2012-03-08 Luis Machado <lgustavo@codesourcery.com>
[deliverable/binutils-gdb.git] / gdb / NEWS
1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
3
4 *** Changes since GDB 7.4
5
6 * Python scripting
7
8 ** GDB commands implemented in Python can now be put in command class
9 "gdb.COMMAND_USER".
10
11 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" is now deleted.
12
13 ** A new class, gdb.printing.FlagEnumerationPrinter, can be used to
14 apply "flag enum"-style pretty-printing to any enum.
15
16 ** gdb.lookup_symbol can now work when there is no current frame.
17
18 ** gdb.Symbol now has a 'line' attribute, holding the line number in
19 the source at which the symbol was defined.
20
21 ** gdb.Symbol now has the new attribute 'needs_frame' and the new
22 method 'value'. The former indicates whether the symbol needs a
23 frame in order to compute its value, and the latter computes the
24 symbol's value.
25
26 * GDBserver now supports stdio connections.
27 E.g. (gdb) target remote | ssh myhost gdbserver - hello
28
29 * The binary "gdbtui" can no longer be built or installed.
30 Use "gdb -tui" instead.
31
32 * GDB will now print "flag" enums specially. A flag enum is one where
33 all the enumerator values have no bits in common when pairwise
34 "and"ed. When printing a value whose type is a flag enum, GDB will
35 show all the constants, e.g., for enum E { ONE = 1, TWO = 2}:
36 (gdb) print (enum E) 3
37 $1 = (ONE | TWO)
38
39 * The filename part of a linespec will now match trailing components
40 of a source file name. For example, "break gcc/expr.c:1000" will
41 now set a breakpoint in build/gcc/expr.c, but not
42 build/libcpp/expr.c.
43
44 * The "info proc" and "generate-core-file" commands will now also
45 work on remote targets connected to GDBserver on Linux.
46
47 * The command "info catch" has been removed. It has been disabled
48 since December 2007.
49
50 * The "catch exception" and "catch assert" commands now accept
51 a condition at the end of the command, much like the "break"
52 command does. For instance:
53
54 (gdb) catch exception Constraint_Error if Barrier = True
55
56 Previously, it was possible to add a condition to such catchpoints,
57 but it had to be done as a second step, after the catchpoint had been
58 created, using the "condition" command.
59
60 * The "info static-tracepoint-marker" command will now also work on
61 native Linux targets with in-process agent.
62
63 * New commands
64
65 ** "catch load" and "catch unload" can be used to stop when a shared
66 library is loaded or unloaded, respectively.
67
68 ** "enable count" can be used to auto-disable a breakpoint after
69 several hits.
70
71 * New targets
72
73 Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
74 HP OpenVMS ia64 ia64-hp-openvms*
75
76 * GDBserver supports evaluation of breakpoint conditions. When
77 support is advertised by GDBserver, GDB may be told to send the
78 breakpoint conditions in bytecode form to GDBserver. GDBserver
79 will only report the breakpoint trigger to GDB when its condition
80 evaluates to true.
81
82 * New options
83
84 set breakpoint condition-evaluation
85 show breakpoint condition-evaluation
86 Controls whether breakpoint conditions are evaluated by GDB ("gdb") or by
87 GDBserver ("target").
88 This option can improve debugger efficiency depending on the speed of the
89 target.
90
91 * New remote packets
92
93 z0/z1 conditional breakpoints extension
94
95 The z0/z1 breakpoint insertion packets have been extended to carry
96 a list of conditional expressions over to the remote stub depending on the
97 condition evaluation mode. The use of this extension can be controlled
98 via the "set remote conditional-breakpoints-packet" command.
99
100 QProgramSignals:
101
102 Specify the signals which the remote stub may pass to the debugged
103 program without GDB involvement.
104
105 *** Changes in GDB 7.4
106
107 * GDB now handles ambiguous linespecs more consistently; the existing
108 FILE:LINE support has been expanded to other types of linespecs. A
109 breakpoint will now be set on all matching locations in all
110 inferiors, and locations will be added or removed according to
111 inferior changes.
112
113 * GDB now allows you to skip uninteresting functions and files when
114 stepping with the "skip function" and "skip file" commands.
115
116 * GDB has two new commands: "set remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit"
117 and "show remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit". These allows to
118 set or show the maximum length limit (in bytes) of a remote
119 target hardware watchpoint.
120
121 This allows e.g. to use "unlimited" hardware watchpoints with the
122 gdbserver integrated in Valgrind version >= 3.7.0. Such Valgrind
123 watchpoints are slower than real hardware watchpoints but are
124 significantly faster than gdb software watchpoints.
125
126 * Python scripting
127
128 ** The register_pretty_printer function in module gdb.printing now takes
129 an optional `replace' argument. If True, the new printer replaces any
130 existing one.
131
132 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" command has been
133 deprecated and will be deleted in GDB 7.5.
134 A new command: "set python print-stack none|full|message" has
135 replaced it. Additionally, the default for "print-stack" is
136 now "message", which just prints the error message without
137 the stack trace.
138
139 ** A prompt substitution hook (prompt_hook) is now available to the
140 Python API.
141
142 ** A new Python module, gdb.prompt has been added to the GDB Python
143 modules library. This module provides functionality for
144 escape sequences in prompts (used by set/show
145 extended-prompt). These escape sequences are replaced by their
146 corresponding value.
147
148 ** Python commands and convenience-functions located in
149 'data-directory'/python/gdb/command and
150 'data-directory'/python/gdb/function are now automatically loaded
151 on GDB start-up.
152
153 ** Blocks now provide four new attributes. global_block and
154 static_block will return the global and static blocks
155 respectively. is_static and is_global are boolean attributes
156 that indicate if the block is one of those two types.
157
158 ** Symbols now provide the "type" attribute, the type of the symbol.
159
160 ** The "gdb.breakpoint" function has been deprecated in favor of
161 "gdb.breakpoints".
162
163 ** A new class "gdb.FinishBreakpoint" is provided to catch the return
164 of a function. This class is based on the "finish" command
165 available in the CLI.
166
167 ** Type objects for struct and union types now allow access to
168 the fields using standard Python dictionary (mapping) methods.
169 For example, "some_type['myfield']" now works, as does
170 "some_type.items()".
171
172 ** A new event "gdb.new_objfile" has been added, triggered by loading a
173 new object file.
174
175 ** A new function, "deep_items" has been added to the gdb.types
176 module in the GDB Python modules library. This function returns
177 an iterator over the fields of a struct or union type. Unlike
178 the standard Python "iteritems" method, it will recursively traverse
179 any anonymous fields.
180
181 * MI changes
182
183 ** "*stopped" events can report several new "reason"s, such as
184 "solib-event".
185
186 ** Breakpoint changes are now notified using new async records, like
187 "=breakpoint-modified".
188
189 ** New command -ada-task-info.
190
191 * libthread-db-search-path now supports two special values: $sdir and $pdir.
192 $sdir specifies the default system locations of shared libraries.
193 $pdir specifies the directory where the libpthread used by the application
194 lives.
195
196 GDB no longer looks in $sdir and $pdir after it has searched the directories
197 mentioned in libthread-db-search-path. If you want to search those
198 directories, they must be specified in libthread-db-search-path.
199 The default value of libthread-db-search-path on GNU/Linux and Solaris
200 systems is now "$sdir:$pdir".
201
202 $pdir is not supported by gdbserver, it is currently ignored.
203 $sdir is supported by gdbserver.
204
205 * New configure option --with-iconv-bin.
206 When using the internationalization support like the one in the GNU C
207 library, GDB will invoke the "iconv" program to get a list of supported
208 character sets. If this program lives in a non-standard location, one can
209 use this option to specify where to find it.
210
211 * When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
212 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports masked hardware
213 watchpoints, which specify a mask in addition to an address to watch.
214 The mask specifies that some bits of an address (the bits which are
215 reset in the mask) should be ignored when matching the address accessed
216 by the inferior against the watchpoint address. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
217 section in the user manual for more details.
218
219 * The new option --once causes GDBserver to stop listening for connections once
220 the first connection is made. The listening port used by GDBserver will
221 become available after that.
222
223 * New commands "info macros" and "alias" have been added.
224
225 * New function parameters suffix @entry specifies value of function parameter
226 at the time the function got called. Entry values are available only since
227 gcc version 4.7.
228
229 * New commands
230
231 !SHELL COMMAND
232 "!" is now an alias of the "shell" command.
233 Note that no space is needed between "!" and SHELL COMMAND.
234
235 * Changed commands
236
237 watch EXPRESSION mask MASK_VALUE
238 The watch command now supports the mask argument which allows creation
239 of masked watchpoints, if the current architecture supports this feature.
240
241 info auto-load-scripts [REGEXP]
242 This command was formerly named "maintenance print section-scripts".
243 It is now generally useful and is no longer a maintenance-only command.
244
245 info macro [-all] [--] MACRO
246 The info macro command has new options `-all' and `--'. The first for
247 printing all definitions of a macro. The second for explicitly specifying
248 the end of arguments and the beginning of the macro name in case the macro
249 name starts with a hyphen.
250
251 collect[/s] EXPRESSIONS
252 The tracepoint collect command now takes an optional modifier "/s"
253 that directs it to dereference pointer-to-character types and
254 collect the bytes of memory up to a zero byte. The behavior is
255 similar to what you see when you use the regular print command on a
256 string. An optional integer following the "/s" sets a bound on the
257 number of bytes that will be collected.
258
259 tstart [NOTES]
260 The trace start command now interprets any supplied arguments as a
261 note to be recorded with the trace run, with an effect similar to
262 setting the variable trace-notes.
263
264 tstop [NOTES]
265 The trace stop command now interprets any arguments as a note to be
266 mentioned along with the tstatus report that the trace was stopped
267 with a command. The effect is similar to setting the variable
268 trace-stop-notes.
269
270 * Tracepoints can now be enabled and disabled at any time after a trace
271 experiment has been started using the standard "enable" and "disable"
272 commands. It is now possible to start a trace experiment with no enabled
273 tracepoints; GDB will display a warning, but will allow the experiment to
274 begin, assuming that tracepoints will be enabled as needed while the trace
275 is running.
276
277 * Fast tracepoints on 32-bit x86-architectures can now be placed at
278 locations with 4-byte instructions, when they were previously
279 limited to locations with instructions of 5 bytes or longer.
280
281 * New options
282
283 set extended-prompt
284 show extended-prompt
285 Set the GDB prompt, and allow escape sequences to be inserted to
286 display miscellaneous information (see 'help set extended-prompt'
287 for the list of sequences). This prompt (and any information
288 accessed through the escape sequences) is updated every time the
289 prompt is displayed.
290
291 set print entry-values (both|compact|default|if-needed|no|only|preferred)
292 show print entry-values
293 Set printing of frame argument values at function entry. In some cases
294 GDB can determine the value of function argument which was passed by the
295 function caller, even if the value was modified inside the called function.
296
297 set debug entry-values
298 show debug entry-values
299 Control display of debugging info for determining frame argument values at
300 function entry and virtual tail call frames.
301
302 set basenames-may-differ
303 show basenames-may-differ
304 Set whether a source file may have multiple base names.
305 (A "base name" is the name of a file with the directory part removed.
306 Example: The base name of "/home/user/hello.c" is "hello.c".)
307 If set, GDB will canonicalize file names (e.g., expand symlinks)
308 before comparing them. Canonicalization is an expensive operation,
309 but it allows the same file be known by more than one base name.
310 If not set (the default), all source files are assumed to have just
311 one base name, and gdb will do file name comparisons more efficiently.
312
313 set trace-user
314 show trace-user
315 set trace-notes
316 show trace-notes
317 Set a user name and notes for the current and any future trace runs.
318 This is useful for long-running and/or disconnected traces, to
319 inform others (or yourself) as to who is running the trace, supply
320 contact information, or otherwise explain what is going on.
321
322 set trace-stop-notes
323 show trace-stop-notes
324 Set a note attached to the trace run, that is displayed when the
325 trace has been stopped by a tstop command. This is useful for
326 instance as an explanation, if you are stopping a trace run that was
327 started by someone else.
328
329 * New remote packets
330
331 QTEnable
332
333 Dynamically enable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
334
335 QTDisable
336
337 Dynamically disable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
338
339 QTNotes
340
341 Set the user and notes of the trace run.
342
343 qTP
344
345 Query the current status of a tracepoint.
346
347 qTMinFTPILen
348
349 Query the minimum length of instruction at which a fast tracepoint may
350 be placed.
351
352 * Dcache size (number of lines) and line-size are now runtime-configurable
353 via "set dcache line" and "set dcache line-size" commands.
354
355 * New targets
356
357 Texas Instruments TMS320C6x tic6x-*-*
358
359 * New Simulators
360
361 Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
362
363 *** Changes in GDB 7.3.1
364
365 * The build failure for NetBSD and OpenBSD targets have now been fixed.
366
367 *** Changes in GDB 7.3
368
369 * GDB has a new command: "thread find [REGEXP]".
370 It finds the thread id whose name, target id, or thread extra info
371 matches the given regular expression.
372
373 * The "catch syscall" command now works on mips*-linux* targets.
374
375 * The -data-disassemble MI command now supports modes 2 and 3 for
376 dumping the instruction opcodes.
377
378 * New command line options
379
380 -data-directory DIR Specify DIR as the "data-directory".
381 This is mostly for testing purposes.
382
383 * The "maint set python auto-load on|off" command has been renamed to
384 "set auto-load-scripts on|off".
385
386 * GDB has a new command: "set directories".
387 It is like the "dir" command except that it replaces the
388 source path list instead of augmenting it.
389
390 * GDB now understands thread names.
391
392 On GNU/Linux, "info threads" will display the thread name as set by
393 prctl or pthread_setname_np.
394
395 There is also a new command, "thread name", which can be used to
396 assign a name internally for GDB to display.
397
398 * OpenCL C
399 Initial support for the OpenCL C language (http://www.khronos.org/opencl)
400 has been integrated into GDB.
401
402 * Python scripting
403
404 ** The function gdb.Write now accepts an optional keyword 'stream'.
405 This keyword, when provided, will direct the output to either
406 stdout, stderr, or GDB's logging output.
407
408 ** Parameters can now be be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
409 you may implement the get_set_doc and get_show_doc functions.
410 This improves how Parameter set/show documentation is processed
411 and allows for more dynamic content.
412
413 ** Symbols, Symbol Table, Symbol Table and Line, Object Files,
414 Inferior, Inferior Thread, Blocks, and Block Iterator APIs now
415 have an is_valid method.
416
417 ** Breakpoints can now be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
418 you may implement a 'stop' function that is executed each time
419 the inferior reaches that breakpoint.
420
421 ** New function gdb.lookup_global_symbol looks up a global symbol.
422
423 ** GDB values in Python are now callable if the value represents a
424 function. For example, if 'some_value' represents a function that
425 takes two integer parameters and returns a value, you can call
426 that function like so:
427
428 result = some_value (10,20)
429
430 ** Module gdb.types has been added.
431 It contains a collection of utilities for working with gdb.Types objects:
432 get_basic_type, has_field, make_enum_dict.
433
434 ** Module gdb.printing has been added.
435 It contains utilities for writing and registering pretty-printers.
436 New classes: PrettyPrinter, SubPrettyPrinter,
437 RegexpCollectionPrettyPrinter.
438 New function: register_pretty_printer.
439
440 ** New commands "info pretty-printers", "enable pretty-printer" and
441 "disable pretty-printer" have been added.
442
443 ** gdb.parameter("directories") is now available.
444
445 ** New function gdb.newest_frame returns the newest frame in the
446 selected thread.
447
448 ** The gdb.InferiorThread class has a new "name" attribute. This
449 holds the thread's name.
450
451 ** Python Support for Inferior events.
452 Python scripts can add observers to be notified of events
453 occurring in the process being debugged.
454 The following events are currently supported:
455 - gdb.events.cont Continue event.
456 - gdb.events.exited Inferior exited event.
457 - gdb.events.stop Signal received, and Breakpoint hit events.
458
459 * C++ Improvements:
460
461 ** GDB now puts template parameters in scope when debugging in an
462 instantiation. For example, if you have:
463
464 template<int X> int func (void) { return X; }
465
466 then if you step into func<5>, "print X" will show "5". This
467 feature requires proper debuginfo support from the compiler; it
468 was added to GCC 4.5.
469
470 ** The motion commands "next", "finish", "until", and "advance" now
471 work better when exceptions are thrown. In particular, GDB will
472 no longer lose control of the inferior; instead, the GDB will
473 stop the inferior at the point at which the exception is caught.
474 This functionality requires a change in the exception handling
475 code that was introduced in GCC 4.5.
476
477 * GDB now follows GCC's rules on accessing volatile objects when
478 reading or writing target state during expression evaluation.
479 One notable difference to prior behavior is that "print x = 0"
480 no longer generates a read of x; the value of the assignment is
481 now always taken directly from the value being assigned.
482
483 * GDB now has some support for using labels in the program's source in
484 linespecs. For instance, you can use "advance label" to continue
485 execution to a label.
486
487 * GDB now has support for reading and writing a new .gdb_index
488 section. This section holds a fast index of DWARF debugging
489 information and can be used to greatly speed up GDB startup and
490 operation. See the documentation for `save gdb-index' for details.
491
492 * The "watch" command now accepts an optional "-location" argument.
493 When used, this causes GDB to watch the memory referred to by the
494 expression. Such a watchpoint is never deleted due to it going out
495 of scope.
496
497 * GDB now supports thread debugging of core dumps on GNU/Linux.
498
499 GDB now activates thread debugging using the libthread_db library
500 when debugging GNU/Linux core dumps, similarly to when debugging
501 live processes. As a result, when debugging a core dump file, GDB
502 is now able to display pthread_t ids of threads. For example, "info
503 threads" shows the same output as when debugging the process when it
504 was live. In earlier releases, you'd see something like this:
505
506 (gdb) info threads
507 * 1 LWP 6780 main () at main.c:10
508
509 While now you see this:
510
511 (gdb) info threads
512 * 1 Thread 0x7f0f5712a700 (LWP 6780) main () at main.c:10
513
514 It is also now possible to inspect TLS variables when debugging core
515 dumps.
516
517 When debugging a core dump generated on a machine other than the one
518 used to run GDB, you may need to point GDB at the correct
519 libthread_db library with the "set libthread-db-search-path"
520 command. See the user manual for more details on this command.
521
522 * When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
523 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports ranged breakpoints,
524 which stop execution of the inferior whenever it executes an instruction
525 at any address within the specified range. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
526 section in the user manual for more details.
527
528 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
529
530 ** GDBserver is now supported on PowerPC LynxOS (versions 4.x and 5.x),
531 and i686 LynxOS (version 5.x).
532
533 ** GDBserver is now supported on Blackfin Linux.
534
535 * New native configurations
536
537 ia64 HP-UX ia64-*-hpux*
538
539 * New targets:
540
541 Analog Devices, Inc. Blackfin Processor bfin-*
542
543 * Ada task switching is now supported on sparc-elf targets when
544 debugging a program using the Ravenscar Profile. For more information,
545 see the "Tasking Support when using the Ravenscar Profile" section
546 in the GDB user manual.
547
548 * Guile support was removed.
549
550 * New features in the GNU simulator
551
552 ** The --map-info flag lists all known core mappings.
553
554 ** CFI flashes may be simulated via the "cfi" device.
555
556 *** Changes in GDB 7.2
557
558 * Shared library support for remote targets by default
559
560 When GDB is configured for a generic, non-OS specific target, like
561 for example, --target=arm-eabi or one of the many *-*-elf targets,
562 GDB now queries remote stubs for loaded shared libraries using the
563 `qXfer:libraries:read' packet. Previously, shared library support
564 was always disabled for such configurations.
565
566 * C++ Improvements:
567
568 ** Argument Dependent Lookup (ADL)
569
570 In C++ ADL lookup directs function search to the namespaces of its
571 arguments even if the namespace has not been imported.
572 For example:
573 namespace A
574 {
575 class B { };
576 void foo (B) { }
577 }
578 ...
579 A::B b
580 foo(b)
581 Here the compiler will search for `foo' in the namespace of 'b'
582 and find A::foo. GDB now supports this. This construct is commonly
583 used in the Standard Template Library for operators.
584
585 ** Improved User Defined Operator Support
586
587 In addition to member operators, GDB now supports lookup of operators
588 defined in a namespace and imported with a `using' directive, operators
589 defined in the global scope, operators imported implicitly from an
590 anonymous namespace, and the ADL operators mentioned in the previous
591 entry.
592 GDB now also supports proper overload resolution for all the previously
593 mentioned flavors of operators.
594
595 ** static const class members
596
597 Printing of static const class members that are initialized in the
598 class definition has been fixed.
599
600 * Windows Thread Information Block access.
601
602 On Windows targets, GDB now supports displaying the Windows Thread
603 Information Block (TIB) structure. This structure is visible either
604 by using the new command `info w32 thread-information-block' or, by
605 dereferencing the new convenience variable named `$_tlb', a
606 thread-specific pointer to the TIB. This feature is also supported
607 when remote debugging using GDBserver.
608
609 * Static tracepoints
610
611 Static tracepoints are calls in the user program into a tracing
612 library. One such library is a port of the LTTng kernel tracer to
613 userspace --- UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer, http://lttng.org/ust).
614 When debugging with GDBserver, GDB now supports combining the GDB
615 tracepoint machinery with such libraries. For example: the user can
616 use GDB to probe a static tracepoint marker (a call from the user
617 program into the tracing library) with the new "strace" command (see
618 "New commands" below). This creates a "static tracepoint" in the
619 breakpoint list, that can be manipulated with the same feature set
620 as fast and regular tracepoints. E.g., collect registers, local and
621 global variables, collect trace state variables, and define
622 tracepoint conditions. In addition, the user can collect extra
623 static tracepoint marker specific data, by collecting the new
624 $_sdata internal variable. When analyzing the trace buffer, you can
625 inspect $_sdata like any other variable available to GDB. For more
626 information, see the "Tracepoints" chapter in GDB user manual. New
627 remote packets have been defined to support static tracepoints, see
628 the "New remote packets" section below.
629
630 * Better reconstruction of tracepoints after disconnected tracing
631
632 GDB will attempt to download the original source form of tracepoint
633 definitions when starting a trace run, and then will upload these
634 upon reconnection to the target, resulting in a more accurate
635 reconstruction of the tracepoints that are in use on the target.
636
637 * Observer mode
638
639 You can now exercise direct control over the ways that GDB can
640 affect your program. For instance, you can disallow the setting of
641 breakpoints, so that the program can run continuously (assuming
642 non-stop mode). In addition, the "observer" variable is available
643 to switch all of the different controls; in observer mode, GDB
644 cannot affect the target's behavior at all, which is useful for
645 tasks like diagnosing live systems in the field.
646
647 * The new convenience variable $_thread holds the number of the
648 current thread.
649
650 * New remote packets
651
652 qGetTIBAddr
653
654 Return the address of the Windows Thread Information Block of a given thread.
655
656 qRelocInsn
657
658 In response to several of the tracepoint packets, the target may now
659 also respond with a number of intermediate `qRelocInsn' request
660 packets before the final result packet, to have GDB handle
661 relocating an instruction to execute at a different address. This
662 is particularly useful for stubs that support fast tracepoints. GDB
663 reports support for this feature in the qSupported packet.
664
665 qTfSTM, qTsSTM
666
667 List static tracepoint markers in the target program.
668
669 qTSTMat
670
671 List static tracepoint markers at a given address in the target
672 program.
673
674 qXfer:statictrace:read
675
676 Read the static trace data collected (by a `collect $_sdata'
677 tracepoint action). The remote stub reports support for this packet
678 to gdb's qSupported query.
679
680 QAllow
681
682 Send the current settings of GDB's permission flags.
683
684 QTDPsrc
685
686 Send part of the source (textual) form of a tracepoint definition,
687 which includes location, conditional, and action list.
688
689 * The source command now accepts a -s option to force searching for the
690 script in the source search path even if the script name specifies
691 a directory.
692
693 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
694
695 - GDBserver now support tracepoints (including fast tracepoints, and
696 static tracepoints). The feature is currently supported by the
697 i386-linux and amd64-linux builds. See the "Tracepoints support
698 in gdbserver" section in the manual for more information.
699
700 GDBserver JIT compiles the tracepoint's conditional agent
701 expression bytecode into native code whenever possible for low
702 overhead dynamic tracepoints conditionals. For such tracepoints,
703 an expression that examines program state is evaluated when the
704 tracepoint is reached, in order to determine whether to capture
705 trace data. If the condition is simple and false, processing the
706 tracepoint finishes very quickly and no data is gathered.
707
708 GDBserver interfaces with the UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer) library
709 for static tracepoints support.
710
711 - GDBserver now supports x86_64 Windows 64-bit debugging.
712
713 * GDB now sends xmlRegisters= in qSupported packet to indicate that
714 it understands register description.
715
716 * The --batch flag now disables pagination and queries.
717
718 * X86 general purpose registers
719
720 GDB now supports reading/writing byte, word and double-word x86
721 general purpose registers directly. This means you can use, say,
722 $ah or $ax to refer, respectively, to the byte register AH and
723 16-bit word register AX that are actually portions of the 32-bit
724 register EAX or 64-bit register RAX.
725
726 * The `commands' command now accepts a range of breakpoints to modify.
727 A plain `commands' following a command that creates multiple
728 breakpoints affects all the breakpoints set by that command. This
729 applies to breakpoints set by `rbreak', and also applies when a
730 single `break' command creates multiple breakpoints (e.g.,
731 breakpoints on overloaded c++ functions).
732
733 * The `rbreak' command now accepts a filename specification as part of
734 its argument, limiting the functions selected by the regex to those
735 in the specified file.
736
737 * Support for remote debugging Windows and SymbianOS shared libraries
738 from Unix hosts has been improved. Non Windows GDB builds now can
739 understand target reported file names that follow MS-DOS based file
740 system semantics, such as file names that include drive letters and
741 use the backslash character as directory separator. This makes it
742 possible to transparently use the "set sysroot" and "set
743 solib-search-path" on Unix hosts to point as host copies of the
744 target's shared libraries. See the new command "set
745 target-file-system-kind" described below, and the "Commands to
746 specify files" section in the user manual for more information.
747
748 * New commands
749
750 eval template, expressions...
751 Convert the values of one or more expressions under the control
752 of the string template to a command line, and call it.
753
754 set target-file-system-kind unix|dos-based|auto
755 show target-file-system-kind
756 Set or show the assumed file system kind for target reported file
757 names.
758
759 save breakpoints <filename>
760 Save all current breakpoint definitions to a file suitable for use
761 in a later debugging session. To read the saved breakpoint
762 definitions, use the `source' command.
763
764 `save tracepoints' is a new alias for `save-tracepoints'. The latter
765 is now deprecated.
766
767 info static-tracepoint-markers
768 Display information about static tracepoint markers in the target.
769
770 strace FN | FILE:LINE | *ADDR | -m MARKER_ID
771 Define a static tracepoint by probing a marker at the given
772 function, line, address, or marker ID.
773
774 set observer on|off
775 show observer
776 Enable and disable observer mode.
777
778 set may-write-registers on|off
779 set may-write-memory on|off
780 set may-insert-breakpoints on|off
781 set may-insert-tracepoints on|off
782 set may-insert-fast-tracepoints on|off
783 set may-interrupt on|off
784 Set individual permissions for GDB effects on the target. Note that
785 some of these settings can have undesirable or surprising
786 consequences, particularly when changed in the middle of a session.
787 For instance, disabling the writing of memory can prevent
788 breakpoints from being inserted, cause single-stepping to fail, or
789 even crash your program, if you disable after breakpoints have been
790 inserted. However, GDB should not crash.
791
792 set record memory-query on|off
793 show record memory-query
794 Control whether to stop the inferior if memory changes caused
795 by an instruction cannot be recorded.
796
797 * Changed commands
798
799 disassemble
800 The disassemble command now supports "start,+length" form of two arguments.
801
802 * Python scripting
803
804 ** GDB now provides a new directory location, called the python directory,
805 where Python scripts written for GDB can be installed. The location
806 of that directory is <data-directory>/python, where <data-directory>
807 is the GDB data directory. For more details, see section `Scripting
808 GDB using Python' in the manual.
809
810 ** The GDB Python API now has access to breakpoints, symbols, symbol
811 tables, program spaces, inferiors, threads and frame's code blocks.
812 Additionally, GDB Parameters can now be created from the API, and
813 manipulated via set/show in the CLI.
814
815 ** New functions gdb.target_charset, gdb.target_wide_charset,
816 gdb.progspaces, gdb.current_progspace, and gdb.string_to_argv.
817
818 ** New exception gdb.GdbError.
819
820 ** Pretty-printers are now also looked up in the current program space.
821
822 ** Pretty-printers can now be individually enabled and disabled.
823
824 ** GDB now looks for names of Python scripts to auto-load in a
825 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts', in addition to looking
826 for a OBJFILE-gdb.py script when OBJFILE is read by the debugger.
827
828 * Tracepoint actions were unified with breakpoint commands. In particular,
829 there are no longer differences in "info break" output for breakpoints and
830 tracepoints and the "commands" command can be used for both tracepoints and
831 regular breakpoints.
832
833 * New targets
834
835 ARM Symbian arm*-*-symbianelf*
836
837 * D language support.
838 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the D programming
839 language.
840
841 * GDB now supports the extended ptrace interface for PowerPC which is
842 available since Linux kernel version 2.6.34. This automatically enables
843 any hardware breakpoints and additional hardware watchpoints available in
844 the processor. The old ptrace interface exposes just one hardware
845 watchpoint and no hardware breakpoints.
846
847 * GDB is now able to use the Data Value Compare (DVC) register available on
848 embedded PowerPC processors to implement in hardware simple watchpoint
849 conditions of the form:
850
851 watch ADDRESS|VARIABLE if ADDRESS|VARIABLE == CONSTANT EXPRESSION
852
853 This works in native GDB running on Linux kernels with the extended ptrace
854 interface mentioned above.
855
856 *** Changes in GDB 7.1
857
858 * C++ Improvements
859
860 ** Namespace Support
861
862 GDB now supports importing of namespaces in C++. This enables the
863 user to inspect variables from imported namespaces. Support for
864 namepace aliasing has also been added. So, if a namespace is
865 aliased in the current scope (e.g. namepace C=A; ) the user can
866 print variables using the alias (e.g. (gdb) print C::x).
867
868 ** Bug Fixes
869
870 All known bugs relating to the printing of virtual base class were
871 fixed. It is now possible to call overloaded static methods using a
872 qualified name.
873
874 ** Cast Operators
875
876 The C++ cast operators static_cast<>, dynamic_cast<>, const_cast<>,
877 and reinterpret_cast<> are now handled by the C++ expression parser.
878
879 * New targets
880
881 Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze-*-*
882 Renesas RX rx-*-elf
883
884 * New Simulators
885
886 Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze
887 Renesas RX rx
888
889 * Multi-program debugging.
890
891 GDB now has support for multi-program (a.k.a. multi-executable or
892 multi-exec) debugging. This allows for debugging multiple inferiors
893 simultaneously each running a different program under the same GDB
894 session. See "Debugging Multiple Inferiors and Programs" in the
895 manual for more information. This implied some user visible changes
896 in the multi-inferior support. For example, "info inferiors" now
897 lists inferiors that are not running yet or that have exited
898 already. See also "New commands" and "New options" below.
899
900 * New tracing features
901
902 GDB's tracepoint facility now includes several new features:
903
904 ** Trace state variables
905
906 GDB tracepoints now include support for trace state variables, which
907 are variables managed by the target agent during a tracing
908 experiment. They are useful for tracepoints that trigger each
909 other, so for instance one tracepoint can count hits in a variable,
910 and then a second tracepoint has a condition that is true when the
911 count reaches a particular value. Trace state variables share the
912 $-syntax of GDB convenience variables, and can appear in both
913 tracepoint actions and condition expressions. Use the "tvariable"
914 command to create, and "info tvariables" to view; see "Trace State
915 Variables" in the manual for more detail.
916
917 ** Fast tracepoints
918
919 GDB now includes an option for defining fast tracepoints, which
920 targets may implement more efficiently, such as by installing a jump
921 into the target agent rather than a trap instruction. The resulting
922 speedup can be by two orders of magnitude or more, although the
923 tradeoff is that some program locations on some target architectures
924 might not allow fast tracepoint installation, for instance if the
925 instruction to be replaced is shorter than the jump. To request a
926 fast tracepoint, use the "ftrace" command, with syntax identical to
927 the regular trace command.
928
929 ** Disconnected tracing
930
931 It is now possible to detach GDB from the target while it is running
932 a trace experiment, then reconnect later to see how the experiment
933 is going. In addition, a new variable disconnected-tracing lets you
934 tell the target agent whether to continue running a trace if the
935 connection is lost unexpectedly.
936
937 ** Trace files
938
939 GDB now has the ability to save the trace buffer into a file, and
940 then use that file as a target, similarly to you can do with
941 corefiles. You can select trace frames, print data that was
942 collected in them, and use tstatus to display the state of the
943 tracing run at the moment that it was saved. To create a trace
944 file, use "tsave <filename>", and to use it, do "target tfile
945 <name>".
946
947 ** Circular trace buffer
948
949 You can ask the target agent to handle the trace buffer as a
950 circular buffer, discarding the oldest trace frames to make room for
951 newer ones, by setting circular-trace-buffer to on. This feature may
952 not be available for all target agents.
953
954 * Changed commands
955
956 disassemble
957 The disassemble command, when invoked with two arguments, now requires
958 the arguments to be comma-separated.
959
960 info variables
961 The info variables command now displays variable definitions. Files
962 which only declare a variable are not shown.
963
964 source
965 The source command is now capable of sourcing Python scripts.
966 This feature is dependent on the debugger being build with Python
967 support.
968
969 Related to this enhancement is also the introduction of a new command
970 "set script-extension" (see below).
971
972 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
973
974 record save [<FILENAME>]
975 Save a file (in core file format) containing the process record
976 execution log for replay debugging at a later time.
977
978 record restore <FILENAME>
979 Restore the process record execution log that was saved at an
980 earlier time, for replay debugging.
981
982 add-inferior [-copies <N>] [-exec <FILENAME>]
983 Add a new inferior.
984
985 clone-inferior [-copies <N>] [ID]
986 Make a new inferior ready to execute the same program another
987 inferior has loaded.
988
989 remove-inferior ID
990 Remove an inferior.
991
992 maint info program-spaces
993 List the program spaces loaded into GDB.
994
995 set remote interrupt-sequence [Ctrl-C | BREAK | BREAK-g]
996 show remote interrupt-sequence
997 Allow the user to select one of ^C, a BREAK signal or BREAK-g
998 as the sequence to the remote target in order to interrupt the execution.
999 Ctrl-C is a default. Some system prefers BREAK which is high level of
1000 serial line for some certain time. Linux kernel prefers BREAK-g, a.k.a
1001 Magic SysRq g. It is BREAK signal and character 'g'.
1002
1003 set remote interrupt-on-connect [on | off]
1004 show remote interrupt-on-connect
1005 When interrupt-on-connect is ON, gdb sends interrupt-sequence to
1006 remote target when gdb connects to it. This is needed when you debug
1007 Linux kernel.
1008
1009 set remotebreak [on | off]
1010 show remotebreak
1011 Deprecated. Use "set/show remote interrupt-sequence" instead.
1012
1013 tvariable $NAME [ = EXP ]
1014 Create or modify a trace state variable.
1015
1016 info tvariables
1017 List trace state variables and their values.
1018
1019 delete tvariable $NAME ...
1020 Delete one or more trace state variables.
1021
1022 teval EXPR, ...
1023 Evaluate the given expressions without collecting anything into the
1024 trace buffer. (Valid in tracepoint actions only.)
1025
1026 ftrace FN / FILE:LINE / *ADDR
1027 Define a fast tracepoint at the given function, line, or address.
1028
1029 * New expression syntax
1030
1031 GDB now parses the 0b prefix of binary numbers the same way as GCC does.
1032 GDB now parses 0b101010 identically with 42.
1033
1034 * New options
1035
1036 set follow-exec-mode new|same
1037 show follow-exec-mode
1038 Control whether GDB reuses the same inferior across an exec call or
1039 creates a new one. This is useful to be able to restart the old
1040 executable after the inferior having done an exec call.
1041
1042 set default-collect EXPR, ...
1043 show default-collect
1044 Define a list of expressions to be collected at each tracepoint.
1045 This is a useful way to ensure essential items are not overlooked,
1046 such as registers or a critical global variable.
1047
1048 set disconnected-tracing
1049 show disconnected-tracing
1050 If set to 1, the target is instructed to continue tracing if it
1051 loses its connection to GDB. If 0, the target is to stop tracing
1052 upon disconnection.
1053
1054 set circular-trace-buffer
1055 show circular-trace-buffer
1056 If set to on, the target is instructed to use a circular trace buffer
1057 and discard the oldest trace frames instead of stopping the trace due
1058 to a full trace buffer. If set to off, the trace stops when the buffer
1059 fills up. Some targets may not support this.
1060
1061 set script-extension off|soft|strict
1062 show script-extension
1063 If set to "off", the debugger does not perform any script language
1064 recognition, and all sourced files are assumed to be GDB scripts.
1065 If set to "soft" (the default), files are sourced according to
1066 filename extension, falling back to GDB scripts if the first
1067 evaluation failed.
1068 If set to "strict", files are sourced according to filename extension.
1069
1070 set ada trust-PAD-over-XVS on|off
1071 show ada trust-PAD-over-XVS
1072 If off, activate a workaround against a bug in the debugging information
1073 generated by the compiler for PAD types (see gcc/exp_dbug.ads in
1074 the GCC sources for more information about the GNAT encoding and
1075 PAD types in particular). It is always safe to set this option to
1076 off, but this introduces a slight performance penalty. The default
1077 is on.
1078
1079 * Python API Improvements
1080
1081 ** GDB provides the new class gdb.LazyString. This is useful in
1082 some pretty-printing cases. The new method gdb.Value.lazy_string
1083 provides a simple way to create objects of this type.
1084
1085 ** The fields returned by gdb.Type.fields now have an
1086 `is_base_class' attribute.
1087
1088 ** The new method gdb.Type.range returns the range of an array type.
1089
1090 ** The new method gdb.parse_and_eval can be used to parse and
1091 evaluate an expression.
1092
1093 * New remote packets
1094
1095 QTDV
1096 Define a trace state variable.
1097
1098 qTV
1099 Get the current value of a trace state variable.
1100
1101 QTDisconnected
1102 Set desired tracing behavior upon disconnection.
1103
1104 QTBuffer:circular
1105 Set the trace buffer to be linear or circular.
1106
1107 qTfP, qTsP
1108 Get data about the tracepoints currently in use.
1109
1110 * Bug fixes
1111
1112 Process record now works correctly with hardware watchpoints.
1113
1114 Multiple bug fixes have been made to the mips-irix port, making it
1115 much more reliable. In particular:
1116 - Debugging threaded applications is now possible again. Previously,
1117 GDB would hang while starting the program, or while waiting for
1118 the program to stop at a breakpoint.
1119 - Attaching to a running process no longer hangs.
1120 - An error occurring while loading a core file has been fixed.
1121 - Changing the value of the PC register now works again. This fixes
1122 problems observed when using the "jump" command, or when calling
1123 a function from GDB, or even when assigning a new value to $pc.
1124 - With the "finish" and "return" commands, the return value for functions
1125 returning a small array is now correctly printed.
1126 - It is now possible to break on shared library code which gets executed
1127 during a shared library init phase (code executed while executing
1128 their .init section). Previously, the breakpoint would have no effect.
1129 - GDB is now able to backtrace through the signal handler for
1130 non-threaded programs.
1131
1132 PIE (Position Independent Executable) programs debugging is now supported.
1133 This includes debugging execution of PIC (Position Independent Code) shared
1134 libraries although for that, it should be possible to run such libraries as an
1135 executable program.
1136
1137 *** Changes in GDB 7.0
1138
1139 * GDB now has an interface for JIT compilation. Applications that
1140 dynamically generate code can create symbol files in memory and register
1141 them with GDB. For users, the feature should work transparently, and
1142 for JIT developers, the interface is documented in the GDB manual in the
1143 "JIT Compilation Interface" chapter.
1144
1145 * Tracepoints may now be conditional. The syntax is as for
1146 breakpoints; either an "if" clause appended to the "trace" command,
1147 or the "condition" command is available. GDB sends the condition to
1148 the target for evaluation using the same bytecode format as is used
1149 for tracepoint actions.
1150
1151 * The disassemble command now supports: an optional /r modifier, print the
1152 raw instructions in hex as well as in symbolic form, and an optional /m
1153 modifier to print mixed source+assembly.
1154
1155 * Process record and replay
1156
1157 In a architecture environment that supports ``process record and
1158 replay'', ``process record and replay'' target can record a log of
1159 the process execution, and replay it with both forward and reverse
1160 execute commands.
1161
1162 * Reverse debugging: GDB now has new commands reverse-continue, reverse-
1163 step, reverse-next, reverse-finish, reverse-stepi, reverse-nexti, and
1164 set execution-direction {forward|reverse}, for targets that support
1165 reverse execution.
1166
1167 * GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on MIPS/Linux systems. This
1168 feature is available with a native GDB running on kernel version
1169 2.6.28 or later.
1170
1171 * GDB now has support for multi-byte and wide character sets on the
1172 target. Strings whose character type is wchar_t, char16_t, or
1173 char32_t are now correctly printed. GDB supports wide- and unicode-
1174 literals in C, that is, L'x', L"string", u'x', u"string", U'x', and
1175 U"string" syntax. And, GDB allows the "%ls" and "%lc" formats in
1176 `printf'. This feature requires iconv to work properly; if your
1177 system does not have a working iconv, GDB can use GNU libiconv. See
1178 the installation instructions for more information.
1179
1180 * GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
1181 remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
1182 with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
1183 the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
1184
1185 * "info sharedlibrary" now takes an optional regex of libraries to show,
1186 and it now reports if a shared library has no debugging information.
1187
1188 * Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
1189 now complete on file names.
1190
1191 * When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
1192 completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
1193 For instance, consider:
1194
1195 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
1196 # struct example variable;
1197 (gdb) p variable.
1198
1199 If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
1200 completions will be "f1" and "f2".
1201
1202 * Inlined functions are now supported. They show up in backtraces, and
1203 the "step", "next", and "finish" commands handle them automatically.
1204
1205 * GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
1206 operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
1207 macros.
1208
1209 * GDB now supports inspecting extra signal information, exported by
1210 the new $_siginfo convenience variable. The feature is currently
1211 implemented on linux ARM, i386 and amd64.
1212
1213 * GDB can now display the VFP floating point registers and NEON vector
1214 registers on ARM targets. Both ARM GNU/Linux native GDB and gdbserver
1215 can provide these registers (requires Linux 2.6.30 or later). Remote
1216 and simulator targets may also provide them.
1217
1218 * New remote packets
1219
1220 qSearch:memory:
1221 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
1222
1223 QStartNoAckMode
1224 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
1225 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
1226 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
1227
1228 vKill
1229 Kill the process with the specified process ID. Use this in preference
1230 to `k' when multiprocess protocol extensions are supported.
1231
1232 qXfer:osdata:read
1233 Obtains additional operating system information
1234
1235 qXfer:siginfo:read
1236 qXfer:siginfo:write
1237 Read or write additional signal information.
1238
1239 * Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
1240
1241 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
1242 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
1243 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
1244
1245 * GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
1246 DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
1247
1248 * The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
1249 and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
1250 `set/show sh calling-convention'.
1251
1252 * GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
1253 with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
1254
1255 * 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
1256
1257 * Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
1258
1259 * Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
1260 which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
1261
1262 * The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
1263 list of section offsets.
1264
1265 * On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
1266 conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
1267 have also been fixed.
1268
1269 * GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
1270 From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
1271 are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
1272
1273 * GDB now parses C++ symbol and type names more flexibly. For
1274 example, given:
1275
1276 template<typename T> class C { };
1277 C<char const *> c;
1278
1279 GDB will now correctly handle all of:
1280
1281 ptype C<char const *>
1282 ptype C<char const*>
1283 ptype C<const char *>
1284 ptype C<const char*>
1285
1286 * New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
1287
1288 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
1289 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
1290
1291 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
1292 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
1293 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
1294
1295 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
1296 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
1297
1298 - Support for the sparc64-linux-gnu target is now included in
1299 gdbserver.
1300
1301 - The amd64-linux build of gdbserver now supports debugging both
1302 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
1303
1304 - The i386-linux, amd64-linux, and i386-win32 builds of gdbserver
1305 now support hardware watchpoints, and will use them automatically
1306 as appropriate.
1307
1308 * Python scripting
1309
1310 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
1311 available is determined at configure time.
1312
1313 New GDB commands can now be written in Python.
1314
1315 * Ada tasking support
1316
1317 Ada tasks can now be inspected in GDB. The following commands have
1318 been introduced:
1319
1320 info tasks
1321 Print the list of Ada tasks.
1322 info task N
1323 Print detailed information about task number N.
1324 task
1325 Print the task number of the current task.
1326 task N
1327 Switch the context of debugging to task number N.
1328
1329 * Support for user-defined prefixed commands. The "define" command can
1330 add new commands to existing prefixes, e.g. "target".
1331
1332 * Multi-inferior, multi-process debugging.
1333
1334 GDB now has generalized support for multi-inferior debugging. See
1335 "Debugging Multiple Inferiors" in the manual for more information.
1336 Although availability still depends on target support, the command
1337 set is more uniform now. The GNU/Linux specific multi-forks support
1338 has been migrated to this new framework. This implied some user
1339 visible changes; see "New commands" and also "Removed commands"
1340 below.
1341
1342 * Target descriptions can now describe the target OS ABI. See the
1343 "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for more
1344 information.
1345
1346 * Target descriptions can now describe "compatible" architectures
1347 to indicate that the target can execute applications for a different
1348 architecture in addition to those for the main target architecture.
1349 See the "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for
1350 more information.
1351
1352 * Multi-architecture debugging.
1353
1354 GDB now includes general supports for debugging applications on
1355 hybrid systems that use more than one single processor architecture
1356 at the same time. Each such hybrid architecture still requires
1357 specific support to be added. The only hybrid architecture supported
1358 in this version of GDB is the Cell Broadband Engine.
1359
1360 * GDB now supports integrated debugging of Cell/B.E. applications that
1361 use both the PPU and SPU architectures. To enable support for hybrid
1362 Cell/B.E. debugging, you need to configure GDB to support both the
1363 powerpc-linux or powerpc64-linux and the spu-elf targets, using the
1364 --enable-targets configure option.
1365
1366 * Non-stop mode debugging.
1367
1368 For some targets, GDB now supports an optional mode of operation in
1369 which you can examine stopped threads while other threads continue
1370 to execute freely. This is referred to as non-stop mode, with the
1371 old mode referred to as all-stop mode. See the "Non-Stop Mode"
1372 section in the user manual for more information.
1373
1374 To be able to support remote non-stop debugging, a remote stub needs
1375 to implement the non-stop mode remote protocol extensions, as
1376 described in the "Remote Non-Stop" section of the user manual. The
1377 GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been adjusted to support these
1378 extensions on linux targets.
1379
1380 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
1381
1382 catch syscall [NAME(S) | NUMBER(S)]
1383 Catch system calls. Arguments, which should be names of system
1384 calls or their numbers, mean catch only those syscalls. Without
1385 arguments, every syscall will be caught. When the inferior issues
1386 any of the specified syscalls, GDB will stop and announce the system
1387 call, both when it is called and when its call returns. This
1388 feature is currently available with a native GDB running on the
1389 Linux Kernel, under the following architectures: x86, x86_64,
1390 PowerPC and PowerPC64.
1391
1392 find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
1393 val1 [, val2, ...]
1394 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
1395
1396 maint set python print-stack
1397 maint show python print-stack
1398 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
1399
1400 python [CODE]
1401 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
1402
1403 macro define
1404 macro list
1405 macro undef
1406 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
1407 interactively.
1408
1409 info os processes
1410 Show operating system information about processes.
1411
1412 info inferiors
1413 List the inferiors currently under GDB's control.
1414
1415 inferior NUM
1416 Switch focus to inferior number NUM.
1417
1418 detach inferior NUM
1419 Detach from inferior number NUM.
1420
1421 kill inferior NUM
1422 Kill inferior number NUM.
1423
1424 * New options
1425
1426 set spu stop-on-load
1427 show spu stop-on-load
1428 Control whether to stop for new SPE threads during Cell/B.E. debugging.
1429
1430 set spu auto-flush-cache
1431 show spu auto-flush-cache
1432 Control whether to automatically flush the software-managed cache
1433 during Cell/B.E. debugging.
1434
1435 set sh calling-convention
1436 show sh calling-convention
1437 Control the calling convention used when calling SH target functions.
1438
1439 set debug timestamp
1440 show debug timestamp
1441 Control display of timestamps with GDB debugging output.
1442
1443 set disassemble-next-line
1444 show disassemble-next-line
1445 Control display of disassembled source lines or instructions when
1446 the debuggee stops.
1447
1448 set remote noack-packet
1449 show remote noack-packet
1450 Set/show the use of remote protocol QStartNoAckMode packet. See above
1451 under "New remote packets."
1452
1453 set remote query-attached-packet
1454 show remote query-attached-packet
1455 Control use of remote protocol `qAttached' (query-attached) packet.
1456
1457 set remote read-siginfo-object
1458 show remote read-siginfo-object
1459 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:read' (read-siginfo-object)
1460 packet.
1461
1462 set remote write-siginfo-object
1463 show remote write-siginfo-object
1464 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:write' (write-siginfo-object)
1465 packet.
1466
1467 set remote reverse-continue
1468 show remote reverse-continue
1469 Control use of remote protocol 'bc' (reverse-continue) packet.
1470
1471 set remote reverse-step
1472 show remote reverse-step
1473 Control use of remote protocol 'bs' (reverse-step) packet.
1474
1475 set displaced-stepping
1476 show displaced-stepping
1477 Control displaced stepping mode. Displaced stepping is a way to
1478 single-step over breakpoints without removing them from the debuggee.
1479 Also known as "out-of-line single-stepping".
1480
1481 set debug displaced
1482 show debug displaced
1483 Control display of debugging info for displaced stepping.
1484
1485 maint set internal-error
1486 maint show internal-error
1487 Control what GDB does when an internal error is detected.
1488
1489 maint set internal-warning
1490 maint show internal-warning
1491 Control what GDB does when an internal warning is detected.
1492
1493 set exec-wrapper
1494 show exec-wrapper
1495 unset exec-wrapper
1496 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
1497
1498 set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
1499 show multiple-symbols
1500 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
1501 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
1502 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
1503
1504 set breakpoint always-inserted
1505 show breakpoint always-inserted
1506 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
1507 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
1508 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
1509
1510 set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
1511 show arm fallback-mode
1512 set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
1513 show arm force-mode
1514 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
1515 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
1516 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
1517 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
1518
1519 set disable-randomization
1520 show disable-randomization
1521 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
1522 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
1523 multiple debugging sessions.
1524
1525 set non-stop
1526 show non-stop
1527 Control whether other threads are stopped or not when some thread hits
1528 a breakpoint.
1529
1530 set target-async
1531 show target-async
1532 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
1533 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
1534 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
1535 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
1536
1537 set target-wide-charset
1538 show target-wide-charset
1539 The target-wide-charset is the name of the character set that GDB
1540 uses when printing characters whose type is wchar_t.
1541
1542 set tcp auto-retry (on|off)
1543 show tcp auto-retry
1544 set tcp connect-timeout
1545 show tcp connect-timeout
1546 These commands allow GDB to retry failed TCP connections to a remote stub
1547 with a specified timeout period; this is useful if the stub is launched
1548 in parallel with GDB but may not be ready to accept connections immediately.
1549
1550 set libthread-db-search-path
1551 show libthread-db-search-path
1552 Control list of directories which GDB will search for appropriate
1553 libthread_db.
1554
1555 set schedule-multiple (on|off)
1556 show schedule-multiple
1557 Allow GDB to resume all threads of all processes or only threads of
1558 the current process.
1559
1560 set stack-cache
1561 show stack-cache
1562 Use more aggressive caching for accesses to the stack. This improves
1563 performance of remote debugging (particularly backtraces) without
1564 affecting correctness.
1565
1566 set interactive-mode (on|off|auto)
1567 show interactive-mode
1568 Control whether GDB runs in interactive mode (on) or not (off).
1569 When in interactive mode, GDB waits for the user to answer all
1570 queries. Otherwise, GDB does not wait and assumes the default
1571 answer. When set to auto (the default), GDB determines which
1572 mode to use based on the stdin settings.
1573
1574 * Removed commands
1575
1576 info forks
1577 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `info
1578 inferiors' command. To list checkpoints, you can still use the
1579 `info checkpoints' command, which was an alias for the `info forks'
1580 command.
1581
1582 fork NUM
1583 Replaced by the new `inferior' command. To switch between
1584 checkpoints, you can still use the `restart' command, which was an
1585 alias for the `fork' command.
1586
1587 process PID
1588 This is removed, since some targets don't have a notion of
1589 processes. To switch between processes, you can still use the
1590 `inferior' command using GDB's own inferior number.
1591
1592 delete fork NUM
1593 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `kill
1594 inferior' command. To delete a checkpoint, you can still use the
1595 `delete checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `delete
1596 fork' command.
1597
1598 detach fork NUM
1599 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `detach
1600 inferior' command. To detach a checkpoint, you can still use the
1601 `detach checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `detach
1602 fork' command.
1603
1604 * New native configurations
1605
1606 x86/x86_64 Darwin i[34567]86-*-darwin*
1607
1608 x86_64 MinGW x86_64-*-mingw*
1609
1610 * New targets
1611
1612 Lattice Mico32 lm32-*
1613 x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
1614 x86_64 DICOS x86_64-*-dicos*
1615 S+core 3 score-*-*
1616
1617 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports x86 Windows CE
1618 (mingw32ce) debugging.
1619
1620 * Removed commands
1621
1622 catch load
1623 catch unload
1624 These commands were actually not implemented on any target.
1625
1626 *** Changes in GDB 6.8
1627
1628 * New native configurations
1629
1630 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
1631 Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
1632
1633 * New targets
1634
1635 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
1636 Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
1637
1638 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
1639
1640 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
1641 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
1642 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
1643 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
1644
1645 * GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
1646 (mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
1647
1648 * Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
1649 is resolved.
1650
1651 * GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
1652 including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
1653 and in inlined functions.
1654
1655 * GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
1656 accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
1657 more than one contiguous range of addresses.
1658
1659 * Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
1660
1661 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
1662 registers on PowerPC targets.
1663
1664 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
1665 targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
1666
1667 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
1668 commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
1669
1670 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
1671 extended-remote mode.
1672
1673 * hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
1674 The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
1675 error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
1676 The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
1677
1678 * GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
1679 building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
1680 target architectures.
1681
1682 * GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
1683 Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
1684 now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
1685 stored in two consecutive float registers.
1686
1687 * The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
1688 breakpoints now.
1689
1690 * Improved support for debugging Ada
1691 Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
1692 include:
1693 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
1694 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
1695 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
1696 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
1697 of an assignment
1698 - Improved command completion in Ada
1699 - Several bug fixes
1700
1701 * GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
1702 process.
1703
1704 * New commands
1705
1706 set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
1707 show print frame-arguments
1708 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
1709 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
1710
1711 remote put
1712 remote get
1713 remote delete
1714 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
1715
1716 * New MI commands
1717
1718 -target-file-put
1719 -target-file-get
1720 -target-file-delete
1721 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
1722
1723 * New remote packets
1724
1725 vFile:open:
1726 vFile:close:
1727 vFile:pread:
1728 vFile:pwrite:
1729 vFile:unlink:
1730 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
1731
1732 vAttach
1733 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
1734 mode.
1735
1736 vRun
1737 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
1738
1739 *** Changes in GDB 6.7
1740
1741 * Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
1742 bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
1743 Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
1744
1745 * When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
1746 symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
1747 -Bsymbolic linker option.
1748
1749 * When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
1750 recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
1751 is not supported.
1752
1753 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
1754 frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
1755
1756 * GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
1757 32-bit or 64-bit register values.
1758
1759 * Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
1760
1761 * GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
1762 target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
1763 a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
1764
1765 * Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
1766 automatically displayed as character or string data.
1767
1768 * The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
1769 arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
1770 as strings.
1771
1772 * Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
1773 for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
1774 only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
1775
1776 * GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
1777 iWMMXt coprocessor.
1778
1779 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
1780 ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
1781 has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
1782
1783 * GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
1784
1785 * GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
1786
1787 * The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
1788 layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
1789 segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
1790
1791 * The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
1792 immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
1793
1794 * The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
1795 "library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
1796 packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
1797 where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
1798 Windows and SymbianOS).
1799
1800 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
1801 (DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
1802
1803 * GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
1804 according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
1805
1806 * New commands
1807
1808 set remoteflow
1809 show remoteflow
1810 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
1811 when debugging using remote targets.
1812
1813 set mem inaccessible-by-default
1814 show mem inaccessible-by-default
1815 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
1816 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
1817 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
1818 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
1819 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
1820
1821 set breakpoint auto-hw
1822 show breakpoint auto-hw
1823 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
1824 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
1825 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
1826 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
1827 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
1828 including "next" and "finish".
1829
1830 catch exception
1831 catch exception unhandled
1832 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
1833
1834 catch assert
1835 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
1836
1837 set sysroot
1838 show sysroot
1839 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
1840 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
1841 an alias to "set sysroot".
1842
1843 info spu
1844 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
1845 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
1846 architecture.
1847
1848 * New native configurations
1849
1850 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
1851
1852 set tdesc filename
1853 unset tdesc filename
1854 show tdesc filename
1855 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
1856 not query the target for its built-in description.
1857
1858 * New targets
1859
1860 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
1861 MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
1862 Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
1863
1864 * New remote packets
1865
1866 QPassSignals:
1867 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
1868 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
1869
1870 qXfer:features:read:
1871 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
1872 features.
1873
1874 qXfer:spu:read:
1875 qXfer:spu:write:
1876 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
1877 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
1878
1879 qXfer:libraries:read:
1880 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
1881 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
1882 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
1883 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
1884
1885 * Removed targets
1886
1887 Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
1888
1889 alpha*-*-osf1*
1890 alpha*-*-osf2*
1891 d10v-*-*
1892 hppa*-*-hiux*
1893 i[34567]86-ncr-*
1894 i[34567]86-*-dgux*
1895 i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
1896 i[34567]86-*-netware*
1897 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
1898 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
1899 i[34567]86-*-sco*
1900 i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
1901 i[34567]86-*-sysv4*
1902 i[34567]86-*-sysv5*
1903 i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
1904 i[34567]86-*-unixware*
1905 i[34567]86-*-sysv*
1906 i[34567]86-*-isc*
1907 m68*-cisco*-*
1908 m68*-tandem-*
1909 mips*-*-pe
1910 rs6000-*-lynxos*
1911 sh*-*-pe
1912
1913 * Other removed features
1914
1915 target abug
1916 target cpu32bug
1917 target est
1918 target rom68k
1919
1920 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
1921
1922 target hms
1923 target e7000
1924 target sh3
1925 target sh3e
1926
1927 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
1928 H8/300.
1929
1930 target ocd
1931
1932 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
1933 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
1934 interfaces.
1935
1936 DWARF 1 support
1937
1938 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
1939 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
1940
1941 Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
1942
1943 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
1944 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
1945 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
1946 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
1947
1948 MIPS ".pdr" sections
1949
1950 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
1951 in debugging information.
1952
1953 Scheme support
1954
1955 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
1956 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
1957
1958 set mips stack-arg-size
1959 set mips saved-gpreg-size
1960
1961 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
1962
1963 *** Changes in GDB 6.6
1964
1965 * New targets
1966
1967 Xtensa xtensa-elf
1968 Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
1969
1970 * GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
1971 (mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
1972 running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
1973
1974 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
1975 Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
1976 supported.
1977
1978 * The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
1979 broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
1980
1981 * The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
1982 stub provides the required support.
1983
1984 * Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
1985 longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
1986
1987 * New commands
1988
1989 set substitute-path
1990 unset substitute-path
1991 show substitute-path
1992 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
1993 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
1994 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
1995 between compilation and debugging.
1996
1997 set trace-commands
1998 show trace-commands
1999 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
2000 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
2001 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
2002
2003 * REMOVED features
2004
2005 The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
2006
2007 Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
2008 an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
2009
2010 The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
2011
2012 * New remote packets
2013
2014 qSupported:
2015 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
2016 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
2017 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
2018 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
2019 target.
2020
2021 qXfer:auxv:read:
2022 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
2023 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
2024
2025 qXfer:memory-map:read:
2026 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
2027 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
2028
2029 vFlashErase:
2030 vFlashWrite:
2031 vFlashDone:
2032 Erase and program a flash memory device.
2033
2034 * Removed remote packets
2035
2036 qPart:auxv:read:
2037 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
2038 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
2039
2040 *** Changes in GDB 6.5
2041
2042 * New targets
2043
2044 Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
2045
2046 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
2047
2048 * New commands
2049
2050 init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
2051 only if it doesn't already have a value.
2052
2053 The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
2054
2055 checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
2056
2057 restart <n> Return the program state to a
2058 previously saved state.
2059
2060 info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
2061
2062 delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
2063
2064 set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
2065 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
2066
2067 info forks List forks of the user program that
2068 are available to be debugged.
2069
2070 fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
2071 forks of the user program that are
2072 available to be debugged.
2073
2074 delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
2075 that are available to be debugged (and
2076 kill the forked process).
2077
2078 detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
2079 that are available to be debugged (and
2080 allow the process to continue).
2081
2082 * New architecture
2083
2084 Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
2085
2086 * Improved Windows host support
2087
2088 GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
2089 native console support, and remote communications using either
2090 network sockets or serial ports.
2091
2092 * Improved Modula-2 language support
2093
2094 GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
2095 basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
2096 pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
2097 printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
2098 written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
2099 GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
2100
2101 * REMOVED features
2102
2103 The ARM rdi-share module.
2104
2105 The Netware NLM debug server.
2106
2107 *** Changes in GDB 6.4
2108
2109 * New native configurations
2110
2111 OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
2112 OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
2113
2114 * New targets
2115
2116 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
2117
2118 * New command line options
2119
2120 --batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
2121 --return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
2122 the child (debugged) program exited with.
2123 --eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
2124 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
2125 specified multiple times and in conjunction
2126 with the --command (-x) option.
2127
2128 * Deprecated commands removed
2129
2130 The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
2131 removed:
2132
2133 Command Replacement
2134 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
2135 othernames set arm disassembler
2136 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
2137 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
2138 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
2139 regs info registers
2140
2141 * New BSD user-level threads support
2142
2143 It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
2144 library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
2145 configurations are:
2146
2147 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
2148 FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
2149 OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
2150
2151 Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
2152 are not yet supported.
2153
2154 * New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
2155 (Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
2156
2157 * REMOVED configurations and files
2158
2159 VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
2160 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
2161 National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
2162
2163 * New "set print array-indexes" command
2164
2165 After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
2166 when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
2167 behavior.
2168
2169 * VAX floating point support
2170
2171 GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
2172
2173 * User-defined command support
2174
2175 In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
2176 to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
2177 section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
2178
2179 *** Changes in GDB 6.3:
2180
2181 * New command line option
2182
2183 GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
2184 debugging.
2185
2186 * GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
2187
2188 GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
2189 information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
2190 by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
2191 proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
2192 to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
2193
2194 * Internationalization
2195
2196 When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
2197 internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
2198 continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
2199
2200 * Ada
2201
2202 Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
2203 implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
2204 into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
2205
2206 * New native configurations
2207
2208 GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
2209
2210 * Remote 'p' packet
2211
2212 GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
2213 packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
2214
2215 * END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
2216
2217 GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
2218 The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
2219 features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
2220 i386 application).
2221
2222 GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
2223 compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
2224 continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
2225 configurations:
2226
2227 hppa-*-hpux
2228 ia64-*-aix
2229 mips-*-irix*
2230 *-*-lynx
2231 mips-*-linux-gnu
2232 sds protocol
2233 xdr protocol
2234 powerpc bdm protocol
2235
2236 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
2237 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
2238
2239 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2240
2241 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2242 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2243 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2244 permanently REMOVED.
2245
2246 h8300-*-*
2247 mcore-*-*
2248 mn10300-*-*
2249 ns32k-*-*
2250 sh64-*-*
2251 v850-*-*
2252
2253 *** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
2254
2255 * MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
2256
2257 When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
2258 heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
2259 been fixed.
2260
2261 * MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
2262
2263 When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
2264 fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
2265 IRIX long double values).
2266
2267 * VAX and "next"
2268
2269 A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
2270 command. This problem has been fixed.
2271
2272 *** Changes in GDB 6.2:
2273
2274 * Fix for ``many threads''
2275
2276 On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
2277 rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
2278 error message:
2279
2280 ptrace: No such process.
2281 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
2282
2283 This problem has been fixed.
2284
2285 * "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
2286
2287 Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
2288 GDB to dump core).
2289
2290 * New ``start'' command.
2291
2292 This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
2293
2294 * New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
2295
2296 Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
2297 live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
2298 platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
2299
2300 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
2301 FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
2302 NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
2303 NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
2304 NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
2305 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2306 OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
2307 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
2308 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
2309
2310 * Signal trampoline code overhauled
2311
2312 Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
2313 These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
2314 of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
2315 call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
2316 signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
2317
2318 Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
2319 features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
2320 include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
2321
2322 * Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
2323
2324 * New native configurations
2325
2326 GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
2327 OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
2328 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
2329 OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
2330 OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
2331 NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
2332 OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
2333
2334 * END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
2335
2336 GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
2337 The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
2338 including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
2339 migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
2340 compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
2341 work, was also included.
2342
2343 GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
2344 module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
2345
2346 h8300-*-*
2347 mcore-*-*
2348 mn10300-*-*
2349 ns32k-*-*
2350 sh64-*-*
2351 v850-*-*
2352 xstormy16-*-*
2353
2354 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
2355 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
2356
2357 * REMOVED configurations and files
2358
2359 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
2360 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
2361 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
2362 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
2363 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
2364 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
2365 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
2366 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
2367 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
2368 sonymips mips-sony-*
2369 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
2370
2371 *** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
2372
2373 * TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
2374
2375 The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
2376 GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
2377 command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
2378 program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
2379 with GDB".
2380
2381 * Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
2382
2383 Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
2384 libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
2385 cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
2386 GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
2387 shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
2388 the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
2389 are created.
2390
2391 Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
2392
2393 * Fixed ISO-C build problems
2394
2395 The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
2396 non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
2397 compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
2398
2399 * Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
2400
2401 Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
2402 wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
2403
2404 * Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
2405
2406 The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
2407 permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
2408 systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
2409
2410 * Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
2411
2412 Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
2413 has been updated to use constant array sizes.
2414
2415 * Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
2416
2417 GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
2418 its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
2419 panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
2420
2421 * Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
2422
2423 When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
2424 by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
2425 not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
2426
2427 *** Changes in GDB 6.1:
2428
2429 * Removed --with-mmalloc
2430
2431 Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
2432 conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
2433
2434 * Changes in AMD64 configurations
2435
2436 The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
2437 the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
2438 and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
2439 you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
2440
2441 * Revised SPARC target
2442
2443 The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
2444 FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
2445 support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
2446 from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
2447 (Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
2448
2449 * New C++ demangler
2450
2451 GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
2452 names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
2453 with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
2454 programs.
2455
2456 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
2457
2458 GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
2459 arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
2460 encountered these.
2461
2462 * C++ nested types and namespaces
2463
2464 GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
2465 improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
2466 is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
2467 Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
2468 namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
2469 "Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
2470 frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
2471 if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
2472 GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
2473
2474 * New native configurations
2475
2476 NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
2477 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2478 OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
2479 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
2480 OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
2481
2482 * New debugging protocols
2483
2484 M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
2485
2486 * "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
2487
2488 The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
2489 and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
2490 tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
2491
2492 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2493
2494 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2495 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2496 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2497 permanently REMOVED.
2498
2499 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
2500 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
2501 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
2502 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
2503 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
2504 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
2505 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
2506 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
2507 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
2508 sonymips mips-sony-*
2509 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
2510
2511 * REMOVED configurations and files
2512
2513 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
2514 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
2515 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2516 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
2517 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2518 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
2519 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2520 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
2521 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2522 386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
2523 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
2524 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
2525 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
2526 SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
2527 SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
2528 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2529 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
2530
2531 *** Changes in GDB 6.0:
2532
2533 * Objective-C
2534
2535 Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
2536 integrated into GDB.
2537
2538 * New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
2539
2540 DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
2541 information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
2542 By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
2543 backtraces.
2544
2545 The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
2546 have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
2547 DWARF 2 CFI support.
2548
2549 * Hosted file I/O.
2550
2551 GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
2552 file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
2553 remote protocol documentation for details.
2554
2555 * All targets using the new architecture framework.
2556
2557 All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
2558 architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
2559 to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
2560 ppc32 on ppc64).
2561
2562 * GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
2563
2564 GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
2565 per-thread variables.
2566
2567 * GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
2568
2569 GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
2570 GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
2571
2572 * Separate debug info.
2573
2574 GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
2575 automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
2576 of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
2577 system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
2578 and optional debug files.
2579
2580 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
2581
2582 DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
2583 describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
2584 debugger.
2585
2586 GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
2587 for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
2588
2589 * Java
2590
2591 A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
2592 Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
2593 considered "useable".
2594
2595 * GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
2596
2597 The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
2598 commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
2599 kernel.
2600
2601 * GDB supports logging output to a file
2602
2603 There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
2604 used to capture GDB's output to a file.
2605
2606 * The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
2607
2608 The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
2609 disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
2610 command.
2611
2612 * d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
2613
2614 The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
2615 registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
2616
2617 * Profiling support
2618
2619 A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
2620 be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
2621 session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
2622 "--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
2623 data, for more informative profiling results.
2624
2625 * Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
2626
2627 The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
2628 option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
2629 "mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
2630
2631 Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
2632 removed.
2633
2634 Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
2635 Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
2636 Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
2637 in a subsequent -var-update.
2638
2639 * New native configurations.
2640
2641 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
2642
2643 * Multi-arched targets.
2644
2645 HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
2646 Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
2647
2648 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2649
2650 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2651 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2652 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2653 permanently REMOVED.
2654
2655 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2656 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
2657 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2658 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
2659 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2660 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
2661 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2662 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
2663 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
2664 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
2665 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2666 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
2667
2668 * REMOVED configurations and files
2669
2670 V850EA ISA
2671 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2672 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
2673 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
2674 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
2675 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
2676 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
2677 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
2678 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
2679 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
2680 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
2681 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
2682 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2683 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
2684
2685 * MIPS $fp behavior changed
2686
2687 The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
2688 the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
2689 context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
2690 address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
2691 The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
2692
2693 *** Changes in GDB 5.3:
2694
2695 * GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
2696
2697 When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
2698 `/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
2699 in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
2700 library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
2701 shared libs like mad''.
2702
2703 * ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
2704
2705 Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
2706 the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
2707 arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
2708 powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
2709
2710 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
2711
2712 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
2713 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
2714 they expand.
2715
2716 The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
2717 invocations in expression, and shows the result.
2718
2719 The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
2720 macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
2721
2722 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
2723 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
2724 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
2725 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
2726
2727 * Multi-arched targets.
2728
2729 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
2730 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
2731 NEC V850 v850-*-*
2732 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
2733 Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
2734 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
2735
2736 * New targets.
2737
2738 Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
2739
2740
2741 * New native configurations
2742
2743 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
2744 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
2745 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
2746 UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
2747
2748 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2749
2750 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2751 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2752 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2753 permanently REMOVED.
2754
2755 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
2756 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2757 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
2758 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
2759 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2760 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
2761 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
2762 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
2763 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
2764 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
2765 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
2766 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
2767 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
2768
2769 * OBSOLETE languages
2770
2771 CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
2772
2773 * REMOVED configurations and files
2774
2775 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
2776 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2777 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2778 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2779 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2780
2781 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
2782
2783 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
2784
2785 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
2786 commands. The default is 1024.
2787
2788 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
2789
2790 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
2791
2792 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
2793
2794 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
2795 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
2796 from a file into memory (restore).
2797
2798 * Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
2799
2800 The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
2801 including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
2802 of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
2803
2804 *** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
2805
2806 * New targets.
2807
2808 Atmel AVR avr*-*-*
2809
2810 * Bug fixes
2811
2812 gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
2813 mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
2814 Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
2815
2816 gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
2817 dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
2818 Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
2819
2820 Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
2821 Surprisingly enough, it works now.
2822 By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
2823
2824 i386 hardware watchpoint support:
2825 avoid misses on second run for some targets.
2826 By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
2827
2828 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
2829
2830 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
2831
2832 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
2833 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
2834 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
2835 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
2836 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
2837 (notably embedded) targets.
2838
2839 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
2840
2841 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
2842 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
2843 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
2844 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
2845
2846 * New command line option
2847
2848 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
2849
2850 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
2851
2852 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
2853 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
2854 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
2855 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
2856 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
2857 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
2858 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
2859 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
2860 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
2861 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
2862
2863 * Changes in ARM configurations.
2864
2865 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
2866 configuration is fully multi-arch.
2867
2868 * New native configurations
2869
2870 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
2871 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
2872 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
2873 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
2874
2875 * New targets
2876
2877 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
2878
2879 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2880
2881 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2882 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2883 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2884 permanently REMOVED.
2885
2886 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
2887 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2888 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2889 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2890 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2891
2892 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
2893
2894 * REMOVED configurations and files
2895
2896 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2897 WDC 65816 w65-*-*
2898 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2899 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2900 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
2901 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
2902 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
2903 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
2904 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
2905 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
2906 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
2907 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
2908 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
2909
2910 * Changes to command line processing
2911
2912 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
2913 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
2914
2915 * Changes to key bindings
2916
2917 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
2918
2919 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
2920
2921 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
2922
2923 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
2924 corrupted.
2925
2926 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
2927
2928 Numerous documentation fixes.
2929
2930 Numerous testsuite fixes.
2931
2932 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
2933
2934 * New native configurations
2935
2936 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
2937 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
2938 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
2939 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
2940 ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
2941 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
2942
2943 * New targets
2944
2945 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
2946 CRIS cris-axis
2947 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
2948
2949 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2950
2951 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
2952 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
2953 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
2954 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
2955 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2956 WDC 65816 w65-*-*
2957 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
2958 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2959 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2960 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
2961 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
2962 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
2963 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
2964 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
2965
2966 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
2967 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
2968
2969 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2970 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2971 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2972 permanently REMOVED.
2973
2974 * REMOVED configurations and files
2975
2976 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
2977 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
2978 Pyramid pyramid-*-*
2979 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
2980 Tahoe tahoe-*-*
2981 ser-ocd.c *-*-*
2982
2983 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
2984
2985 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
2986 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
2987 present.
2988
2989 * Other news:
2990
2991 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
2992
2993 * The MI enabled by default.
2994
2995 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
2996 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
2997 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
2998 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
2999 which is now deprecated.
3000
3001 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
3002
3003 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
3004 main features are supported:
3005
3006 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
3007
3008 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
3009 extension;
3010
3011 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
3012
3013 - a Pascal expression parser.
3014
3015 However, some important features are not yet supported.
3016
3017 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
3018
3019 - there are some problems with boolean types;
3020
3021 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
3022 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
3023
3024 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
3025
3026 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
3027
3028 * Changes in completion.
3029
3030 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
3031 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
3032 users expect at the shell prompt.
3033
3034 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
3035 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
3036 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
3037 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
3038 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
3039 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
3040 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
3041
3042 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
3043
3044 * New platform-independent commands:
3045
3046 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
3047 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
3048 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
3049
3050 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
3051
3052 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
3053 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
3054 many threads as your system allows you to have.
3055
3056 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
3057
3058 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
3059 multi-threaded programs though.
3060
3061 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
3062
3063 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
3064
3065 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
3066 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
3067 supported.)
3068
3069 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
3070
3071 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
3072 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
3073 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
3074 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
3075 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
3076 registers.
3077
3078 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
3079 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
3080 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
3081
3082 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
3083
3084 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
3085 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
3086
3087 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
3088 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
3089 IDT.
3090
3091 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
3092 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
3093 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
3094 a given linear address.
3095
3096 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
3097 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
3098 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
3099
3100 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
3101
3102 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
3103
3104 * Changes in documentation.
3105
3106 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
3107 Documentation License.
3108
3109 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
3110 manual.
3111
3112 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
3113
3114 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
3115 manual.
3116
3117 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
3118 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
3119 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
3120
3121 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
3122
3123 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
3124 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
3125 contents of this file.
3126
3127 * gdba.el deleted
3128
3129 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
3130
3131 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
3132
3133 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
3134
3135 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
3136 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
3137 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
3138 greater level of detail.
3139
3140 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
3141
3142 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
3143 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
3144 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
3145 written.
3146
3147 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
3148
3149 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
3150 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
3151 machines ``out of the box''.
3152
3153 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
3154 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
3155 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
3156 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
3157 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
3158
3159 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
3160 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
3161 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
3162 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
3163 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
3164
3165 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
3166 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
3167 also works.
3168
3169 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
3170 GDB.
3171
3172 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
3173 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
3174 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
3175 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
3176
3177 * New native configurations
3178
3179 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
3180 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
3181
3182 * New targets
3183
3184 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
3185 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
3186 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
3187 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
3188
3189 * OBSOLETE configurations
3190
3191 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
3192 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
3193 Pyramid pyramid-*-*
3194 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
3195 Tahoe tahoe-*-*
3196
3197 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
3198 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
3199 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
3200 be permanently REMOVED.
3201
3202 * Gould support removed
3203
3204 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
3205
3206 * New features for SVR4
3207
3208 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
3209 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
3210 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
3211
3212 * Many C++ enhancements
3213
3214 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
3215 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
3216
3217 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
3218
3219 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
3220 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
3221 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
3222 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
3223
3224 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
3225 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
3226
3227 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
3228
3229 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
3230 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
3231 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
3232
3233 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
3234 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
3235
3236 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
3237
3238 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
3239 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
3240 include ``set remote P-packet''.
3241
3242 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
3243
3244 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
3245 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
3246 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
3247
3248 * ``apropos'' command added.
3249
3250 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
3251 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
3252 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
3253
3254 * New MI interface
3255
3256 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
3257 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
3258 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
3259 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
3260 enabled by configuring with:
3261
3262 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
3263
3264 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
3265
3266 * New native configurations
3267
3268 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
3269 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
3270 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
3271
3272 * New targets
3273
3274 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
3275 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
3276 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
3277
3278 * OBSOLETE configurations
3279
3280 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
3281
3282 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
3283 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
3284 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
3285 be permanently REMOVED.
3286
3287 * ANSI/ISO C
3288
3289 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
3290 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
3291 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
3292 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
3293 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
3294 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
3295 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
3296 already.
3297
3298 * Readline 2.2
3299
3300 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
3301
3302 * set extension-language
3303
3304 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
3305 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
3306 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
3307 set extension-language .c c++
3308 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
3309 and their associated languages.
3310
3311 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
3312
3313 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
3314 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
3315 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
3316
3317 set processor NAME
3318
3319 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
3320 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
3321
3322 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
3323 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
3324 403 IBM PowerPC 403
3325 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
3326 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
3327 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
3328 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
3329 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
3330 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
3331 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
3332 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
3333
3334 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
3335 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
3336 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
3337 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
3338
3339 * HP-UX support
3340
3341 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
3342 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
3343 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
3344 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
3345 for xdb and dbx commands.
3346
3347 * Catchpoints
3348
3349 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
3350 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
3351 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
3352
3353 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
3354 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
3355 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
3356
3357 * Debugging across forks
3358
3359 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
3360 in the inferior.
3361
3362 * TUI
3363
3364 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
3365 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
3366 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
3367
3368 * GDB remote protocol additions
3369
3370 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
3371 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
3372 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
3373 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
3374
3375 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
3376 full 64-bit address. The command
3377
3378 set remoteaddresssize 32
3379
3380 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
3381 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
3382 will be discarded.
3383
3384 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
3385 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
3386
3387 maint packet heythere
3388
3389 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
3390 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
3391 time.
3392
3393 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
3394 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
3395 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
3396
3397 * Tracing can collect general expressions
3398
3399 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
3400 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
3401 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
3402
3403 * mask-address variable for Mips
3404
3405 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
3406 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
3407 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
3408
3409 * Higher serial baud rates
3410
3411 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
3412 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
3413 to achieve all of these rates.)
3414
3415 * i960 simulator
3416
3417 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
3418 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
3419
3420
3421 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
3422
3423 * New native configurations
3424
3425 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
3426 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
3427 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
3428 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
3429 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
3430 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
3431 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
3432
3433 * New targets
3434
3435 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
3436 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
3437 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
3438 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
3439 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
3440 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
3441 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
3442 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
3443 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
3444 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
3445 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
3446
3447 * New debugging protocols
3448
3449 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
3450 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
3451 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
3452 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
3453 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
3454 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
3455
3456 * DWARF 2
3457
3458 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
3459 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
3460 information.
3461
3462 * Java frontend
3463
3464 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
3465 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
3466
3467 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
3468
3469 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
3470 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
3471 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
3472
3473 * Live range splitting
3474
3475 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
3476 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
3477 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
3478
3479 * Hurd support
3480
3481 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
3482 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
3483
3484 * ARM Thumb support
3485
3486 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
3487 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
3488 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
3489 accordingly.
3490
3491 * MIPS16 support
3492
3493 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
3494 instruction set.
3495
3496 * Overlay support
3497
3498 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
3499 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
3500 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
3501 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
3502 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
3503 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
3504
3505 * info symbol
3506
3507 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
3508 the symbol at the specified address.
3509
3510 * Trace support
3511
3512 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
3513 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
3514 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
3515 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
3516 file tracepoint.c for more details.
3517
3518 * MIPS simulator
3519
3520 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
3521 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
3522 of most MIPS variants.
3523
3524 * Sparc simulator
3525
3526 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
3527 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
3528 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
3529
3530 * set architecture
3531
3532 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
3533 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
3534 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
3535 the possible architectures.
3536
3537 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
3538
3539 * New native configurations
3540
3541 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
3542 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
3543 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
3544 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
3545 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
3546 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
3547
3548 * New targets
3549
3550 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
3551 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
3552 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
3553 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
3554 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
3555 Hitachi SH3 sh-*-*
3556 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
3557
3558 * PowerPC simulator
3559
3560 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
3561 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
3562 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
3563 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
3564 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
3565
3566 * Solaris 2.5
3567
3568 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
3569
3570 * Windows 95/NT native
3571
3572 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
3573 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
3574 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
3575 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
3576 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
3577
3578 * dont-repeat command
3579
3580 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
3581 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
3582 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
3583 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
3584
3585 * Send break instead of ^C
3586
3587 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
3588 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
3589 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
3590
3591 * Remote protocol timeout
3592
3593 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
3594 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
3595 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
3596
3597 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
3598
3599 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
3600 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
3601 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
3602 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
3603 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
3604
3605 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
3606 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
3607 automatically on hpux10.
3608
3609 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
3610
3611 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
3612
3613 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
3614
3615 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
3616 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
3617 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
3618 every character. The default value is 1050.
3619
3620 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
3621
3622 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
3623 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
3624 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
3625 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
3626 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
3627 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
3628
3629 * Speedups for remote debugging
3630
3631 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
3632 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
3633 and more efficient S-record downloading.
3634
3635 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
3636
3637 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
3638 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
3639
3640 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
3641
3642 * Psymtabs for XCOFF
3643
3644 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
3645 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
3646
3647 * Remote targets use caching
3648
3649 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
3650 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
3651 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
3652 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
3653 off' turns the the data cache off.
3654
3655 * Remote targets may have threads
3656
3657 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
3658 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
3659 gdb/remote.c for details.
3660
3661 * NetROM support
3662
3663 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
3664 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
3665 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
3666 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
3667 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
3668 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
3669 sequence is something like
3670
3671 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
3672 load <prog>
3673 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
3674
3675 * Macintosh host
3676
3677 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
3678 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
3679 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
3680 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
3681 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
3682 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
3683 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
3684 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
3685
3686 * Autoconf
3687
3688 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
3689 but does simplify configuration and building.
3690
3691 * hpux10
3692
3693 GDB now supports hpux10.
3694
3695 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
3696
3697 * New native configurations
3698
3699 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
3700 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
3701 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
3702 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
3703
3704 * New targets
3705
3706 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
3707 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
3708 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
3709 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
3710 WDC 65816 w65-*-*
3711
3712 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
3713
3714 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
3715 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
3716 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
3717 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
3718 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
3719
3720 * Arguments to user-defined commands
3721
3722 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
3723 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
3724 trivial example:
3725 define adder
3726 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
3727
3728 To execute the command use:
3729 adder 1 2 3
3730
3731 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
3732 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
3733 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
3734
3735 * New `if' and `while' commands
3736
3737 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
3738 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
3739 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
3740 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
3741 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
3742 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
3743 if the expression is zero.
3744
3745 * Fortran source language mode
3746
3747 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
3748 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
3749 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
3750 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
3751 Fortran compilers.
3752
3753 * Better HPUX support
3754
3755 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
3756 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
3757 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
3758 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
3759 that behavior do the following before running the program:
3760
3761 adb -w a.out
3762 __dld_flags?W 0x5
3763 control-d
3764
3765 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
3766 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
3767
3768 adb -w a.out
3769 __dld_flags?W 0x4
3770 control-d
3771
3772 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
3773 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
3774 external linkage.
3775
3776 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
3777 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
3778
3779 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
3780
3781 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
3782 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
3783 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
3784 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
3785 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
3786 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
3787
3788 * New DOS host serial code
3789
3790 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
3791 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
3792 a PC's serial port.
3793
3794 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
3795
3796 * New "complete" command
3797
3798 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
3799 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
3800
3801 * Trailing space optional in prompt
3802
3803 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
3804 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
3805
3806 * Breakpoint hit counts
3807
3808 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
3809 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
3810 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
3811 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
3812 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
3813 that breakpoint.
3814
3815 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
3816
3817 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
3818 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
3819 arrays actually contain only short strings.
3820
3821 * Shared library breakpoints
3822
3823 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
3824 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
3825
3826 * Hardware watchpoints
3827
3828 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
3829 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
3830
3831 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
3832
3833 * Annotations
3834
3835 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
3836 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
3837
3838 * Improved Irix 5 support
3839
3840 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
3841
3842 * Improved HPPA support
3843
3844 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
3845
3846 * New native configurations
3847
3848 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
3849 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
3850 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
3851 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
3852
3853 * New targets
3854
3855 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
3856 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
3857 Sparc64 sparc64-*-*
3858
3859 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
3860
3861 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
3862 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
3863
3864 * Fixes
3865
3866 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
3867 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
3868
3869 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
3870
3871 * Irix 5 is now supported
3872
3873 * HPPA support
3874
3875 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
3876 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
3877 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
3878 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
3879 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
3880
3881
3882 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
3883
3884 * User visible changes:
3885
3886 * Remote Debugging
3887
3888 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
3889 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
3890 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
3891 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
3892 debugging info for the mips target).
3893
3894 * DEC Alpha native support
3895
3896 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
3897 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
3898 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
3899 Alpha-specific notes.
3900
3901 * Preliminary thread implementation
3902
3903 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
3904
3905 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
3906
3907 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
3908 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
3909 for details).
3910
3911 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
3912
3913 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
3914 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
3915 call methods, ...etc.
3916
3917 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
3918
3919 * User visible changes:
3920
3921 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
3922 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
3923 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
3924 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
3925
3926 Filename completion now works.
3927
3928 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
3929 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
3930 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
3931
3932 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
3933 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
3934 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
3935 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
3936 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
3937
3938 * DEC alpha support
3939
3940 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
3941 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
3942
3943
3944 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
3945
3946 * Testsuite
3947
3948 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
3949 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
3950 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
3951
3952 * C++ demangling
3953
3954 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
3955 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
3956 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
3957 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
3958 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
3959
3960 * Simulators
3961
3962 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
3963 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
3964 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
3965
3966 * New targets supported
3967
3968 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
3969 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
3970 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
3971 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
3972 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
3973
3974 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
3975 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
3976 GO32 memory extender.
3977
3978 * New remote protocols
3979
3980 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
3981
3982 * New source languages supported
3983
3984 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
3985 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
3986 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
3987
3988
3989 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
3990
3991 * HP Precision Architecture supported
3992
3993 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
3994 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
3995 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
3996 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
3997 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
3998 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
3999
4000 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
4001
4002 * Faster and better demangling
4003
4004 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
4005 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
4006 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
4007 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
4008 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
4009 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
4010 symbol lookups.
4011
4012 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
4013 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
4014 compiler does not actually implement.
4015
4016 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
4017
4018 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
4019 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
4020 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
4021 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
4022 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
4023 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
4024 fix.
4025
4026 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
4027 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
4028
4029 * Improved configure script
4030
4031 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
4032 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
4033 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
4034 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
4035
4036 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
4037 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
4038 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
4039 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
4040 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
4041 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
4042
4043 * Documentation improvements
4044
4045 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
4046 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
4047 before submitting changes.
4048
4049 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
4050 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
4051 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
4052 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
4053 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
4054
4055 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
4056 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
4057 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
4058 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
4059 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
4060 around this problem.
4061
4062 * New features
4063
4064 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
4065 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
4066 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
4067 the target program.
4068
4069 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
4070 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
4071
4072 * New native hosts supported
4073
4074 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
4075 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
4076
4077 * New targets supported
4078
4079 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
4080
4081 * New file formats supported
4082
4083 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
4084 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
4085
4086 * Major bug fixes
4087
4088 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
4089
4090 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
4091 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
4092
4093 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
4094 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
4095 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
4096
4097 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
4098 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
4099
4100 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
4101 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
4102 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
4103 libraries.
4104
4105 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
4106 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
4107 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
4108 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
4109 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
4110
4111 * Internal improvements
4112
4113 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
4114 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
4115
4116 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
4117 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
4118 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
4119 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
4120 shared code that handles any of them.
4121
4122 * New command line options
4123
4124 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
4125
4126 * Mmalloc licensing
4127
4128 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
4129 General Public License.
4130
4131 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
4132
4133 * Host/native/target split
4134
4135 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
4136 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
4137 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
4138 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
4139 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
4140
4141 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
4142 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
4143 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
4144 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
4145 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
4146 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
4147 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
4148
4149 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
4150 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
4151 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
4152
4153 * New hosts supported
4154
4155 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
4156 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
4157 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
4158
4159 * New targets supported
4160
4161 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
4162 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
4163
4164 * New native hosts supported
4165
4166 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
4167 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
4168 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
4169
4170 * New file formats supported
4171
4172 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
4173 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
4174 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
4175
4176 * New commands
4177
4178 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
4179 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
4180 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
4181
4182 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
4183
4184 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
4185 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
4186 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
4187 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
4188
4189 * C++ improvements
4190
4191 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
4192 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
4193 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
4194
4195 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
4196
4197 * Major bug fixes
4198
4199 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
4200 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
4201 by the compiler.
4202
4203 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
4204 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
4205
4206 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
4207 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
4208 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
4209 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
4210 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
4211 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
4212
4213 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
4214 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
4215 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
4216 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
4217
4218 * AMD 29k support
4219
4220 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
4221 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
4222 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
4223 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
4224 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
4225
4226 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
4227 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
4228 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
4229 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
4230
4231 * Remote interfaces
4232
4233 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
4234 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
4235 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
4236 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
4237 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
4238 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
4239 each instruction being stepped through.
4240
4241 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
4242 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
4243
4244 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
4245 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
4246 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
4247 processor with a serial port.
4248
4249 * Configuration
4250
4251 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
4252 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
4253 supported, and what files each one uses.
4254
4255 * Library changes
4256
4257 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
4258 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
4259 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
4260 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
4261
4262 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
4263 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
4264 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
4265 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
4266
4267 * Documentation
4268
4269 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
4270 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
4271 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
4272 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
4273 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
4274 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
4275
4276 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
4277
4278
4279 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
4280
4281 * Better support for C++ function names
4282
4283 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
4284 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
4285 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
4286 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
4287 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
4288
4289 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
4290 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
4291 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
4292 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
4293 for the list of formats.
4294
4295 * G++ symbol mangling problem
4296
4297 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
4298 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
4299 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
4300 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
4301 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
4302 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
4303 this problem.)
4304
4305 * New 'maintenance' command
4306
4307 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
4308 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
4309 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
4310
4311 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
4312 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
4313 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
4314 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
4315 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
4316 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
4317
4318 The following commands are new:
4319
4320 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
4321 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
4322 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
4323
4324 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
4325
4326 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
4327 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
4328 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
4329 read after argv processing.
4330
4331 * New hosts supported
4332
4333 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
4334
4335 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
4336
4337 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
4338 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
4339 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
4340 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
4341 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
4342 It costs extra.
4343
4344 * New targets supported
4345
4346 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
4347
4348 * More smarts about finding #include files
4349
4350 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
4351 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
4352 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
4353 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
4354 the one that contains your sources.
4355
4356 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
4357 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
4358 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
4359
4360 * Interesting infernals change
4361
4362 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
4363 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
4364 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
4365 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
4366
4367 * Bug fixes (of course!)
4368
4369 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
4370 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
4371 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
4372
4373 See the ChangeLog for details.
4374
4375 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
4376
4377 * New machines supported (host and target)
4378
4379 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
4380
4381 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
4382
4383 * New malloc package
4384
4385 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
4386 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
4387 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
4388 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
4389 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
4390 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
4391
4392 * info proc
4393
4394 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
4395 'help info proc' for details.
4396
4397 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
4398
4399 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
4400 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
4401 possible.
4402
4403 * File name changes for MS-DOS
4404
4405 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
4406 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
4407 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
4408 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
4409 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
4410 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
4411
4412 * Cross byte order fixes
4413
4414 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
4415 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
4416
4417 * New -mapped and -readnow options
4418
4419 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
4420 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
4421 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
4422 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
4423 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
4424 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
4425 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
4426 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
4427 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
4428 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
4429
4430 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
4431 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
4432 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
4433 slower, but makes future operations faster.
4434
4435 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
4436 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
4437 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
4438 use is:
4439
4440 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
4441
4442 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
4443 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
4444 shared across multiple host platforms.
4445
4446 * longjmp() handling
4447
4448 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
4449 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
4450 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
4451 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
4452
4453 * Solaris 2.0
4454
4455 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
4456 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
4457 reading symbols.
4458
4459 * Bug fixes
4460
4461 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
4462 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
4463 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
4464
4465 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
4466
4467 * New machines supported (host and target)
4468
4469 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
4470 (except core files)
4471 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
4472 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
4473
4474 * New machines supported (target)
4475
4476 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
4477
4478 * C++ support
4479
4480 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
4481 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
4482 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
4483
4484 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
4485 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
4486 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
4487 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
4488 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
4489 released.
4490
4491 * New features for SVR4
4492
4493 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
4494 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
4495 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
4496
4497 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
4498 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
4499 it prints the address mappings of the process.
4500
4501 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
4502 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
4503
4504 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
4505
4506 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
4507 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
4508 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
4509 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
4510 same code linked statically.
4511
4512 * New Getopt
4513
4514 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
4515 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
4516 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
4517 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
4518 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
4519 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
4520
4521 * Bugs fixed
4522
4523 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
4524 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
4525 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
4526
4527
4528 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
4529
4530 * New machines supported (host and target)
4531
4532 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
4533 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
4534 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
4535
4536 * Almost SCO Unix support
4537
4538 We had hoped to support:
4539 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
4540 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
4541 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
4542 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
4543
4544 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
4545
4546 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
4547 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
4548 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
4549 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
4550 reqired (if any).
4551
4552 * New Readline
4553
4554 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
4555 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
4556 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
4557
4558 * Bugs fixed
4559
4560 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
4561 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
4562 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
4563
4564 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
4565
4566 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
4567 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
4568 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
4569
4570 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
4571 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
4572 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
4573 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
4574 version 2.
4575
4576 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
4577 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
4578 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
4579 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
4580 situation somewhat.
4581
4582 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
4583 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
4584 methods.
4585
4586 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
4587 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
4588 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
4589
4590
4591 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
4592
4593 * Improved configuration
4594
4595 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
4596 Porting BFD is simpler.
4597
4598 * Stepping improved
4599
4600 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
4601 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
4602 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
4603 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
4604
4605 * Bug fixing
4606
4607 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
4608
4609 * New host supported (not target)
4610
4611 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
4612
4613
4614 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
4615
4616 * Multiple source language support
4617
4618 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
4619 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
4620 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
4621 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
4622 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
4623 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
4624
4625 * GDB and Modula-2
4626
4627 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
4628 currently under development at the State University of New York at
4629 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
4630 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
4631
4632 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
4633 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
4634 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
4635
4636 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
4637 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
4638
4639 * set write on/off
4640
4641 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
4642 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
4643 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
4644 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
4645 effect immediately.
4646
4647 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
4648
4649 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
4650 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
4651 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
4652 examining core files.
4653
4654 * set listsize
4655
4656 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
4657 The default is 10.
4658
4659 * New machines supported (host and target)
4660
4661 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4662 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
4663 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
4664
4665 * New hosts supported (not targets)
4666
4667 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
4668
4669 * New targets supported (not hosts)
4670
4671 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
4672 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
4673 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
4674
4675 * New remote interfaces
4676
4677 AMD 29000 Adapt
4678 AMD 29000 Minimon
4679
4680
4681 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
4682
4683 * New Facilities
4684
4685 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
4686
4687 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
4688 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
4689 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
4690 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
4691 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
4692 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
4693 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
4694 stub on the target system.
4695
4696 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
4697
4698 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
4699 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
4700 object file types such as a.out and coff.
4701
4702 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
4703 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
4704
4705
4706 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
4707
4708 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
4709 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
4710
4711 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
4712 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
4713 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
4714
4715 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
4716 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
4717 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
4718 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
4719
4720 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
4721 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
4722 it is already running. Default is ON.
4723
4724 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
4725 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
4726 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
4727 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
4728 Default is ON.
4729
4730 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
4731 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
4732 or the value of the environment variable
4733 GDBHISTFILE.
4734
4735 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
4736 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
4737 HISTSIZE.
4738
4739 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
4740 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
4741 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
4742
4743 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
4744 history expansion will be performed on
4745 command line input. The default is OFF.
4746
4747 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
4748 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
4749 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
4750
4751 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
4752 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
4753 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
4754 variable TERM.
4755
4756 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
4757 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
4758 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
4759 variable TERM.
4760
4761 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
4762 ``set width'' instead.
4763
4764 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
4765 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
4766 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
4767 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
4768
4769 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
4770 is OFF.
4771
4772 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
4773 "raw" form if off.
4774
4775 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
4776 like instructions.
4777
4778 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
4779
4780
4781 * Support for Epoch Environment.
4782
4783 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
4784 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
4785 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
4786 window.
4787
4788
4789 * Support for Shared Libraries
4790
4791 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
4792 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
4793 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
4794 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
4795 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
4796 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
4797 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
4798 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
4799
4800 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
4801 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
4802 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
4803
4804 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
4805
4806
4807 * Watchpoints
4808
4809 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
4810 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
4811 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
4812 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
4813 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
4814 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
4815
4816 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
4817
4818 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
4819
4820 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4821 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4822 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4823
4824
4825 * C++ multiple inheritance
4826
4827 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
4828 for C++ programs.
4829
4830 * C++ exception handling
4831
4832 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
4833 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
4834 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
4835 handler's context).
4836
4837 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
4838 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
4839 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
4840
4841 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
4842 current stack frame.
4843
4844
4845 * Minor command changes
4846
4847 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
4848 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
4849 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
4850
4851 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
4852 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
4853 frames without printing.
4854
4855 * New directory command
4856
4857 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
4858 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
4859 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
4860 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
4861 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
4862
4863 * Configuring GDB for compilation
4864
4865 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
4866 for more details.
4867
4868 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
4869 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
4870 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
4871 where the program that you are debugging will run.
This page took 0.152776 seconds and 4 git commands to generate.