663 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
664 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
665 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
667 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
669 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
670 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
671 contents of this file.
675 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
677 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
679 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
681 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
682 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
683 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
684 greater level of detail.
686 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
688 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
689 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
690 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
693 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
695 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
696 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
697 machines ``out of the box''.
699 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
700 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
701 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
702 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
703 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
705 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
706 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
707 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
708 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
709 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
711 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
712 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
715 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
718 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
719 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
720 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
721 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
723 * New native configurations
725 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
726 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
730 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
731 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
732 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
733 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
735 * OBSOLETE configurations
737 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
738 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
740 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
743 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
744 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
745 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
746 be permanently REMOVED.
748 * Gould support removed
750 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
752 * New features for SVR4
754 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
755 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
756 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
758 * Many C++ enhancements
760 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
761 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
763 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
765 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
766 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
767 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
768 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
770 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
771 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
773 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
775 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
776 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
777 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
779 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
780 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
782 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
784 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
785 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
786 include ``set remote P-packet''.
788 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
790 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
791 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
792 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
794 * ``apropos'' command added.
796 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
797 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
798 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
802 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
803 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
804 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
805 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
806 enabled by configuring with:
808 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
810 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
812 * New native configurations
814 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
815 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
816 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
820 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
821 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
822 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
824 * OBSOLETE configurations
826 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
828 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
829 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
830 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
831 be permanently REMOVED.
835 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
836 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
837 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
838 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
839 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
840 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
841 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
846 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
848 * set extension-language
850 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
851 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
852 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
853 set extension-language .c c++
854 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
855 and their associated languages.
857 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
859 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
860 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
861 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
865 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
866 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
868 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
869 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
871 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
872 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
873 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
874 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
875 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
876 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
877 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
878 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
880 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
881 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
882 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
883 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
887 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
888 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
889 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
890 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
891 for xdb and dbx commands.
895 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
896 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
897 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
899 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
900 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
901 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
903 * Debugging across forks
905 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
910 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
911 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
912 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
914 * GDB remote protocol additions
916 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
917 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
918 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
919 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
921 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
922 full 64-bit address. The command
924 set remoteaddresssize 32
926 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
927 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
930 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
931 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
933 maint packet heythere
935 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
936 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
939 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
940 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
941 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
943 * Tracing can collect general expressions
945 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
946 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
947 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
949 * mask-address variable for Mips
951 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
952 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
953 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
955 * Higher serial baud rates
957 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
958 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
959 to achieve all of these rates.)
963 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
964 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
967 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
969 * New native configurations
971 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
972 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
973 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
974 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
975 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
976 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
977 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
981 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
982 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
983 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
984 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
985 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
986 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
987 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
988 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
989 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
990 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
991 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
993 * New debugging protocols
995 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
996 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
997 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
998 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
999 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1000 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1004 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
1005 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
1010 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
1011 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
1013 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
1015 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
1016 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
1017 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
1019 * Live range splitting
1021 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
1022 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
1023 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
1027 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
1028 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
1032 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
1033 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
1034 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
1039 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
1044 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
1045 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
1046 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
1047 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
1048 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
1049 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
1053 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
1054 the symbol at the specified address.
1058 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
1059 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
1060 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
1061 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
1062 file tracepoint.c for more details.
1066 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
1067 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
1068 of most MIPS variants.
1072 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
1073 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
1074 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
1078 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
1079 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
1080 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
1081 the possible architectures.
1083 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
1085 * New native configurations
1087 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
1088 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
1089 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
1090 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
1091 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1092 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
1096 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
1097 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1098 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
1099 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
1100 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
1102 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1106 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
1107 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
1108 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
1109 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
1110 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
1114 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
1116 * Windows 95/NT native
1118 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
1119 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
1120 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
1121 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
1122 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
1124 * dont-repeat command
1126 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
1127 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
1128 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
1129 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
1131 * Send break instead of ^C
1133 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
1134 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
1135 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
1137 * Remote protocol timeout
1139 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
1140 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
1141 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
1143 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
1145 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
1146 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
1147 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
1148 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
1149 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
1151 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
1152 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
1153 automatically on hpux10.
1155 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
1157 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
1159 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
1161 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
1162 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
1163 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
1164 every character. The default value is 1050.
1166 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
1168 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
1169 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
1170 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
1171 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
1172 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
1173 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
1175 * Speedups for remote debugging
1177 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
1178 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
1179 and more efficient S-record downloading.
1181 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
1183 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
1184 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
1186 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
1188 * Psymtabs for XCOFF
1190 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
1191 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
1193 * Remote targets use caching
1195 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
1196 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
1197 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
1198 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
1199 off' turns the the data cache off.
1201 * Remote targets may have threads
1203 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
1204 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
1205 gdb/remote.c for details.
1209 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
1210 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
1211 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
1212 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
1213 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
1214 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
1215 sequence is something like
1217 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
1219 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
1223 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
1224 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
1225 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
1226 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
1227 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
1228 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
1229 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
1230 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
1234 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
1235 but does simplify configuration and building.
1239 GDB now supports hpux10.
1241 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
1243 * New native configurations
1245 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
1246 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
1247 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
1248 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
1252 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1253 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
1254 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
1255 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
1258 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
1260 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
1261 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
1262 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
1263 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
1264 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
1266 * Arguments to user-defined commands
1268 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
1269 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
1272 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
1274 To execute the command use:
1277 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
1278 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
1279 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
1281 * New `if' and `while' commands
1283 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
1284 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
1285 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
1286 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
1287 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
1288 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
1289 if the expression is zero.
1291 * Fortran source language mode
1293 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
1294 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
1295 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
1296 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
1299 * Better HPUX support
1301 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
1302 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
1303 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
1304 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
1305 that behavior do the following before running the program:
1311 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
1312 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
1318 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
1319 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
1322 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
1323 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
1325 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
1327 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
1328 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
1329 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
1330 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
1331 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
1332 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
1334 * New DOS host serial code
1336 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
1337 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
1340 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
1342 * New "complete" command
1344 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
1345 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
1347 * Trailing space optional in prompt
1349 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
1350 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
1352 * Breakpoint hit counts
1354 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
1355 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
1356 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
1357 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
1358 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
1361 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
1363 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
1364 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
1365 arrays actually contain only short strings.
1367 * Shared library breakpoints
1369 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
1370 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
1372 * Hardware watchpoints
1374 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
1375 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
1377 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
1381 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
1382 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
1384 * Improved Irix 5 support
1386 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
1388 * Improved HPPA support
1390 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
1392 * New native configurations
1394 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
1395 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1396 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
1397 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
1401 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1402 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
1405 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
1407 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
1408 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
1412 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
1413 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
1415 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
1417 * Irix 5 is now supported
1421 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
1422 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
1423 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
1424 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
1425 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
1428 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
1430 * User visible changes:
1434 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
1435 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
1436 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
1437 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
1438 debugging info for the mips target).
1440 * DEC Alpha native support
1442 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
1443 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
1444 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
1445 Alpha-specific notes.
1447 * Preliminary thread implementation
1449 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
1451 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
1453 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
1454 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
1457 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
1459 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
1460 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
1461 call methods, ...etc.
1463 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
1465 * User visible changes:
1467 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
1468 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
1469 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
1470 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
1472 Filename completion now works.
1474 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
1475 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
1476 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
1478 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
1479 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
1480 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
1481 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
1482 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
1486 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
1487 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
1490 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
1494 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
1495 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
1496 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
1500 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
1501 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
1502 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
1503 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
1504 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
1508 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
1509 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
1510 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
1512 * New targets supported
1514 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
1515 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1516 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
1517 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1518 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
1520 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
1521 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
1522 GO32 memory extender.
1524 * New remote protocols
1526 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
1528 * New source languages supported
1530 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
1531 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
1532 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
1535 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
1537 * HP Precision Architecture supported
1539 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
1540 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
1541 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
1542 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
1543 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
1544 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
1546 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
1548 * Faster and better demangling
1550 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
1551 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
1552 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
1553 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
1554 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
1555 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
1558 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
1559 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
1560 compiler does not actually implement.
1562 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
1564 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
1565 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
1566 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
1567 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
1568 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
1569 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
1572 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
1573 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
1575 * Improved configure script
1577 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
1578 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
1579 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
1580 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
1582 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
1583 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
1584 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
1585 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
1586 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
1587 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
1589 * Documentation improvements
1591 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
1592 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
1593 before submitting changes.
1595 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
1596 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
1597 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
1598 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
1599 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
1601 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
1602 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
1603 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
1604 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
1605 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
1606 around this problem.
1610 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
1611 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
1612 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
1615 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
1616 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
1618 * New native hosts supported
1620 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
1621 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
1623 * New targets supported
1625 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
1627 * New file formats supported
1629 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
1630 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
1634 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
1636 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
1637 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
1639 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
1640 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
1641 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
1643 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
1644 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
1646 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
1647 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
1648 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
1651 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
1652 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
1653 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
1654 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
1655 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
1657 * Internal improvements
1659 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
1660 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
1662 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
1663 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
1664 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
1665 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
1666 shared code that handles any of them.
1668 * New command line options
1670 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
1674 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
1675 General Public License.
1677 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
1679 * Host/native/target split
1681 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
1682 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
1683 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
1684 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
1685 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
1687 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
1688 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
1689 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
1690 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
1691 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
1692 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
1693 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
1695 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
1696 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
1697 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
1699 * New hosts supported
1701 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
1702 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
1703 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
1705 * New targets supported
1707 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
1708 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
1710 * New native hosts supported
1712 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
1713 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
1714 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
1716 * New file formats supported
1718 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
1719 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
1720 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
1724 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
1725 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
1726 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
1728 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
1730 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
1731 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
1732 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
1733 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
1737 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
1738 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
1739 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
1741 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
1745 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
1746 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
1749 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
1750 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
1752 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
1753 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
1754 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
1755 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
1756 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
1757 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
1759 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
1760 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
1761 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
1762 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
1766 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
1767 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
1768 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
1769 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
1770 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
1772 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
1773 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
1774 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
1775 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
1779 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
1780 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
1781 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
1782 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
1783 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
1784 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
1785 each instruction being stepped through.
1787 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
1788 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
1790 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
1791 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
1792 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
1793 processor with a serial port.
1797 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
1798 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
1799 supported, and what files each one uses.
1803 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
1804 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
1805 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
1806 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
1808 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
1809 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
1810 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
1811 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
1815 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
1816 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
1817 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
1818 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
1819 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
1820 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
1822 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
1825 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
1827 * Better support for C++ function names
1829 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
1830 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
1831 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
1832 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
1833 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
1835 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
1836 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
1837 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
1838 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
1839 for the list of formats.
1841 * G++ symbol mangling problem
1843 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
1844 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
1845 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
1846 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
1847 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
1848 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
1851 * New 'maintenance' command
1853 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
1854 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
1855 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
1857 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
1858 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
1859 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
1860 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
1861 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
1862 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
1864 The following commands are new:
1866 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
1867 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
1868 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
1870 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
1872 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
1873 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
1874 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
1875 read after argv processing.
1877 * New hosts supported
1879 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
1881 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
1883 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
1884 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
1885 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
1886 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
1887 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
1890 * New targets supported
1892 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
1894 * More smarts about finding #include files
1896 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
1897 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
1898 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
1899 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
1900 the one that contains your sources.
1902 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
1903 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
1904 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
1906 * Interesting infernals change
1908 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
1909 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
1910 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
1911 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
1913 * Bug fixes (of course!)
1915 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
1916 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
1917 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
1919 See the ChangeLog for details.
1921 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
1923 * New machines supported (host and target)
1925 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
1927 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
1929 * New malloc package
1931 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
1932 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
1933 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
1934 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
1935 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
1936 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
1940 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
1941 'help info proc' for details.
1943 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
1945 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
1946 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
1949 * File name changes for MS-DOS
1951 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
1952 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
1953 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
1954 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
1955 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
1956 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
1958 * Cross byte order fixes
1960 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
1961 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
1963 * New -mapped and -readnow options
1965 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
1966 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
1967 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
1968 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
1969 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
1970 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
1971 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
1972 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
1973 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
1974 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
1976 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
1977 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
1978 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
1979 slower, but makes future operations faster.
1981 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
1982 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
1983 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
1986 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
1988 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
1989 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
1990 shared across multiple host platforms.
1992 * longjmp() handling
1994 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
1995 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
1996 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
1997 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
2001 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
2002 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
2007 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
2008 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
2009 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
2011 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
2013 * New machines supported (host and target)
2015 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2017 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
2018 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
2020 * New machines supported (target)
2022 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2026 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
2027 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
2028 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
2030 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
2031 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
2032 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
2033 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
2034 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
2037 * New features for SVR4
2039 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
2040 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
2041 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
2043 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
2044 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
2045 it prints the address mappings of the process.
2047 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
2048 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
2050 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
2052 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
2053 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
2054 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
2055 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
2056 same code linked statically.
2060 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
2061 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
2062 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
2063 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
2064 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
2065 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
2069 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
2070 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
2071 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
2074 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
2076 * New machines supported (host and target)
2078 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
2079 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
2080 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2082 * Almost SCO Unix support
2084 We had hoped to support:
2085 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2086 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
2087 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
2088 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
2090 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
2092 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
2093 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
2094 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
2095 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
2100 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
2101 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
2102 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
2106 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
2107 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
2108 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
2110 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
2112 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
2113 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
2114 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
2116 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
2117 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
2118 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
2119 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
2122 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
2123 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
2124 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
2125 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
2128 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
2129 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
2132 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
2133 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
2134 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
2137 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
2139 * Improved configuration
2141 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
2142 Porting BFD is simpler.
2146 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
2147 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
2148 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
2149 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
2153 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
2155 * New host supported (not target)
2157 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
2160 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
2162 * Multiple source language support
2164 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
2165 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
2166 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
2167 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
2168 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
2169 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
2173 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
2174 currently under development at the State University of New York at
2175 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
2176 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
2178 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
2179 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
2180 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
2182 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
2183 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
2187 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
2188 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
2189 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
2190 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
2193 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
2195 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
2196 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
2197 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
2198 examining core files.
2202 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
2205 * New machines supported (host and target)
2207 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
2208 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
2209 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
2211 * New hosts supported (not targets)
2213 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
2215 * New targets supported (not hosts)
2217 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2218 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2219 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
2221 * New remote interfaces
2227 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
2231 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
2233 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
2234 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
2235 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
2236 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
2237 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
2238 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
2239 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
2240 stub on the target system.
2242 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
2244 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
2245 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
2246 object file types such as a.out and coff.
2248 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
2249 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
2252 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
2254 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
2255 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
2257 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
2258 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
2259 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
2261 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
2262 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
2263 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
2264 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
2266 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
2267 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
2268 it is already running. Default is ON.
2270 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
2271 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
2272 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
2273 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
2276 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
2277 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
2278 or the value of the environment variable
2281 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
2282 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
2285 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
2286 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
2287 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
2289 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
2290 history expansion will be performed on
2291 command line input. The default is OFF.
2293 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
2294 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
2295 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
2297 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
2298 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
2299 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2302 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
2303 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
2304 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2307 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
2308 ``set width'' instead.
2310 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
2311 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
2312 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
2313 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
2315 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
2318 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
2321 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
2324 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
2327 * Support for Epoch Environment.
2329 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
2330 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
2331 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
2335 * Support for Shared Libraries
2337 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
2338 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
2339 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
2340 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
2341 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
2342 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
2343 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
2344 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
2346 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
2347 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
2348 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
2350 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
2355 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
2356 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
2357 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
2358 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
2359 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
2360 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
2362 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
2364 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
2366 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2367 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2368 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2371 * C++ multiple inheritance
2373 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
2376 * C++ exception handling
2378 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
2379 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
2380 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
2383 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
2384 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
2385 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
2387 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
2388 current stack frame.
2391 * Minor command changes
2393 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
2394 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
2395 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
2397 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
2398 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
2399 frames without printing.
2401 * New directory command
2403 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
2404 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
2405 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
2406 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
2407 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
2409 * Configuring GDB for compilation
2411 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
2414 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
2415 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
2416 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
2417 where the program that you are debugging will run.
projects / deliverable / binutils-gdb.git / blob