1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB 5.2:
6 * ``gdbserver'' now supports multithreaded applications on some targets
8 Support for multithreaded applications using LinuxThreads has been added
9 for arm*-*-linux*, i[3456]86-*-linux*, mips*-*-linux*, powerpc*-*-linux*,
12 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
14 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
15 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
18 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
19 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
20 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
21 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
23 Here are the new commands for working with macros:
25 ** macro expand EXPRESSION
27 Expand any macro invocations in expression, and show the result.
29 ** show macro MACRO-NAME
31 Show the definition of the macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was
34 * Multi-arched targets.
36 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
37 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
39 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
40 Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
41 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
45 Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
48 * New native configurations
50 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
51 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
52 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
53 UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
55 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
57 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
58 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
59 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
62 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
63 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
64 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
66 * REMOVED configurations and files
68 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
69 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
70 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
71 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
72 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
74 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
76 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
78 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
79 commands. The default is 1024.
81 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
83 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
85 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
87 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
88 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
89 from a file into memory (restore).
91 *** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
99 gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
100 mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
101 Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
103 gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
104 dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
105 Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
107 Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
108 Surprisingly enough, it works now.
109 By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
111 i386 hardware watchpoint support:
112 avoid misses on second run for some targets.
113 By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
115 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
117 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
119 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
120 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
121 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
122 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
123 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
124 (notably embedded) targets.
126 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
128 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
129 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
130 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
131 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
133 * New command line option
135 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
137 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
139 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
140 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
141 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
142 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
143 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
144 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
145 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
146 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
147 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
148 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
150 * Changes in ARM configurations.
152 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
153 configuration is fully multi-arch.
155 * New native configurations
157 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
158 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
159 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
160 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
164 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
166 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
168 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
169 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
170 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
173 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
174 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
175 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
176 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
177 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
179 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
181 * REMOVED configurations and files
183 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
185 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
186 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
187 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
188 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
189 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
190 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
191 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
192 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
193 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
194 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
195 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
197 * Changes to command line processing
199 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
200 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
202 * Changes to key bindings
204 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
206 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
208 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
210 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
213 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
215 Numerous documentation fixes.
217 Numerous testsuite fixes.
219 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
221 * New native configurations
223 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
224 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
225 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
226 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
228 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
232 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
234 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
236 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
238 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
239 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
240 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
241 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
242 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
244 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
245 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
246 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
247 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
248 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
249 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
250 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
251 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
253 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
254 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
256 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
257 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
258 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
261 * REMOVED configurations and files
263 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
264 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
266 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
270 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
272 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
273 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
278 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
280 * The MI enabled by default.
282 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
283 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
284 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
285 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
286 which is now deprecated.
288 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
290 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
291 main features are supported:
293 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
295 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
298 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
300 - a Pascal expression parser.
302 However, some important features are not yet supported.
304 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
306 - there are some problems with boolean types;
308 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
309 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
311 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
313 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
315 * Changes in completion.
317 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
318 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
319 users expect at the shell prompt.
321 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
322 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
323 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
324 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
325 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
326 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
327 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
329 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
331 * New platform-independent commands:
333 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
334 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
335 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
337 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
339 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
340 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
341 many threads as your system allows you to have.
343 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
345 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
346 multi-threaded programs though.
348 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
350 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
352 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
353 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
356 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
358 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
359 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
360 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
361 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
362 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
365 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
366 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
367 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
369 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
371 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
372 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
374 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
375 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
378 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
379 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
380 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
381 a given linear address.
383 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
384 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
385 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
387 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
389 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
391 * Changes in documentation.
393 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
394 Documentation License.
396 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
399 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
401 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
404 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
405 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
406 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
408 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
410 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
411 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
412 contents of this file.
416 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
418 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
420 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
422 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
423 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
424 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
425 greater level of detail.
427 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
429 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
430 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
431 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
434 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
436 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
437 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
438 machines ``out of the box''.
440 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
441 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
442 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
443 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
444 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
446 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
447 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
448 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
449 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
450 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
452 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
453 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
456 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
459 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
460 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
461 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
462 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
464 * New native configurations
466 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
467 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
471 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
472 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
473 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
474 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
476 * OBSOLETE configurations
478 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
479 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
481 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
484 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
485 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
486 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
487 be permanently REMOVED.
489 * Gould support removed
491 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
493 * New features for SVR4
495 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
496 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
497 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
499 * Many C++ enhancements
501 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
502 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
504 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
506 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
507 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
508 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
509 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
511 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
512 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
514 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
516 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
517 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
518 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
520 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
521 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
523 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
525 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
526 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
527 include ``set remote P-packet''.
529 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
531 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
532 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
533 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
535 * ``apropos'' command added.
537 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
538 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
539 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
543 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
544 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
545 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
546 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
547 enabled by configuring with:
549 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
551 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
553 * New native configurations
555 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
556 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
557 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
561 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
562 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
563 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
565 * OBSOLETE configurations
567 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
569 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
570 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
571 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
572 be permanently REMOVED.
576 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
577 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
578 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
579 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
580 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
581 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
582 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
587 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
589 * set extension-language
591 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
592 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
593 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
594 set extension-language .c c++
595 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
596 and their associated languages.
598 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
600 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
601 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
602 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
606 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
607 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
609 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
610 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
612 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
613 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
614 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
615 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
616 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
617 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
618 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
619 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
621 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
622 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
623 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
624 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
628 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
629 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
630 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
631 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
632 for xdb and dbx commands.
636 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
637 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
638 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
640 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
641 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
642 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
644 * Debugging across forks
646 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
651 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
652 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
653 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
655 * GDB remote protocol additions
657 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
658 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
659 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
660 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
662 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
663 full 64-bit address. The command
665 set remoteaddresssize 32
667 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
668 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
671 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
672 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
674 maint packet heythere
676 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
677 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
680 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
681 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
682 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
684 * Tracing can collect general expressions
686 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
687 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
688 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
690 * mask-address variable for Mips
692 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
693 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
694 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
696 * Higher serial baud rates
698 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
699 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
700 to achieve all of these rates.)
704 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
705 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
708 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
710 * New native configurations
712 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
713 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
714 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
715 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
716 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
717 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
718 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
722 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
723 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
724 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
725 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
726 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
727 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
728 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
729 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
730 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
731 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
732 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
734 * New debugging protocols
736 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
737 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
738 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
739 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
740 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
741 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
745 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
746 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
751 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
752 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
754 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
756 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
757 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
758 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
760 * Live range splitting
762 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
763 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
764 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
768 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
769 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
773 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
774 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
775 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
780 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
785 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
786 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
787 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
788 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
789 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
790 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
794 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
795 the symbol at the specified address.
799 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
800 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
801 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
802 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
803 file tracepoint.c for more details.
807 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
808 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
809 of most MIPS variants.
813 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
814 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
815 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
819 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
820 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
821 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
822 the possible architectures.
824 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
826 * New native configurations
828 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
829 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
830 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
831 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
832 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
833 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
837 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
838 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
839 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
840 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
841 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
843 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
847 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
848 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
849 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
850 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
851 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
855 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
857 * Windows 95/NT native
859 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
860 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
861 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
862 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
863 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
865 * dont-repeat command
867 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
868 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
869 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
870 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
872 * Send break instead of ^C
874 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
875 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
876 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
878 * Remote protocol timeout
880 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
881 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
882 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
884 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
886 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
887 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
888 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
889 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
890 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
892 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
893 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
894 automatically on hpux10.
896 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
898 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
900 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
902 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
903 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
904 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
905 every character. The default value is 1050.
907 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
909 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
910 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
911 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
912 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
913 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
914 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
916 * Speedups for remote debugging
918 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
919 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
920 and more efficient S-record downloading.
922 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
924 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
925 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
927 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
931 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
932 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
934 * Remote targets use caching
936 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
937 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
938 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
939 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
940 off' turns the the data cache off.
942 * Remote targets may have threads
944 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
945 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
946 gdb/remote.c for details.
950 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
951 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
952 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
953 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
954 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
955 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
956 sequence is something like
958 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
960 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
964 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
965 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
966 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
967 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
968 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
969 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
970 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
971 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
975 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
976 but does simplify configuration and building.
980 GDB now supports hpux10.
982 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
984 * New native configurations
986 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
987 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
988 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
989 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
993 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
994 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
995 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
996 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
999 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
1001 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
1002 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
1003 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
1004 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
1005 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
1007 * Arguments to user-defined commands
1009 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
1010 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
1013 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
1015 To execute the command use:
1018 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
1019 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
1020 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
1022 * New `if' and `while' commands
1024 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
1025 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
1026 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
1027 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
1028 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
1029 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
1030 if the expression is zero.
1032 * Fortran source language mode
1034 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
1035 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
1036 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
1037 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
1040 * Better HPUX support
1042 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
1043 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
1044 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
1045 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
1046 that behavior do the following before running the program:
1052 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
1053 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
1059 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
1060 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
1063 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
1064 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
1066 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
1068 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
1069 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
1070 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
1071 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
1072 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
1073 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
1075 * New DOS host serial code
1077 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
1078 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
1081 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
1083 * New "complete" command
1085 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
1086 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
1088 * Trailing space optional in prompt
1090 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
1091 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
1093 * Breakpoint hit counts
1095 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
1096 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
1097 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
1098 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
1099 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
1102 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
1104 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
1105 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
1106 arrays actually contain only short strings.
1108 * Shared library breakpoints
1110 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
1111 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
1113 * Hardware watchpoints
1115 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
1116 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
1118 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
1122 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
1123 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
1125 * Improved Irix 5 support
1127 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
1129 * Improved HPPA support
1131 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
1133 * New native configurations
1135 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
1136 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1137 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
1138 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
1142 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1143 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
1146 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
1148 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
1149 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
1153 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
1154 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
1156 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
1158 * Irix 5 is now supported
1162 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
1163 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
1164 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
1165 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
1166 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
1169 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
1171 * User visible changes:
1175 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
1176 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
1177 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
1178 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
1179 debugging info for the mips target).
1181 * DEC Alpha native support
1183 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
1184 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
1185 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
1186 Alpha-specific notes.
1188 * Preliminary thread implementation
1190 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
1192 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
1194 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
1195 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
1198 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
1200 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
1201 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
1202 call methods, ...etc.
1204 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
1206 * User visible changes:
1208 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
1209 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
1210 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
1211 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
1213 Filename completion now works.
1215 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
1216 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
1217 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
1219 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
1220 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
1221 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
1222 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
1223 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
1227 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
1228 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
1231 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
1235 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
1236 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
1237 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
1241 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
1242 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
1243 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
1244 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
1245 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
1249 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
1250 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
1251 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
1253 * New targets supported
1255 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
1256 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1257 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
1258 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1259 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
1261 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
1262 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
1263 GO32 memory extender.
1265 * New remote protocols
1267 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
1269 * New source languages supported
1271 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
1272 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
1273 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
1276 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
1278 * HP Precision Architecture supported
1280 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
1281 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
1282 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
1283 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
1284 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
1285 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
1287 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
1289 * Faster and better demangling
1291 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
1292 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
1293 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
1294 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
1295 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
1296 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
1299 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
1300 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
1301 compiler does not actually implement.
1303 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
1305 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
1306 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
1307 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
1308 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
1309 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
1310 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
1313 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
1314 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
1316 * Improved configure script
1318 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
1319 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
1320 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
1321 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
1323 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
1324 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
1325 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
1326 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
1327 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
1328 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
1330 * Documentation improvements
1332 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
1333 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
1334 before submitting changes.
1336 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
1337 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
1338 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
1339 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
1340 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
1342 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
1343 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
1344 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
1345 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
1346 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
1347 around this problem.
1351 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
1352 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
1353 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
1356 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
1357 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
1359 * New native hosts supported
1361 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
1362 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
1364 * New targets supported
1366 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
1368 * New file formats supported
1370 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
1371 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
1375 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
1377 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
1378 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
1380 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
1381 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
1382 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
1384 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
1385 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
1387 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
1388 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
1389 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
1392 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
1393 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
1394 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
1395 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
1396 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
1398 * Internal improvements
1400 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
1401 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
1403 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
1404 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
1405 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
1406 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
1407 shared code that handles any of them.
1409 * New command line options
1411 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
1415 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
1416 General Public License.
1418 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
1420 * Host/native/target split
1422 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
1423 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
1424 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
1425 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
1426 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
1428 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
1429 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
1430 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
1431 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
1432 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
1433 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
1434 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
1436 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
1437 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
1438 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
1440 * New hosts supported
1442 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
1443 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
1444 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
1446 * New targets supported
1448 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
1449 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
1451 * New native hosts supported
1453 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
1454 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
1455 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
1457 * New file formats supported
1459 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
1460 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
1461 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
1465 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
1466 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
1467 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
1469 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
1471 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
1472 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
1473 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
1474 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
1478 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
1479 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
1480 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
1482 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
1486 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
1487 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
1490 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
1491 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
1493 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
1494 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
1495 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
1496 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
1497 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
1498 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
1500 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
1501 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
1502 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
1503 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
1507 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
1508 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
1509 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
1510 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
1511 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
1513 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
1514 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
1515 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
1516 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
1520 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
1521 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
1522 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
1523 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
1524 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
1525 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
1526 each instruction being stepped through.
1528 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
1529 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
1531 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
1532 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
1533 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
1534 processor with a serial port.
1538 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
1539 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
1540 supported, and what files each one uses.
1544 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
1545 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
1546 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
1547 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
1549 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
1550 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
1551 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
1552 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
1556 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
1557 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
1558 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
1559 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
1560 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
1561 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
1563 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
1566 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
1568 * Better support for C++ function names
1570 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
1571 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
1572 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
1573 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
1574 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
1576 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
1577 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
1578 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
1579 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
1580 for the list of formats.
1582 * G++ symbol mangling problem
1584 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
1585 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
1586 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
1587 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
1588 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
1589 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
1592 * New 'maintenance' command
1594 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
1595 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
1596 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
1598 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
1599 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
1600 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
1601 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
1602 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
1603 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
1605 The following commands are new:
1607 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
1608 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
1609 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
1611 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
1613 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
1614 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
1615 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
1616 read after argv processing.
1618 * New hosts supported
1620 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
1622 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
1624 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
1625 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
1626 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
1627 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
1628 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
1631 * New targets supported
1633 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
1635 * More smarts about finding #include files
1637 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
1638 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
1639 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
1640 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
1641 the one that contains your sources.
1643 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
1644 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
1645 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
1647 * Interesting infernals change
1649 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
1650 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
1651 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
1652 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
1654 * Bug fixes (of course!)
1656 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
1657 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
1658 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
1660 See the ChangeLog for details.
1662 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
1664 * New machines supported (host and target)
1666 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
1668 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
1670 * New malloc package
1672 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
1673 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
1674 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
1675 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
1676 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
1677 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
1681 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
1682 'help info proc' for details.
1684 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
1686 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
1687 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
1690 * File name changes for MS-DOS
1692 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
1693 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
1694 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
1695 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
1696 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
1697 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
1699 * Cross byte order fixes
1701 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
1702 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
1704 * New -mapped and -readnow options
1706 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
1707 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
1708 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
1709 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
1710 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
1711 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
1712 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
1713 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
1714 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
1715 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
1717 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
1718 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
1719 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
1720 slower, but makes future operations faster.
1722 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
1723 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
1724 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
1727 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
1729 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
1730 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
1731 shared across multiple host platforms.
1733 * longjmp() handling
1735 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
1736 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
1737 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
1738 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
1742 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
1743 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
1748 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
1749 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
1750 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
1752 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
1754 * New machines supported (host and target)
1756 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
1758 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
1759 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
1761 * New machines supported (target)
1763 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1767 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
1768 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
1769 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
1771 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
1772 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
1773 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
1774 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
1775 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
1778 * New features for SVR4
1780 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
1781 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
1782 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
1784 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
1785 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
1786 it prints the address mappings of the process.
1788 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
1789 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
1791 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
1793 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
1794 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
1795 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
1796 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
1797 same code linked statically.
1801 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
1802 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
1803 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
1804 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
1805 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
1806 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
1810 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
1811 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
1812 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
1815 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
1817 * New machines supported (host and target)
1819 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
1820 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
1821 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1823 * Almost SCO Unix support
1825 We had hoped to support:
1826 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
1827 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
1828 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
1829 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
1831 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
1833 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
1834 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
1835 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
1836 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
1841 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
1842 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
1843 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
1847 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
1848 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
1849 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
1851 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
1853 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
1854 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
1855 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
1857 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
1858 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
1859 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
1860 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
1863 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
1864 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
1865 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
1866 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
1869 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
1870 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
1873 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
1874 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
1875 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
1878 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
1880 * Improved configuration
1882 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
1883 Porting BFD is simpler.
1887 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
1888 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
1889 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
1890 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
1894 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
1896 * New host supported (not target)
1898 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
1901 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
1903 * Multiple source language support
1905 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
1906 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
1907 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
1908 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
1909 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
1910 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
1914 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
1915 currently under development at the State University of New York at
1916 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
1917 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
1919 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
1920 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
1921 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
1923 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
1924 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
1928 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
1929 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
1930 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
1931 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
1934 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
1936 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
1937 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
1938 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
1939 examining core files.
1943 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
1946 * New machines supported (host and target)
1948 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
1949 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
1950 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
1952 * New hosts supported (not targets)
1954 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
1956 * New targets supported (not hosts)
1958 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1959 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1960 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
1962 * New remote interfaces
1968 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
1972 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
1974 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
1975 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
1976 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
1977 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
1978 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
1979 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
1980 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
1981 stub on the target system.
1983 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
1985 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
1986 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
1987 object file types such as a.out and coff.
1989 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
1990 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
1993 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
1995 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
1996 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
1998 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
1999 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
2000 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
2002 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
2003 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
2004 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
2005 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
2007 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
2008 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
2009 it is already running. Default is ON.
2011 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
2012 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
2013 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
2014 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
2017 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
2018 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
2019 or the value of the environment variable
2022 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
2023 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
2026 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
2027 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
2028 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
2030 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
2031 history expansion will be performed on
2032 command line input. The default is OFF.
2034 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
2035 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
2036 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
2038 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
2039 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
2040 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2043 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
2044 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
2045 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
2048 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
2049 ``set width'' instead.
2051 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
2052 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
2053 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
2054 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
2056 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
2059 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
2062 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
2065 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
2068 * Support for Epoch Environment.
2070 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
2071 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
2072 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
2076 * Support for Shared Libraries
2078 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
2079 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
2080 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
2081 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
2082 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
2083 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
2084 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
2085 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
2087 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
2088 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
2089 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
2091 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
2096 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
2097 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
2098 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
2099 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
2100 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
2101 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
2103 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
2105 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
2107 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2108 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2109 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
2112 * C++ multiple inheritance
2114 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
2117 * C++ exception handling
2119 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
2120 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
2121 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
2124 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
2125 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
2126 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
2128 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
2129 current stack frame.
2132 * Minor command changes
2134 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
2135 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
2136 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
2138 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
2139 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
2140 frames without printing.
2142 * New directory command
2144 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
2145 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
2146 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
2147 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
2148 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
2150 * Configuring GDB for compilation
2152 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
2155 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
2156 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
2157 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
2158 where the program that you are debugging will run.
projects / external / binutils.git / blob