Known problems in GDB 6.0 See also: http://www.gnu.org/software/gdb/bugs/ mips*-*-* powerpc*-*-* sparc*-*-* GDB's SPARC, MIPS and PowerPC targets, in 6.0, have not been updated to use the new frame mechanism. People encountering problems with these targets should consult GDB's web pages and mailing lists (http://www.gnu.org/software/gdb/) to see if there is an update. arm-*-* GDB's ARM target, in 6.0, has not been updated to use the new frame mechanism. Fortunately the ARM target, in the GDB's mainline sources, has been updated so people encountering problems should consider downloading a more current GDB (http://www.gnu.org/software/gdb/current). gdb/1516: [regression] local classes, gcc 2.95.3, dwarf-2 With gcc 2.95.3 and the dwarf-2 debugging format, classes which are defined locally to a function include the demangled name of the function as part of their name. For example, if a function "foobar" contains a local class definition "Local", gdb will say that the name of the class type is "foobar__Fi.0:Local". This applies only to classes where the class type is defined inside a function, not to variables defined with types that are defined somewhere outside any function (which most types are). gdb/1091: Constructor breakpoints ignored gdb/1193: g++ 3.3 creates multiple constructors: gdb 5.3 can't set breakpoints When gcc 3.x compiles a C++ constructor or C++ destructor, it generates 2 or 3 different versions of the object code. These versions have unique mangled names (they have to, in order for linking to work), but they have identical source code names, which leads to a great deal of confusion. Specifically, if you set a breakpoint in a constructor or a destructor, gdb will put a breakpoint in one of the versions, but your program may execute the other version. This makes it impossible to set breakpoints reliably in constructors or destructors. gcc 3.x generates these multiple object code functions in order to implement virtual base classes. gcc 2.x generated just one object code function with a hidden parameter, but gcc 3.x conforms to a multi-vendor ABI for C++ which requires multiple object code functions.