1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB 5.2:
6 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
8 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
9 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
12 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
13 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
14 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
15 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
17 Here are the new commands for working with macros:
19 ** macro expand EXPRESSION
21 Expand any macro invocations in expression, and show the result.
23 ** show macro MACRO-NAME
25 Show the definition of the macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was
28 * Multi-arched targets.
30 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
31 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
33 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
39 * New native configurations
41 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
42 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
43 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
45 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
47 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
48 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
49 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
52 * REMOVED configurations and files
54 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
55 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
56 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
57 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
58 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
60 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
62 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
64 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
65 commands. The default is 1024.
67 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
69 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
71 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
73 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
74 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
75 from a file into memory (restore).
77 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
79 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
81 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
82 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
83 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
84 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
85 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
86 (notably embedded) targets.
88 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
90 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
91 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
92 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
93 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
95 * New command line option
97 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
99 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
101 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
102 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
103 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
104 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
105 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
106 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
107 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
108 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
109 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
110 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
112 * Changes in ARM configurations.
114 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
115 configuration is fully multi-arch.
117 * New native configurations
119 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
120 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
121 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
122 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
126 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
128 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
130 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
131 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
132 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
135 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
136 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
137 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
138 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
139 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
141 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
143 * REMOVED configurations and files
145 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
147 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
148 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
149 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
150 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
151 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
152 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
153 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
154 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
155 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
156 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
157 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
159 * Changes to command line processing
161 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
162 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
164 * Changes to key bindings
166 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
168 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
170 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
172 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
175 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
177 Numerous documentation fixes.
179 Numerous testsuite fixes.
181 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
183 * New native configurations
185 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
186 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
187 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
188 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
190 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
194 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
196 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
198 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
200 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
201 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
202 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
203 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
204 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
206 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
207 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
208 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
209 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
210 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
211 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
212 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
213 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
215 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
216 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
218 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
219 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
220 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
223 * REMOVED configurations and files
225 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
226 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
228 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
232 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
234 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
235 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
240 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
242 * The MI enabled by default.
244 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
245 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
246 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
247 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
248 which is now deprecated.
250 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
252 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
253 main features are supported:
255 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
257 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
260 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
262 - a Pascal expression parser.
264 However, some important features are not yet supported.
266 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
268 - there are some problems with boolean types;
270 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
271 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
273 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
275 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
277 * Changes in completion.
279 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
280 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
281 users expect at the shell prompt.
283 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
284 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
285 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
286 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
287 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
288 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
289 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
291 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
293 * New platform-independent commands:
295 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
296 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
297 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
299 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
301 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
302 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
303 many threads as your system allows you to have.
305 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
307 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
308 multi-threaded programs though.
310 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
312 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
314 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
315 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
318 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
320 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
321 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
322 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
323 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
324 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
327 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
328 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
329 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
331 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
333 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
334 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
336 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
337 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
340 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
341 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
342 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
343 a given linear address.
345 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
346 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
347 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
349 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
351 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
353 * Changes in documentation.
355 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
356 Documentation License.
358 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
361 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
363 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
366 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
367 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
368 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
370 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
372 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
373 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
374 contents of this file.
378 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
380 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
382 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
384 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
385 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
386 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
387 greater level of detail.
389 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
391 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
392 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
393 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
396 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
398 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
399 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
400 machines ``out of the box''.
402 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
403 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
404 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
405 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
406 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
408 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
409 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
410 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
411 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
412 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
414 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
415 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
418 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
421 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
422 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
423 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
424 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
426 * New native configurations
428 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
429 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
433 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
434 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
435 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
436 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
438 * OBSOLETE configurations
440 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
441 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
443 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
446 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
447 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
448 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
449 be permanently REMOVED.
451 * Gould support removed
453 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
455 * New features for SVR4
457 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
458 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
459 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
461 * Many C++ enhancements
463 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
464 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
466 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
468 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
469 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
470 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
471 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
473 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
474 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
476 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
478 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
479 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
480 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
482 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
483 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
485 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
487 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
488 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
489 include ``set remote P-packet''.
491 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
493 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
494 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
495 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
497 * ``apropos'' command added.
499 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
500 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
501 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
505 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
506 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
507 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
508 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
509 enabled by configuring with:
511 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
513 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
515 * New native configurations
517 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
518 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
519 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
523 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
524 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
525 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
527 * OBSOLETE configurations
529 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
531 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
532 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
533 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
534 be permanently REMOVED.
538 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
539 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
540 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
541 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
542 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
543 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
544 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
549 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
551 * set extension-language
553 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
554 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
555 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
556 set extension-language .c c++
557 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
558 and their associated languages.
560 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
562 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
563 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
564 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
568 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
569 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
571 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
572 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
574 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
575 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
576 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
577 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
578 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
579 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
580 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
581 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
583 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
584 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
585 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
586 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
590 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
591 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
592 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
593 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
594 for xdb and dbx commands.
598 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
599 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
600 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
602 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
603 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
604 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
606 * Debugging across forks
608 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
613 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
614 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
615 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
617 * GDB remote protocol additions
619 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
620 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
621 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
622 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
624 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
625 full 64-bit address. The command
627 set remoteaddresssize 32
629 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
630 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
633 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
634 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
636 maint packet heythere
638 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
639 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
642 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
643 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
644 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
646 * Tracing can collect general expressions
648 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
649 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
650 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
652 * mask-address variable for Mips
654 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
655 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
656 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
658 * Higher serial baud rates
660 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
661 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
662 to achieve all of these rates.)
666 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
667 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
670 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
672 * New native configurations
674 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
675 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
676 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
677 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
678 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
679 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
680 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
684 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
685 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
686 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
687 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
688 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
689 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
690 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
691 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
692 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
693 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
694 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
696 * New debugging protocols
698 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
699 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
700 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
701 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
702 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
703 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
707 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
708 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
713 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
714 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
716 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
718 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
719 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
720 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
722 * Live range splitting
724 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
725 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
726 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
730 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
731 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
735 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
736 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
737 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
742 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
747 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
748 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
749 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
750 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
751 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
752 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
756 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
757 the symbol at the specified address.
761 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
762 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
763 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
764 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
765 file tracepoint.c for more details.
769 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
770 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
771 of most MIPS variants.
775 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
776 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
777 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
781 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
782 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
783 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
784 the possible architectures.
786 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
788 * New native configurations
790 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
791 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
792 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
793 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
794 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
795 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
799 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
800 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
801 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
802 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
803 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
805 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
809 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
810 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
811 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
812 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
813 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
817 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
819 * Windows 95/NT native
821 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
822 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
823 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
824 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
825 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
827 * dont-repeat command
829 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
830 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
831 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
832 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
834 * Send break instead of ^C
836 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
837 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
838 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
840 * Remote protocol timeout
842 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
843 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
844 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
846 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
848 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
849 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
850 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
851 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
852 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
854 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
855 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
856 automatically on hpux10.
858 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
860 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
862 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
864 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
865 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
866 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
867 every character. The default value is 1050.
869 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
871 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
872 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
873 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
874 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
875 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
876 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
878 * Speedups for remote debugging
880 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
881 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
882 and more efficient S-record downloading.
884 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
886 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
887 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
889 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
893 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
894 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
896 * Remote targets use caching
898 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
899 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
900 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
901 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
902 off' turns the the data cache off.
904 * Remote targets may have threads
906 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
907 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
908 gdb/remote.c for details.
912 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
913 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
914 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
915 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
916 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
917 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
918 sequence is something like
920 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
922 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
926 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
927 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
928 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
929 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
930 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
931 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
932 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
933 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
937 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
938 but does simplify configuration and building.
942 GDB now supports hpux10.
944 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
946 * New native configurations
948 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
949 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
950 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
951 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
955 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
956 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
957 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
958 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
961 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
963 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
964 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
965 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
966 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
967 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
969 * Arguments to user-defined commands
971 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
972 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
975 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
977 To execute the command use:
980 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
981 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
982 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
984 * New `if' and `while' commands
986 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
987 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
988 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
989 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
990 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
991 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
992 if the expression is zero.
994 * Fortran source language mode
996 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
997 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
998 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
999 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
1002 * Better HPUX support
1004 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
1005 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
1006 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
1007 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
1008 that behavior do the following before running the program:
1014 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
1015 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
1021 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
1022 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
1025 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
1026 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
1028 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
1030 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
1031 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
1032 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
1033 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
1034 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
1035 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
1037 * New DOS host serial code
1039 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
1040 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
1043 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
1045 * New "complete" command
1047 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
1048 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
1050 * Trailing space optional in prompt
1052 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
1053 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
1055 * Breakpoint hit counts
1057 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
1058 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
1059 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
1060 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
1061 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
1064 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
1066 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
1067 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
1068 arrays actually contain only short strings.
1070 * Shared library breakpoints
1072 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
1073 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
1075 * Hardware watchpoints
1077 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
1078 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
1080 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
1084 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
1085 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
1087 * Improved Irix 5 support
1089 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
1091 * Improved HPPA support
1093 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
1095 * New native configurations
1097 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
1098 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1099 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
1100 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
1104 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1105 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
1108 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
1110 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
1111 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
1115 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
1116 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
1118 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
1120 * Irix 5 is now supported
1124 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
1125 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
1126 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
1127 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
1128 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
1131 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
1133 * User visible changes:
1137 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
1138 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
1139 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
1140 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
1141 debugging info for the mips target).
1143 * DEC Alpha native support
1145 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
1146 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
1147 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
1148 Alpha-specific notes.
1150 * Preliminary thread implementation
1152 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
1154 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
1156 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
1157 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
1160 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
1162 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
1163 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
1164 call methods, ...etc.
1166 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
1168 * User visible changes:
1170 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
1171 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
1172 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
1173 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
1175 Filename completion now works.
1177 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
1178 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
1179 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
1181 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
1182 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
1183 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
1184 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
1185 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
1189 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
1190 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
1193 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
1197 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
1198 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
1199 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
1203 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
1204 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
1205 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
1206 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
1207 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
1211 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
1212 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
1213 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
1215 * New targets supported
1217 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
1218 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1219 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
1220 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1221 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
1223 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
1224 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
1225 GO32 memory extender.
1227 * New remote protocols
1229 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
1231 * New source languages supported
1233 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
1234 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
1235 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
1238 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
1240 * HP Precision Architecture supported
1242 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
1243 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
1244 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
1245 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
1246 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
1247 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
1249 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
1251 * Faster and better demangling
1253 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
1254 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
1255 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
1256 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
1257 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
1258 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
1261 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
1262 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
1263 compiler does not actually implement.
1265 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
1267 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
1268 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
1269 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
1270 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
1271 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
1272 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
1275 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
1276 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
1278 * Improved configure script
1280 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
1281 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
1282 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
1283 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
1285 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
1286 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
1287 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
1288 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
1289 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
1290 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
1292 * Documentation improvements
1294 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
1295 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
1296 before submitting changes.
1298 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
1299 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
1300 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
1301 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
1302 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
1304 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
1305 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
1306 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
1307 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
1308 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
1309 around this problem.
1313 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
1314 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
1315 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
1318 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
1319 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
1321 * New native hosts supported
1323 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
1324 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
1326 * New targets supported
1328 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
1330 * New file formats supported
1332 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
1333 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
1337 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
1339 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
1340 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
1342 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
1343 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
1344 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
1346 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
1347 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
1349 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
1350 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
1351 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
1354 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
1355 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
1356 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
1357 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
1358 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
1360 * Internal improvements
1362 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
1363 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
1365 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
1366 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
1367 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
1368 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
1369 shared code that handles any of them.
1371 * New command line options
1373 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
1377 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
1378 General Public License.
1380 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
1382 * Host/native/target split
1384 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
1385 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
1386 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
1387 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
1388 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
1390 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
1391 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
1392 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
1393 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
1394 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
1395 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
1396 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
1398 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
1399 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
1400 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
1402 * New hosts supported
1404 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
1405 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
1406 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
1408 * New targets supported
1410 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
1411 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
1413 * New native hosts supported
1415 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
1416 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
1417 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
1419 * New file formats supported
1421 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
1422 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
1423 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
1427 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
1428 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
1429 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
1431 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
1433 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
1434 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
1435 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
1436 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
1440 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
1441 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
1442 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
1444 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
1448 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
1449 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
1452 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
1453 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
1455 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
1456 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
1457 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
1458 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
1459 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
1460 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
1462 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
1463 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
1464 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
1465 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
1469 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
1470 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
1471 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
1472 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
1473 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
1475 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
1476 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
1477 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
1478 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
1482 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
1483 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
1484 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
1485 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
1486 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
1487 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
1488 each instruction being stepped through.
1490 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
1491 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
1493 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
1494 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
1495 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
1496 processor with a serial port.
1500 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
1501 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
1502 supported, and what files each one uses.
1506 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
1507 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
1508 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
1509 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
1511 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
1512 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
1513 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
1514 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
1518 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
1519 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
1520 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
1521 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
1522 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
1523 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
1525 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
1528 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
1530 * Better support for C++ function names
1532 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
1533 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
1534 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
1535 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
1536 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
1538 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
1539 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
1540 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
1541 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
1542 for the list of formats.
1544 * G++ symbol mangling problem
1546 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
1547 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
1548 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
1549 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
1550 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
1551 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
1554 * New 'maintenance' command
1556 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
1557 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
1558 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
1560 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
1561 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
1562 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
1563 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
1564 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
1565 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
1567 The following commands are new:
1569 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
1570 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
1571 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
1573 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
1575 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
1576 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
1577 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
1578 read after argv processing.
1580 * New hosts supported
1582 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
1584 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
1586 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
1587 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
1588 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
1589 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
1590 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
1593 * New targets supported
1595 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
1597 * More smarts about finding #include files
1599 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
1600 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
1601 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
1602 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
1603 the one that contains your sources.
1605 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
1606 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
1607 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
1609 * Interesting infernals change
1611 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
1612 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
1613 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
1614 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
1616 * Bug fixes (of course!)
1618 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
1619 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
1620 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
1622 See the ChangeLog for details.
1624 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
1626 * New machines supported (host and target)
1628 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
1630 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
1632 * New malloc package
1634 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
1635 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
1636 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
1637 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
1638 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
1639 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
1643 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
1644 'help info proc' for details.
1646 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
1648 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
1649 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
1652 * File name changes for MS-DOS
1654 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
1655 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
1656 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
1657 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
1658 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
1659 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
1661 * Cross byte order fixes
1663 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
1664 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
1666 * New -mapped and -readnow options
1668 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
1669 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
1670 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
1671 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
1672 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
1673 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
1674 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
1675 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
1676 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
1677 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
1679 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
1680 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
1681 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
1682 slower, but makes future operations faster.
1684 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
1685 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
1686 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
1689 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
1691 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
1692 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
1693 shared across multiple host platforms.
1695 * longjmp() handling
1697 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
1698 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
1699 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
1700 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
1704 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
1705 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
1710 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
1711 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
1712 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
1714 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
1716 * New machines supported (host and target)
1718 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
1720 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
1721 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
1723 * New machines supported (target)
1725 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1729 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
1730 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
1731 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
1733 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
1734 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
1735 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
1736 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
1737 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
1740 * New features for SVR4
1742 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
1743 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
1744 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
1746 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
1747 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
1748 it prints the address mappings of the process.
1750 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
1751 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
1753 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
1755 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
1756 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
1757 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
1758 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
1759 same code linked statically.
1763 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
1764 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
1765 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
1766 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
1767 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
1768 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
1772 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
1773 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
1774 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
1777 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
1779 * New machines supported (host and target)
1781 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
1782 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
1783 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1785 * Almost SCO Unix support
1787 We had hoped to support:
1788 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
1789 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
1790 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
1791 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
1793 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
1795 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
1796 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
1797 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
1798 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
1803 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
1804 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
1805 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
1809 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
1810 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
1811 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
1813 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
1815 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
1816 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
1817 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
1819 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
1820 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
1821 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
1822 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
1825 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
1826 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
1827 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
1828 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
1831 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
1832 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
1835 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
1836 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
1837 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
1840 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
1842 * Improved configuration
1844 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
1845 Porting BFD is simpler.
1849 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
1850 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
1851 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
1852 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
1856 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
1858 * New host supported (not target)
1860 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
1863 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
1865 * Multiple source language support
1867 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
1868 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
1869 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
1870 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
1871 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
1872 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
1876 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
1877 currently under development at the State University of New York at
1878 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
1879 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
1881 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
1882 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
1883 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
1885 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
1886 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
1890 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
1891 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
1892 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
1893 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
1896 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
1898 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
1899 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
1900 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
1901 examining core files.
1905 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
1908 * New machines supported (host and target)
1910 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
1911 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
1912 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
1914 * New hosts supported (not targets)
1916 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
1918 * New targets supported (not hosts)
1920 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1921 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1922 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
1924 * New remote interfaces
1930 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
1934 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
1936 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
1937 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
1938 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
1939 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
1940 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
1941 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
1942 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
1943 stub on the target system.
1945 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
1947 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
1948 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
1949 object file types such as a.out and coff.
1951 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
1952 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
1955 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
1957 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
1958 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
1960 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
1961 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
1962 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
1964 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
1965 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
1966 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
1967 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
1969 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
1970 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
1971 it is already running. Default is ON.
1973 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
1974 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
1975 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
1976 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
1979 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
1980 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
1981 or the value of the environment variable
1984 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
1985 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
1988 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
1989 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
1990 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
1992 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
1993 history expansion will be performed on
1994 command line input. The default is OFF.
1996 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
1997 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
1998 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
2000 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
2001 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
2002 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2005 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
2006 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
2007 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2010 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
2011 ``set width'' instead.
2013 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
2014 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
2015 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
2016 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
2018 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
2021 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
2024 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
2027 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
2030 * Support for Epoch Environment.
2032 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
2033 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
2034 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
2038 * Support for Shared Libraries
2040 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
2041 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
2042 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
2043 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
2044 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
2045 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
2046 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
2047 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
2049 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
2050 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
2051 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
2053 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
2058 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
2059 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
2060 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
2061 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
2062 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
2063 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
2065 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
2067 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
2069 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2070 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2071 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2074 * C++ multiple inheritance
2076 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
2079 * C++ exception handling
2081 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
2082 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
2083 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
2086 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
2087 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
2088 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
2090 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
2091 current stack frame.
2094 * Minor command changes
2096 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
2097 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
2098 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
2100 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
2101 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
2102 frames without printing.
2104 * New directory command
2106 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
2107 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
2108 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
2109 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
2110 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
2112 * Configuring GDB for compilation
2114 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
2117 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
2118 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
2119 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
2120 where the program that you are debugging will run.
projects / deliverable / binutils-gdb.git / blob