1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB 6.1:
6 * New ``start'' command.
8 This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
10 * Signal trampoline code overhauled
12 Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
13 These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
14 of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
15 call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
16 signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
18 These fixes were tested on i386 GNU/Linux systems that include a 2.4
21 * Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
23 * New native configurations
25 GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
26 OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
27 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
28 OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
29 OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
30 NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
31 OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
33 * REMOVED configurations and files
35 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
36 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
37 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
38 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
39 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
40 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
41 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
42 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
43 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
45 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
47 *** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
49 * TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
51 The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
52 GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
53 command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
54 program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
57 * Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
59 Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
60 libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
61 cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
62 GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
63 shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
64 the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
67 Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
69 * Fixed ISO-C build problems
71 The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
72 non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
73 compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
75 * Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
77 Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
78 wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
80 * Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
82 The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
83 permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
84 systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
86 * Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
88 Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
89 has been updated to use constant array sizes.
91 * Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
93 GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
94 its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
95 panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
97 * Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
99 When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
100 by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
101 not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
103 *** Changes in GDB 6.1:
105 * Removed --with-mmalloc
107 Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
108 conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
110 * Changes in AMD64 configurations
112 The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
113 the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
114 and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
115 you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
117 * Revised SPARC target
119 The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
120 FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
121 support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
122 from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
123 (Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
127 GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
128 names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
129 with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
132 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
134 GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
135 arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
138 * C++ nested types and namespaces
140 GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
141 improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
142 is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
143 Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
144 namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
145 "Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
146 frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
147 if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
148 GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
150 * New native configurations
152 NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
153 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
154 OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
155 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
156 OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
158 * New debugging protocols
160 M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
162 * "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
164 The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
165 and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
166 tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
168 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
170 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
171 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
172 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
175 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
176 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
177 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
178 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
179 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
180 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
181 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
182 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
183 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
185 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
187 * REMOVED configurations and files
189 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
190 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
191 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
192 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
193 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
194 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
195 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
196 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
197 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
198 386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
199 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
200 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
201 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
202 SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
203 SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
204 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
205 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
207 *** Changes in GDB 6.0:
211 Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
214 * New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
216 DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
217 information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
218 By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
221 The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
222 have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
227 GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
228 file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
229 remote protocol documentation for details.
231 * All targets using the new architecture framework.
233 All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
234 architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
235 to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
238 * GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
240 GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
241 per-thread variables.
243 * GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
245 GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
246 GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
248 * Separate debug info.
250 GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
251 automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
252 of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
253 system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
254 and optional debug files.
256 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
258 DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
259 describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
262 GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
263 for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
267 A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
268 Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
269 considered "useable".
271 * GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
273 The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
274 commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
277 * GDB supports logging output to a file
279 There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
280 used to capture GDB's output to a file.
282 * The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
284 The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
285 disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
288 * d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
290 The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
291 registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
295 A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
296 be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
297 session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
298 "--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
299 data, for more informative profiling results.
301 * Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
303 The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
304 option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
305 "mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
307 Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
310 Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
311 Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
312 Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
313 in a subsequent -var-update.
315 * New native configurations.
317 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
319 * Multi-arched targets.
321 HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
322 Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
324 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
326 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
327 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
328 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
331 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
332 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
333 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
334 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
335 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
336 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
337 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
338 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
339 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
340 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
341 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
342 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
344 * REMOVED configurations and files
347 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
348 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
349 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
350 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
351 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
352 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
354 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
355 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
356 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
357 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
358 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
359 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
361 * MIPS $fp behavior changed
363 The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
364 the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
365 context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
366 address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
367 The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
369 *** Changes in GDB 5.3:
371 * GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
373 When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
374 `/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
375 in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
376 library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
377 shared libs like mad''.
379 * ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
381 Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
382 the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
383 arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
384 powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
386 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
388 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
389 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
392 The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
393 invocations in expression, and shows the result.
395 The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
396 macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
398 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
399 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
400 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
401 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
403 * Multi-arched targets.
405 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
406 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
408 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
409 Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
410 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
414 Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
417 * New native configurations
419 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
420 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
421 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
422 UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
424 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
426 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
427 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
428 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
431 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
432 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
433 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
434 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
435 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
436 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
437 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
438 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
439 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
440 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
442 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
443 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
447 CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
449 * REMOVED configurations and files
451 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
452 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
453 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
454 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
455 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
457 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
459 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
461 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
462 commands. The default is 1024.
464 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
466 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
468 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
470 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
471 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
472 from a file into memory (restore).
474 * Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
476 The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
477 including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
478 of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
480 *** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
488 gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
489 mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
490 Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
492 gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
493 dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
494 Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
496 Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
497 Surprisingly enough, it works now.
498 By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
500 i386 hardware watchpoint support:
501 avoid misses on second run for some targets.
502 By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
504 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
506 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
508 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
509 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
510 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
511 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
512 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
513 (notably embedded) targets.
515 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
517 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
518 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
519 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
520 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
522 * New command line option
524 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
526 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
528 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
529 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
530 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
531 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
532 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
533 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
534 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
535 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
536 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
537 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
539 * Changes in ARM configurations.
541 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
542 configuration is fully multi-arch.
544 * New native configurations
546 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
547 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
548 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
549 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
553 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
555 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
557 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
558 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
559 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
562 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
563 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
564 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
565 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
566 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
568 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
570 * REMOVED configurations and files
572 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
574 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
575 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
576 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
577 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
578 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
579 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
580 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
581 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
582 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
583 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
584 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
586 * Changes to command line processing
588 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
589 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
591 * Changes to key bindings
593 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
595 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
597 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
599 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
602 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
604 Numerous documentation fixes.
606 Numerous testsuite fixes.
608 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
610 * New native configurations
612 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
613 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
614 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
615 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
617 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
621 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
623 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
625 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
627 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
628 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
629 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
630 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
631 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
633 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
634 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
635 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
636 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
637 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
638 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
639 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
640 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
642 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
643 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
645 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
646 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
647 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
650 * REMOVED configurations and files
652 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
653 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
655 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
659 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
661 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
662 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
667 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
669 * The MI enabled by default.
671 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
672 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
673 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
674 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
675 which is now deprecated.
677 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
679 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
680 main features are supported:
682 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
684 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
687 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
689 - a Pascal expression parser.
691 However, some important features are not yet supported.
693 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
695 - there are some problems with boolean types;
697 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
698 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
700 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
702 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
704 * Changes in completion.
706 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
707 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
708 users expect at the shell prompt.
710 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
711 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
712 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
713 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
714 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
715 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
716 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
718 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
720 * New platform-independent commands:
722 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
723 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
724 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
726 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
728 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
729 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
730 many threads as your system allows you to have.
732 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
734 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
735 multi-threaded programs though.
737 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
739 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
741 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
742 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
745 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
747 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
748 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
749 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
750 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
751 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
754 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
755 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
756 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
758 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
760 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
761 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
763 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
764 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
767 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
768 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
769 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
770 a given linear address.
772 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
773 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
774 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
776 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
778 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
780 * Changes in documentation.
782 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
783 Documentation License.
785 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
788 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
790 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
793 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
794 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
795 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
797 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
799 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
800 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
801 contents of this file.
805 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
807 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
809 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
811 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
812 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
813 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
814 greater level of detail.
816 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
818 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
819 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
820 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
823 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
825 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
826 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
827 machines ``out of the box''.
829 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
830 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
831 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
832 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
833 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
835 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
836 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
837 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
838 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
839 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
841 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
842 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
845 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
848 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
849 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
850 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
851 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
853 * New native configurations
855 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
856 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
860 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
861 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
862 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
863 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
865 * OBSOLETE configurations
867 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
868 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
870 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
873 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
874 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
875 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
876 be permanently REMOVED.
878 * Gould support removed
880 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
882 * New features for SVR4
884 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
885 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
886 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
888 * Many C++ enhancements
890 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
891 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
893 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
895 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
896 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
897 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
898 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
900 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
901 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
903 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
905 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
906 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
907 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
909 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
910 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
912 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
914 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
915 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
916 include ``set remote P-packet''.
918 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
920 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
921 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
922 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
924 * ``apropos'' command added.
926 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
927 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
928 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
932 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
933 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
934 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
935 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
936 enabled by configuring with:
938 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
940 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
942 * New native configurations
944 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
945 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
946 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
950 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
951 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
952 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
954 * OBSOLETE configurations
956 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
958 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
959 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
960 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
961 be permanently REMOVED.
965 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
966 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
967 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
968 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
969 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
970 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
971 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
976 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
978 * set extension-language
980 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
981 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
982 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
983 set extension-language .c c++
984 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
985 and their associated languages.
987 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
989 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
990 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
991 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
995 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
996 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
998 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
999 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
1001 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
1002 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
1003 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
1004 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
1005 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
1006 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
1007 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
1008 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
1010 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
1011 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
1012 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
1013 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
1017 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
1018 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
1019 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
1020 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
1021 for xdb and dbx commands.
1025 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
1026 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
1027 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
1029 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
1030 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
1031 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
1033 * Debugging across forks
1035 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
1040 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
1041 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
1042 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
1044 * GDB remote protocol additions
1046 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
1047 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
1048 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
1049 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
1051 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
1052 full 64-bit address. The command
1054 set remoteaddresssize 32
1056 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
1057 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
1060 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
1061 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
1063 maint packet heythere
1065 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
1066 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
1069 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
1070 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
1071 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
1073 * Tracing can collect general expressions
1075 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
1076 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
1077 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
1079 * mask-address variable for Mips
1081 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
1082 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
1083 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
1085 * Higher serial baud rates
1087 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
1088 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
1089 to achieve all of these rates.)
1093 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
1094 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
1097 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
1099 * New native configurations
1101 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
1102 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
1103 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1104 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
1105 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1106 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
1107 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
1111 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1112 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
1113 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1114 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
1115 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
1116 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
1117 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
1118 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
1119 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
1120 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1121 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
1123 * New debugging protocols
1125 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
1126 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
1127 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
1128 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1129 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1130 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1134 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
1135 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
1140 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
1141 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
1143 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
1145 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
1146 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
1147 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
1149 * Live range splitting
1151 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
1152 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
1153 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
1157 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
1158 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
1162 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
1163 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
1164 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
1169 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
1174 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
1175 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
1176 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
1177 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
1178 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
1179 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
1183 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
1184 the symbol at the specified address.
1188 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
1189 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
1190 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
1191 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
1192 file tracepoint.c for more details.
1196 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
1197 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
1198 of most MIPS variants.
1202 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
1203 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
1204 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
1208 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
1209 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
1210 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
1211 the possible architectures.
1213 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
1215 * New native configurations
1217 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
1218 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
1219 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
1220 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
1221 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1222 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
1226 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
1227 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1228 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
1229 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
1230 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
1232 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1236 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
1237 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
1238 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
1239 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
1240 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
1244 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
1246 * Windows 95/NT native
1248 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
1249 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
1250 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
1251 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
1252 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
1254 * dont-repeat command
1256 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
1257 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
1258 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
1259 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
1261 * Send break instead of ^C
1263 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
1264 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
1265 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
1267 * Remote protocol timeout
1269 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
1270 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
1271 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
1273 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
1275 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
1276 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
1277 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
1278 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
1279 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
1281 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
1282 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
1283 automatically on hpux10.
1285 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
1287 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
1289 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
1291 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
1292 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
1293 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
1294 every character. The default value is 1050.
1296 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
1298 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
1299 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
1300 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
1301 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
1302 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
1303 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
1305 * Speedups for remote debugging
1307 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
1308 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
1309 and more efficient S-record downloading.
1311 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
1313 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
1314 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
1316 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
1318 * Psymtabs for XCOFF
1320 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
1321 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
1323 * Remote targets use caching
1325 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
1326 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
1327 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
1328 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
1329 off' turns the the data cache off.
1331 * Remote targets may have threads
1333 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
1334 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
1335 gdb/remote.c for details.
1339 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
1340 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
1341 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
1342 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
1343 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
1344 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
1345 sequence is something like
1347 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
1349 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
1353 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
1354 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
1355 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
1356 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
1357 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
1358 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
1359 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
1360 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
1364 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
1365 but does simplify configuration and building.
1369 GDB now supports hpux10.
1371 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
1373 * New native configurations
1375 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
1376 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
1377 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
1378 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
1382 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1383 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
1384 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
1385 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
1388 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
1390 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
1391 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
1392 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
1393 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
1394 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
1396 * Arguments to user-defined commands
1398 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
1399 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
1402 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
1404 To execute the command use:
1407 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
1408 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
1409 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
1411 * New `if' and `while' commands
1413 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
1414 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
1415 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
1416 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
1417 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
1418 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
1419 if the expression is zero.
1421 * Fortran source language mode
1423 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
1424 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
1425 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
1426 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
1429 * Better HPUX support
1431 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
1432 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
1433 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
1434 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
1435 that behavior do the following before running the program:
1441 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
1442 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
1448 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
1449 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
1452 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
1453 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
1455 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
1457 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
1458 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
1459 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
1460 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
1461 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
1462 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
1464 * New DOS host serial code
1466 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
1467 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
1470 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
1472 * New "complete" command
1474 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
1475 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
1477 * Trailing space optional in prompt
1479 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
1480 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
1482 * Breakpoint hit counts
1484 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
1485 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
1486 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
1487 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
1488 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
1491 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
1493 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
1494 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
1495 arrays actually contain only short strings.
1497 * Shared library breakpoints
1499 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
1500 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
1502 * Hardware watchpoints
1504 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
1505 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
1507 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
1511 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
1512 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
1514 * Improved Irix 5 support
1516 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
1518 * Improved HPPA support
1520 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
1522 * New native configurations
1524 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
1525 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1526 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
1527 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
1531 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1532 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
1535 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
1537 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
1538 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
1542 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
1543 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
1545 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
1547 * Irix 5 is now supported
1551 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
1552 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
1553 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
1554 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
1555 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
1558 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
1560 * User visible changes:
1564 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
1565 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
1566 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
1567 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
1568 debugging info for the mips target).
1570 * DEC Alpha native support
1572 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
1573 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
1574 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
1575 Alpha-specific notes.
1577 * Preliminary thread implementation
1579 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
1581 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
1583 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
1584 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
1587 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
1589 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
1590 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
1591 call methods, ...etc.
1593 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
1595 * User visible changes:
1597 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
1598 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
1599 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
1600 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
1602 Filename completion now works.
1604 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
1605 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
1606 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
1608 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
1609 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
1610 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
1611 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
1612 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
1616 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
1617 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
1620 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
1624 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
1625 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
1626 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
1630 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
1631 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
1632 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
1633 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
1634 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
1638 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
1639 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
1640 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
1642 * New targets supported
1644 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
1645 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1646 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
1647 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1648 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
1650 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
1651 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
1652 GO32 memory extender.
1654 * New remote protocols
1656 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
1658 * New source languages supported
1660 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
1661 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
1662 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
1665 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
1667 * HP Precision Architecture supported
1669 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
1670 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
1671 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
1672 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
1673 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
1674 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
1676 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
1678 * Faster and better demangling
1680 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
1681 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
1682 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
1683 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
1684 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
1685 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
1688 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
1689 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
1690 compiler does not actually implement.
1692 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
1694 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
1695 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
1696 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
1697 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
1698 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
1699 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
1702 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
1703 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
1705 * Improved configure script
1707 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
1708 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
1709 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
1710 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
1712 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
1713 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
1714 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
1715 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
1716 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
1717 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
1719 * Documentation improvements
1721 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
1722 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
1723 before submitting changes.
1725 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
1726 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
1727 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
1728 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
1729 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
1731 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
1732 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
1733 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
1734 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
1735 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
1736 around this problem.
1740 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
1741 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
1742 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
1745 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
1746 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
1748 * New native hosts supported
1750 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
1751 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
1753 * New targets supported
1755 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
1757 * New file formats supported
1759 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
1760 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
1764 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
1766 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
1767 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
1769 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
1770 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
1771 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
1773 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
1774 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
1776 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
1777 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
1778 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
1781 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
1782 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
1783 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
1784 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
1785 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
1787 * Internal improvements
1789 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
1790 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
1792 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
1793 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
1794 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
1795 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
1796 shared code that handles any of them.
1798 * New command line options
1800 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
1804 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
1805 General Public License.
1807 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
1809 * Host/native/target split
1811 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
1812 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
1813 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
1814 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
1815 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
1817 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
1818 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
1819 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
1820 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
1821 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
1822 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
1823 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
1825 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
1826 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
1827 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
1829 * New hosts supported
1831 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
1832 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
1833 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
1835 * New targets supported
1837 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
1838 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
1840 * New native hosts supported
1842 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
1843 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
1844 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
1846 * New file formats supported
1848 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
1849 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
1850 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
1854 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
1855 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
1856 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
1858 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
1860 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
1861 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
1862 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
1863 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
1867 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
1868 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
1869 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
1871 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
1875 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
1876 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
1879 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
1880 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
1882 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
1883 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
1884 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
1885 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
1886 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
1887 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
1889 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
1890 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
1891 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
1892 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
1896 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
1897 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
1898 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
1899 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
1900 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
1902 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
1903 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
1904 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
1905 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
1909 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
1910 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
1911 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
1912 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
1913 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
1914 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
1915 each instruction being stepped through.
1917 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
1918 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
1920 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
1921 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
1922 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
1923 processor with a serial port.
1927 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
1928 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
1929 supported, and what files each one uses.
1933 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
1934 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
1935 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
1936 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
1938 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
1939 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
1940 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
1941 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
1945 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
1946 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
1947 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
1948 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
1949 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
1950 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
1952 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
1955 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
1957 * Better support for C++ function names
1959 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
1960 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
1961 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
1962 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
1963 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
1965 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
1966 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
1967 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
1968 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
1969 for the list of formats.
1971 * G++ symbol mangling problem
1973 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
1974 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
1975 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
1976 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
1977 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
1978 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
1981 * New 'maintenance' command
1983 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
1984 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
1985 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
1987 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
1988 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
1989 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
1990 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
1991 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
1992 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
1994 The following commands are new:
1996 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
1997 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
1998 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
2000 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
2002 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
2003 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
2004 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
2005 read after argv processing.
2007 * New hosts supported
2009 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
2011 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
2013 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
2014 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
2015 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
2016 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
2017 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
2020 * New targets supported
2022 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2024 * More smarts about finding #include files
2026 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
2027 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
2028 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
2029 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
2030 the one that contains your sources.
2032 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
2033 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
2034 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
2036 * Interesting infernals change
2038 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
2039 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
2040 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
2041 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
2043 * Bug fixes (of course!)
2045 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
2046 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
2047 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
2049 See the ChangeLog for details.
2051 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
2053 * New machines supported (host and target)
2055 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
2057 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
2059 * New malloc package
2061 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
2062 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
2063 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
2064 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
2065 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
2066 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
2070 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
2071 'help info proc' for details.
2073 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
2075 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
2076 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
2079 * File name changes for MS-DOS
2081 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
2082 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
2083 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
2084 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
2085 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
2086 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
2088 * Cross byte order fixes
2090 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
2091 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
2093 * New -mapped and -readnow options
2095 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
2096 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
2097 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
2098 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
2099 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
2100 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
2101 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
2102 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
2103 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
2104 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
2106 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
2107 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
2108 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
2109 slower, but makes future operations faster.
2111 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
2112 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
2113 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
2116 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
2118 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
2119 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
2120 shared across multiple host platforms.
2122 * longjmp() handling
2124 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
2125 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
2126 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
2127 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
2131 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
2132 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
2137 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
2138 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
2139 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
2141 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
2143 * New machines supported (host and target)
2145 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2147 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
2148 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
2150 * New machines supported (target)
2152 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2156 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
2157 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
2158 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
2160 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
2161 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
2162 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
2163 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
2164 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
2167 * New features for SVR4
2169 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
2170 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
2171 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
2173 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
2174 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
2175 it prints the address mappings of the process.
2177 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
2178 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
2180 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
2182 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
2183 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
2184 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
2185 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
2186 same code linked statically.
2190 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
2191 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
2192 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
2193 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
2194 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
2195 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
2199 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
2200 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
2201 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
2204 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
2206 * New machines supported (host and target)
2208 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
2209 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
2210 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2212 * Almost SCO Unix support
2214 We had hoped to support:
2215 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2216 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
2217 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
2218 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
2220 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
2222 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
2223 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
2224 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
2225 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
2230 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
2231 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
2232 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
2236 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
2237 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
2238 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
2240 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
2242 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
2243 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
2244 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
2246 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
2247 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
2248 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
2249 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
2252 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
2253 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
2254 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
2255 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
2258 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
2259 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
2262 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
2263 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
2264 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
2267 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
2269 * Improved configuration
2271 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
2272 Porting BFD is simpler.
2276 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
2277 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
2278 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
2279 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
2283 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
2285 * New host supported (not target)
2287 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
2290 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
2292 * Multiple source language support
2294 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
2295 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
2296 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
2297 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
2298 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
2299 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
2303 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
2304 currently under development at the State University of New York at
2305 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
2306 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
2308 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
2309 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
2310 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
2312 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
2313 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
2317 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
2318 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
2319 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
2320 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
2323 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
2325 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
2326 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
2327 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
2328 examining core files.
2332 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
2335 * New machines supported (host and target)
2337 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
2338 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
2339 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
2341 * New hosts supported (not targets)
2343 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
2345 * New targets supported (not hosts)
2347 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2348 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2349 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
2351 * New remote interfaces
2357 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
2361 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
2363 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
2364 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
2365 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
2366 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
2367 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
2368 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
2369 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
2370 stub on the target system.
2372 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
2374 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
2375 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
2376 object file types such as a.out and coff.
2378 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
2379 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
2382 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
2384 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
2385 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
2387 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
2388 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
2389 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
2391 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
2392 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
2393 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
2394 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
2396 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
2397 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
2398 it is already running. Default is ON.
2400 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
2401 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
2402 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
2403 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
2406 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
2407 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
2408 or the value of the environment variable
2411 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
2412 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
2415 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
2416 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
2417 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
2419 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
2420 history expansion will be performed on
2421 command line input. The default is OFF.
2423 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
2424 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
2425 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
2427 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
2428 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
2429 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2432 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
2433 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
2434 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2437 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
2438 ``set width'' instead.
2440 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
2441 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
2442 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
2443 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
2445 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
2448 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
2451 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
2454 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
2457 * Support for Epoch Environment.
2459 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
2460 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
2461 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
2465 * Support for Shared Libraries
2467 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
2468 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
2469 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
2470 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
2471 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
2472 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
2473 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
2474 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
2476 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
2477 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
2478 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
2480 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
2485 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
2486 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
2487 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
2488 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
2489 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
2490 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
2492 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
2494 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
2496 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2497 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2498 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2501 * C++ multiple inheritance
2503 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
2506 * C++ exception handling
2508 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
2509 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
2510 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
2513 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
2514 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
2515 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
2517 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
2518 current stack frame.
2521 * Minor command changes
2523 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
2524 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
2525 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
2527 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
2528 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
2529 frames without printing.
2531 * New directory command
2533 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
2534 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
2535 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
2536 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
2537 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
2539 * Configuring GDB for compilation
2541 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
2544 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
2545 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
2546 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
2547 where the program that you are debugging will run.
projects / deliverable / binutils-gdb.git / blob