1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB 5.2:
6 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
8 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
9 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
12 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
13 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
14 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
15 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
17 Here are the new commands for working with macros:
19 ** macro expand EXPRESSION
21 Expand any macro invocations in expression, and show the result.
23 ** show macro MACRO-NAME
25 Show the definition of the macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was
28 * Multi-arched targets.
36 * New native configurations
38 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
39 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
41 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
43 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
44 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
45 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
48 * REMOVED configurations and files
50 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
51 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
52 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
53 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
54 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
56 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
58 * Changes in VAX configurations.
60 Multi-arch support is enabled for all VAX configurations.
62 * Changes in Alpha configurations.
64 Multi-arch support is enabled for all Alpha configurations.
66 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
68 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
69 commands. The default is 1024.
71 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
73 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
75 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
77 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
78 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
79 from a file into memory (restore).
81 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
83 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
85 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
86 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
87 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
88 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
89 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
90 (notably embedded) targets.
92 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
94 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
95 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
96 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
97 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
99 * New command line option
101 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
103 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
105 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
106 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
107 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
108 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
109 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
110 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
111 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
112 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
113 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
114 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
116 * Changes in ARM configurations.
118 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
119 configuration is fully multi-arch.
121 * New native configurations
123 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
124 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
125 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
126 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
130 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
132 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
134 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
135 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
136 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
139 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
140 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
141 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
142 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
143 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
145 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
147 * REMOVED configurations and files
149 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
151 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
152 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
153 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
154 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
155 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
156 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
157 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
158 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
159 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
160 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
161 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
163 * Changes to command line processing
165 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
166 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
168 * Changes to key bindings
170 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
172 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
174 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
176 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
179 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
181 Numerous documentation fixes.
183 Numerous testsuite fixes.
185 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
187 * New native configurations
189 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
190 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
191 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
192 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
194 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
198 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
200 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
202 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
204 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
205 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
206 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
207 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
208 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
210 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
211 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
212 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
213 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
214 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
215 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
216 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
217 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
219 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
220 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
222 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
223 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
224 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
227 * REMOVED configurations and files
229 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
230 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
232 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
236 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
238 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
239 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
244 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
246 * The MI enabled by default.
248 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
249 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
250 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
251 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
252 which is now deprecated.
254 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
256 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
257 main features are supported:
259 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
261 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
264 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
266 - a Pascal expression parser.
268 However, some important features are not yet supported.
270 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
272 - there are some problems with boolean types;
274 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
275 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
277 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
279 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
281 * Changes in completion.
283 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
284 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
285 users expect at the shell prompt.
287 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
288 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
289 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
290 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
291 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
292 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
293 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
295 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
297 * New platform-independent commands:
299 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
300 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
301 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
303 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
305 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
306 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
307 many threads as your system allows you to have.
309 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
311 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
312 multi-threaded programs though.
314 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
316 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
318 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
319 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
322 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
324 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
325 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
326 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
327 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
328 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
331 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
332 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
333 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
335 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
337 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
338 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
340 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
341 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
344 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
345 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
346 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
347 a given linear address.
349 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
350 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
351 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
353 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
355 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
357 * Changes in documentation.
359 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
360 Documentation License.
362 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
365 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
367 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
370 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
371 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
372 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
374 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
376 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
377 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
378 contents of this file.
382 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
384 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
386 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
388 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
389 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
390 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
391 greater level of detail.
393 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
395 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
396 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
397 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
400 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
402 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
403 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
404 machines ``out of the box''.
406 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
407 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
408 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
409 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
410 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
412 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
413 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
414 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
415 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
416 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
418 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
419 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
422 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
425 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
426 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
427 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
428 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
430 * New native configurations
432 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
433 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
437 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
438 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
439 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
440 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
442 * OBSOLETE configurations
444 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
445 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
447 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
450 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
451 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
452 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
453 be permanently REMOVED.
455 * Gould support removed
457 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
459 * New features for SVR4
461 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
462 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
463 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
465 * Many C++ enhancements
467 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
468 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
470 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
472 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
473 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
474 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
475 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
477 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
478 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
480 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
482 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
483 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
484 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
486 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
487 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
489 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
491 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
492 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
493 include ``set remote P-packet''.
495 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
497 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
498 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
499 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
501 * ``apropos'' command added.
503 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
504 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
505 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
509 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
510 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
511 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
512 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
513 enabled by configuring with:
515 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
517 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
519 * New native configurations
521 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
522 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
523 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
527 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
528 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
529 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
531 * OBSOLETE configurations
533 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
535 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
536 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
537 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
538 be permanently REMOVED.
542 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
543 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
544 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
545 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
546 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
547 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
548 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
553 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
555 * set extension-language
557 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
558 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
559 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
560 set extension-language .c c++
561 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
562 and their associated languages.
564 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
566 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
567 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
568 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
572 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
573 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
575 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
576 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
578 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
579 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
580 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
581 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
582 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
583 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
584 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
585 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
587 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
588 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
589 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
590 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
594 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
595 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
596 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
597 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
598 for xdb and dbx commands.
602 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
603 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
604 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
606 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
607 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
608 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
610 * Debugging across forks
612 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
617 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
618 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
619 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
621 * GDB remote protocol additions
623 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
624 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
625 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
626 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
628 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
629 full 64-bit address. The command
631 set remoteaddresssize 32
633 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
634 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
637 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
638 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
640 maint packet heythere
642 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
643 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
646 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
647 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
648 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
650 * Tracing can collect general expressions
652 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
653 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
654 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
656 * mask-address variable for Mips
658 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
659 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
660 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
662 * Higher serial baud rates
664 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
665 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
666 to achieve all of these rates.)
670 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
671 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
674 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
676 * New native configurations
678 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
679 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
680 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
681 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
682 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
683 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
684 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
688 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
689 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
690 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
691 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
692 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
693 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
694 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
695 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
696 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
697 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
698 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
700 * New debugging protocols
702 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
703 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
704 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
705 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
706 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
707 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
711 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
712 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
717 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
718 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
720 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
722 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
723 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
724 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
726 * Live range splitting
728 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
729 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
730 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
734 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
735 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
739 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
740 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
741 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
746 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
751 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
752 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
753 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
754 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
755 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
756 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
760 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
761 the symbol at the specified address.
765 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
766 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
767 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
768 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
769 file tracepoint.c for more details.
773 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
774 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
775 of most MIPS variants.
779 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
780 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
781 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
785 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
786 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
787 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
788 the possible architectures.
790 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
792 * New native configurations
794 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
795 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
796 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
797 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
798 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
799 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
803 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
804 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
805 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
806 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
807 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
809 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
813 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
814 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
815 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
816 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
817 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
821 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
823 * Windows 95/NT native
825 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
826 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
827 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
828 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
829 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
831 * dont-repeat command
833 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
834 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
835 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
836 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
838 * Send break instead of ^C
840 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
841 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
842 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
844 * Remote protocol timeout
846 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
847 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
848 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
850 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
852 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
853 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
854 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
855 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
856 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
858 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
859 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
860 automatically on hpux10.
862 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
864 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
866 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
868 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
869 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
870 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
871 every character. The default value is 1050.
873 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
875 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
876 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
877 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
878 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
879 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
880 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
882 * Speedups for remote debugging
884 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
885 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
886 and more efficient S-record downloading.
888 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
890 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
891 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
893 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
897 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
898 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
900 * Remote targets use caching
902 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
903 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
904 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
905 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
906 off' turns the the data cache off.
908 * Remote targets may have threads
910 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
911 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
912 gdb/remote.c for details.
916 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
917 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
918 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
919 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
920 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
921 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
922 sequence is something like
924 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
926 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
930 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
931 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
932 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
933 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
934 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
935 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
936 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
937 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
941 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
942 but does simplify configuration and building.
946 GDB now supports hpux10.
948 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
950 * New native configurations
952 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
953 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
954 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
955 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
959 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
960 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
961 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
962 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
965 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
967 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
968 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
969 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
970 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
971 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
973 * Arguments to user-defined commands
975 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
976 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
979 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
981 To execute the command use:
984 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
985 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
986 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
988 * New `if' and `while' commands
990 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
991 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
992 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
993 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
994 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
995 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
996 if the expression is zero.
998 * Fortran source language mode
1000 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
1001 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
1002 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
1003 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
1006 * Better HPUX support
1008 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
1009 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
1010 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
1011 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
1012 that behavior do the following before running the program:
1018 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
1019 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
1025 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
1026 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
1029 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
1030 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
1032 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
1034 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
1035 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
1036 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
1037 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
1038 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
1039 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
1041 * New DOS host serial code
1043 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
1044 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
1047 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
1049 * New "complete" command
1051 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
1052 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
1054 * Trailing space optional in prompt
1056 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
1057 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
1059 * Breakpoint hit counts
1061 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
1062 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
1063 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
1064 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
1065 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
1068 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
1070 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
1071 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
1072 arrays actually contain only short strings.
1074 * Shared library breakpoints
1076 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
1077 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
1079 * Hardware watchpoints
1081 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
1082 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
1084 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
1088 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
1089 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
1091 * Improved Irix 5 support
1093 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
1095 * Improved HPPA support
1097 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
1099 * New native configurations
1101 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
1102 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1103 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
1104 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
1108 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1109 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
1112 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
1114 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
1115 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
1119 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
1120 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
1122 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
1124 * Irix 5 is now supported
1128 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
1129 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
1130 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
1131 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
1132 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
1135 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
1137 * User visible changes:
1141 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
1142 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
1143 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
1144 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
1145 debugging info for the mips target).
1147 * DEC Alpha native support
1149 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
1150 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
1151 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
1152 Alpha-specific notes.
1154 * Preliminary thread implementation
1156 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
1158 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
1160 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
1161 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
1164 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
1166 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
1167 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
1168 call methods, ...etc.
1170 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
1172 * User visible changes:
1174 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
1175 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
1176 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
1177 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
1179 Filename completion now works.
1181 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
1182 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
1183 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
1185 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
1186 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
1187 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
1188 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
1189 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
1193 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
1194 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
1197 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
1201 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
1202 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
1203 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
1207 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
1208 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
1209 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
1210 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
1211 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
1215 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
1216 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
1217 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
1219 * New targets supported
1221 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
1222 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1223 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
1224 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1225 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
1227 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
1228 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
1229 GO32 memory extender.
1231 * New remote protocols
1233 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
1235 * New source languages supported
1237 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
1238 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
1239 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
1242 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
1244 * HP Precision Architecture supported
1246 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
1247 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
1248 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
1249 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
1250 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
1251 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
1253 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
1255 * Faster and better demangling
1257 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
1258 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
1259 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
1260 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
1261 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
1262 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
1265 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
1266 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
1267 compiler does not actually implement.
1269 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
1271 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
1272 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
1273 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
1274 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
1275 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
1276 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
1279 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
1280 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
1282 * Improved configure script
1284 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
1285 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
1286 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
1287 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
1289 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
1290 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
1291 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
1292 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
1293 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
1294 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
1296 * Documentation improvements
1298 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
1299 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
1300 before submitting changes.
1302 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
1303 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
1304 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
1305 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
1306 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
1308 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
1309 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
1310 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
1311 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
1312 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
1313 around this problem.
1317 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
1318 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
1319 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
1322 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
1323 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
1325 * New native hosts supported
1327 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
1328 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
1330 * New targets supported
1332 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
1334 * New file formats supported
1336 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
1337 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
1341 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
1343 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
1344 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
1346 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
1347 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
1348 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
1350 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
1351 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
1353 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
1354 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
1355 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
1358 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
1359 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
1360 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
1361 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
1362 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
1364 * Internal improvements
1366 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
1367 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
1369 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
1370 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
1371 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
1372 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
1373 shared code that handles any of them.
1375 * New command line options
1377 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
1381 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
1382 General Public License.
1384 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
1386 * Host/native/target split
1388 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
1389 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
1390 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
1391 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
1392 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
1394 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
1395 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
1396 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
1397 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
1398 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
1399 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
1400 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
1402 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
1403 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
1404 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
1406 * New hosts supported
1408 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
1409 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
1410 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
1412 * New targets supported
1414 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
1415 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
1417 * New native hosts supported
1419 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
1420 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
1421 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
1423 * New file formats supported
1425 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
1426 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
1427 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
1431 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
1432 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
1433 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
1435 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
1437 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
1438 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
1439 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
1440 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
1444 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
1445 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
1446 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
1448 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
1452 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
1453 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
1456 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
1457 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
1459 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
1460 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
1461 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
1462 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
1463 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
1464 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
1466 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
1467 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
1468 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
1469 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
1473 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
1474 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
1475 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
1476 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
1477 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
1479 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
1480 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
1481 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
1482 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
1486 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
1487 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
1488 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
1489 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
1490 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
1491 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
1492 each instruction being stepped through.
1494 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
1495 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
1497 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
1498 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
1499 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
1500 processor with a serial port.
1504 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
1505 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
1506 supported, and what files each one uses.
1510 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
1511 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
1512 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
1513 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
1515 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
1516 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
1517 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
1518 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
1522 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
1523 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
1524 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
1525 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
1526 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
1527 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
1529 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
1532 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
1534 * Better support for C++ function names
1536 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
1537 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
1538 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
1539 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
1540 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
1542 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
1543 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
1544 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
1545 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
1546 for the list of formats.
1548 * G++ symbol mangling problem
1550 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
1551 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
1552 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
1553 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
1554 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
1555 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
1558 * New 'maintenance' command
1560 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
1561 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
1562 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
1564 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
1565 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
1566 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
1567 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
1568 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
1569 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
1571 The following commands are new:
1573 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
1574 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
1575 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
1577 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
1579 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
1580 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
1581 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
1582 read after argv processing.
1584 * New hosts supported
1586 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
1588 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
1590 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
1591 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
1592 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
1593 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
1594 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
1597 * New targets supported
1599 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
1601 * More smarts about finding #include files
1603 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
1604 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
1605 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
1606 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
1607 the one that contains your sources.
1609 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
1610 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
1611 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
1613 * Interesting infernals change
1615 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
1616 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
1617 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
1618 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
1620 * Bug fixes (of course!)
1622 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
1623 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
1624 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
1626 See the ChangeLog for details.
1628 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
1630 * New machines supported (host and target)
1632 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
1634 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
1636 * New malloc package
1638 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
1639 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
1640 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
1641 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
1642 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
1643 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
1647 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
1648 'help info proc' for details.
1650 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
1652 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
1653 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
1656 * File name changes for MS-DOS
1658 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
1659 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
1660 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
1661 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
1662 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
1663 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
1665 * Cross byte order fixes
1667 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
1668 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
1670 * New -mapped and -readnow options
1672 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
1673 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
1674 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
1675 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
1676 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
1677 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
1678 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
1679 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
1680 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
1681 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
1683 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
1684 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
1685 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
1686 slower, but makes future operations faster.
1688 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
1689 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
1690 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
1693 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
1695 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
1696 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
1697 shared across multiple host platforms.
1699 * longjmp() handling
1701 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
1702 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
1703 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
1704 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
1708 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
1709 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
1714 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
1715 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
1716 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
1718 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
1720 * New machines supported (host and target)
1722 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
1724 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
1725 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
1727 * New machines supported (target)
1729 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1733 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
1734 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
1735 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
1737 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
1738 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
1739 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
1740 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
1741 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
1744 * New features for SVR4
1746 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
1747 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
1748 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
1750 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
1751 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
1752 it prints the address mappings of the process.
1754 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
1755 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
1757 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
1759 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
1760 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
1761 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
1762 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
1763 same code linked statically.
1767 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
1768 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
1769 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
1770 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
1771 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
1772 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
1776 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
1777 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
1778 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
1781 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
1783 * New machines supported (host and target)
1785 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
1786 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
1787 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1789 * Almost SCO Unix support
1791 We had hoped to support:
1792 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
1793 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
1794 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
1795 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
1797 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
1799 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
1800 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
1801 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
1802 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
1807 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
1808 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
1809 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
1813 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
1814 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
1815 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
1817 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
1819 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
1820 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
1821 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
1823 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
1824 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
1825 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
1826 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
1829 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
1830 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
1831 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
1832 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
1835 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
1836 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
1839 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
1840 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
1841 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
1844 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
1846 * Improved configuration
1848 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
1849 Porting BFD is simpler.
1853 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
1854 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
1855 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
1856 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
1860 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
1862 * New host supported (not target)
1864 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
1867 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
1869 * Multiple source language support
1871 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
1872 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
1873 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
1874 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
1875 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
1876 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
1880 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
1881 currently under development at the State University of New York at
1882 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
1883 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
1885 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
1886 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
1887 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
1889 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
1890 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
1894 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
1895 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
1896 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
1897 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
1900 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
1902 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
1903 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
1904 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
1905 examining core files.
1909 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
1912 * New machines supported (host and target)
1914 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
1915 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
1916 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
1918 * New hosts supported (not targets)
1920 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
1922 * New targets supported (not hosts)
1924 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1925 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1926 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
1928 * New remote interfaces
1934 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
1938 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
1940 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
1941 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
1942 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
1943 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
1944 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
1945 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
1946 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
1947 stub on the target system.
1949 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
1951 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
1952 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
1953 object file types such as a.out and coff.
1955 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
1956 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
1959 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
1961 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
1962 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
1964 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
1965 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
1966 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
1968 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
1969 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
1970 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
1971 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
1973 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
1974 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
1975 it is already running. Default is ON.
1977 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
1978 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
1979 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
1980 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
1983 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
1984 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
1985 or the value of the environment variable
1988 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
1989 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
1992 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
1993 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
1994 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
1996 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
1997 history expansion will be performed on
1998 command line input. The default is OFF.
2000 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
2001 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
2002 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
2004 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
2005 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
2006 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2009 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
2010 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
2011 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2014 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
2015 ``set width'' instead.
2017 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
2018 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
2019 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
2020 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
2022 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
2025 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
2028 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
2031 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
2034 * Support for Epoch Environment.
2036 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
2037 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
2038 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
2042 * Support for Shared Libraries
2044 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
2045 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
2046 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
2047 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
2048 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
2049 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
2050 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
2051 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
2053 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
2054 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
2055 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
2057 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
2062 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
2063 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
2064 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
2065 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
2066 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
2067 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
2069 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
2071 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
2073 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2074 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2075 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2078 * C++ multiple inheritance
2080 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
2083 * C++ exception handling
2085 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
2086 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
2087 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
2090 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
2091 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
2092 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
2094 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
2095 current stack frame.
2098 * Minor command changes
2100 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
2101 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
2102 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
2104 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
2105 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
2106 frames without printing.
2108 * New directory command
2110 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
2111 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
2112 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
2113 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
2114 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
2116 * Configuring GDB for compilation
2118 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
2121 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
2122 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
2123 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
2124 where the program that you are debugging will run.
projects / deliverable / binutils-gdb.git / blob