1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB 8.0
8 * GDB now supports access to the PKU register on GNU/Linux. The register is
9 added by the Memory Protection Keys for Userspace feature which will be
10 available in future Intel CPUs.
12 * GDB now supports C++11 rvalue references.
16 ** New functions to start, stop and access a running btrace recording.
17 ** Rvalue references are now supported in gdb.Type.
19 * GDB now supports recording and replaying rdrand and rdseed Intel 64
22 * Building GDB and GDBserver now requires a C++11 compiler.
24 For example, GCC 4.8 or later.
26 It is no longer possible to build GDB or GDBserver with a C
27 compiler. The --disable-build-with-cxx configure option has been
30 * Building GDB and GDBserver now requires GNU make >= 3.81.
32 It is no longer supported to build GDB or GDBserver with another
33 implementation of the make program or an earlier version of GNU make.
35 * Native debugging on MS-Windows supports command-line redirection
37 Command-line arguments used for starting programs on MS-Windows can
38 now include redirection symbols supported by native Windows shells,
39 such as '<', '>', '>>', '2>&1', etc. This affects GDB commands such
40 as "run", "start", and "set args", as well as the corresponding MI
43 * Support for thread names on MS-Windows.
45 GDB now catches and handles the special exception that programs
46 running on MS-Windows use to assign names to threads in the
49 * Support for Java programs compiled with gcj has been removed.
51 * User commands now accept an unlimited number of arguments.
52 Previously, only up to 10 was accepted.
54 * The "eval" command now expands user-defined command arguments.
56 This makes it easier to process a variable number of arguments:
61 eval "print $arg%d", $i
66 * Target descriptions can now describe registers for sparc32 and sparc64.
68 * GDB now supports DWARF version 5 (debug information format).
69 Its .debug_names index is not yet supported.
71 * New native configurations
73 FreeBSD/mips mips*-*-freebsd
77 Synopsys ARC arc*-*-elf32
78 FreeBSD/mips mips*-*-freebsd
80 * Removed targets and native configurations
82 Alpha running FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
83 Alpha running GNU/kFreeBSD alpha*-*-kfreebsd*-gnu
88 Erases all the flash memory regions reported by the target.
90 maint print arc arc-instruction address
91 Print internal disassembler information about instruction at a given address.
95 set disassembler-options
96 show disassembler-options
97 Controls the passing of target specific information to the disassembler.
98 If it is necessary to specify more than one disassembler option then
99 multiple options can be placed together into a comma separated list.
100 The default value is the empty string. Currently, the only supported
101 targets are ARM, PowerPC and S/390.
106 Erases all the flash memory regions reported by the target. This is
107 equivalent to the CLI command flash-erase.
109 -file-list-shared-libraries
110 List the shared libraries in the program. This is
111 equivalent to the CLI command "info shared".
113 *** Changes in GDB 7.12
115 * GDB and GDBserver now build with a C++ compiler by default.
117 The --enable-build-with-cxx configure option is now enabled by
118 default. One must now explicitly configure with
119 --disable-build-with-cxx in order to build with a C compiler. This
120 option will be removed in a future release.
122 * GDBserver now supports recording btrace without maintaining an active
125 * GDB now supports a negative repeat count in the 'x' command to examine
126 memory backward from the given address. For example:
129 #0 Func1 (n=42, p=0x40061c "hogehoge") at main.cpp:4
130 #1 0x400580 in main (argc=1, argv=0x7fffffffe5c8) at main.cpp:8
131 (gdb) x/-5i 0x0000000000400580
132 0x40056a <main(int, char**)+8>: mov %edi,-0x4(%rbp)
133 0x40056d <main(int, char**)+11>: mov %rsi,-0x10(%rbp)
134 0x400571 <main(int, char**)+15>: mov $0x40061c,%esi
135 0x400576 <main(int, char**)+20>: mov $0x2a,%edi
136 0x40057b <main(int, char**)+25>:
137 callq 0x400536 <Func1(int, char const*)>
139 * Fortran: Support structures with fields of dynamic types and
140 arrays of dynamic types.
142 * The symbol dumping maintenance commands have new syntax.
143 maint print symbols [-pc address] [--] [filename]
144 maint print symbols [-objfile objfile] [-source source] [--] [filename]
145 maint print psymbols [-objfile objfile] [-pc address] [--] [filename]
146 maint print psymbols [-objfile objfile] [-source source] [--] [filename]
147 maint print msymbols [-objfile objfile] [--] [filename]
149 * GDB now supports multibit bitfields and enums in target register
152 * New Python-based convenience function $_as_string(val), which returns
153 the textual representation of a value. This function is especially
154 useful to obtain the text label of an enum value.
156 * Intel MPX bound violation handling.
158 Segmentation faults caused by a Intel MPX boundary violation
159 now display the kind of violation (upper or lower), the memory
160 address accessed and the memory bounds, along with the usual
161 signal received and code location.
165 Program received signal SIGSEGV, Segmentation fault
166 Upper bound violation while accessing address 0x7fffffffc3b3
167 Bounds: [lower = 0x7fffffffc390, upper = 0x7fffffffc3a3]
168 0x0000000000400d7c in upper () at i386-mpx-sigsegv.c:68
170 * Rust language support.
171 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the Rust programming
172 language. See https://www.rust-lang.org/ for more information about
175 * Support for running interpreters on specified input/output devices
177 GDB now supports a new mechanism that allows frontends to provide
178 fully featured GDB console views, as a better alternative to
179 building such views on top of the "-interpreter-exec console"
180 command. See the new "new-ui" command below. With that command,
181 frontends can now start GDB in the traditional command-line mode
182 running in an embedded terminal emulator widget, and create a
183 separate MI interpreter running on a specified i/o device. In this
184 way, GDB handles line editing, history, tab completion, etc. in the
185 console all by itself, and the GUI uses the separate MI interpreter
186 for its own control and synchronization, invisible to the command
189 * The "catch syscall" command catches groups of related syscalls.
191 The "catch syscall" command now supports catching a group of related
192 syscalls using the 'group:' or 'g:' prefix.
197 skip -gfile file-glob-pattern
198 skip -function function
199 skip -rfunction regular-expression
200 A generalized form of the skip command, with new support for
201 glob-style file names and regular expressions for function names.
202 Additionally, a file spec and a function spec may now be combined.
204 maint info line-table REGEXP
205 Display the contents of GDB's internal line table data struture.
208 Run any GDB unit tests that were compiled in.
211 Start a new user interface instance running INTERP as interpreter,
212 using the TTY file for input/output.
216 ** gdb.Breakpoint objects have a new attribute "pending", which
217 indicates whether the breakpoint is pending.
218 ** Three new breakpoint-related events have been added:
219 gdb.breakpoint_created, gdb.breakpoint_modified, and
220 gdb.breakpoint_deleted.
223 Signal ("set") the given MS-Windows event object. This is used in
224 conjunction with the Windows JIT debugging (AeDebug) support, where
225 the OS suspends a crashing process until a debugger can attach to
226 it. Resuming the crashing process, in order to debug it, is done by
229 * Support for tracepoints and fast tracepoints on s390-linux and s390x-linux
230 was added in GDBserver, including JIT compiling fast tracepoint's
231 conditional expression bytecode into native code.
233 * Support for various remote target protocols and ROM monitors has
236 target m32rsdi Remote M32R debugging over SDI
237 target mips MIPS remote debugging protocol
238 target pmon PMON ROM monitor
239 target ddb NEC's DDB variant of PMON for Vr4300
240 target rockhopper NEC RockHopper variant of PMON
241 target lsi LSI variant of PMO
243 * Support for tracepoints and fast tracepoints on powerpc-linux,
244 powerpc64-linux, and powerpc64le-linux was added in GDBserver,
245 including JIT compiling fast tracepoint's conditional expression
246 bytecode into native code.
248 * MI async record =record-started now includes the method and format used for
249 recording. For example:
251 =record-started,thread-group="i1",method="btrace",format="bts"
253 * MI async record =thread-selected now includes the frame field. For example:
255 =thread-selected,id="3",frame={level="0",addr="0x00000000004007c0"}
259 Andes NDS32 nds32*-*-elf
261 *** Changes in GDB 7.11
263 * GDB now supports debugging kernel-based threads on FreeBSD.
265 * Per-inferior thread numbers
267 Thread numbers are now per inferior instead of global. If you're
268 debugging multiple inferiors, GDB displays thread IDs using a
269 qualified INF_NUM.THR_NUM form. For example:
273 1.1 Thread 0x7ffff7fc2740 (LWP 8155) (running)
274 1.2 Thread 0x7ffff7fc1700 (LWP 8168) (running)
275 * 2.1 Thread 0x7ffff7fc2740 (LWP 8157) (running)
276 2.2 Thread 0x7ffff7fc1700 (LWP 8190) (running)
278 As consequence, thread numbers as visible in the $_thread
279 convenience variable and in Python's InferiorThread.num attribute
280 are no longer unique between inferiors.
282 GDB now maintains a second thread ID per thread, referred to as the
283 global thread ID, which is the new equivalent of thread numbers in
284 previous releases. See also $_gthread below.
286 For backwards compatibility, MI's thread IDs always refer to global
289 * Commands that accept thread IDs now accept the qualified
290 INF_NUM.THR_NUM form as well. For example:
293 [Switching to thread 2.1 (Thread 0x7ffff7fc2740 (LWP 8157))] (running)
296 * In commands that accept a list of thread IDs, you can now refer to
297 all threads of an inferior using a star wildcard. GDB accepts
298 "INF_NUM.*", to refer to all threads of inferior INF_NUM, and "*" to
299 refer to all threads of the current inferior. For example, "info
302 * You can use "info threads -gid" to display the global thread ID of
305 * The new convenience variable $_gthread holds the global number of
308 * The new convenience variable $_inferior holds the number of the
311 * GDB now displays the ID and name of the thread that hit a breakpoint
312 or received a signal, if your program is multi-threaded. For
315 Thread 3 "bar" hit Breakpoint 1 at 0x40087a: file program.c, line 20.
316 Thread 1 "main" received signal SIGINT, Interrupt.
318 * Record btrace now supports non-stop mode.
320 * Support for tracepoints on aarch64-linux was added in GDBserver.
322 * The 'record instruction-history' command now indicates speculative execution
323 when using the Intel Processor Trace recording format.
325 * GDB now allows users to specify explicit locations, bypassing
326 the linespec parser. This feature is also available to GDB/MI
329 * Multi-architecture debugging is supported on AArch64 GNU/Linux.
330 GDB now is able to debug both AArch64 applications and ARM applications
333 * Support for fast tracepoints on aarch64-linux was added in GDBserver,
334 including JIT compiling fast tracepoint's conditional expression bytecode
337 * GDB now supports displaced stepping on AArch64 GNU/Linux.
339 * "info threads", "info inferiors", "info display", "info checkpoints"
340 and "maint info program-spaces" now list the corresponding items in
341 ascending ID order, for consistency with all other "info" commands.
343 * In Ada, the overloads selection menu has been enhanced to display the
344 parameter types and the return types for the matching overloaded subprograms.
348 maint set target-non-stop (on|off|auto)
349 maint show target-non-stop
350 Control whether GDB targets always operate in non-stop mode even if
351 "set non-stop" is "off". The default is "auto", meaning non-stop
352 mode is enabled if supported by the target.
354 maint set bfd-sharing
355 maint show bfd-sharing
356 Control the reuse of bfd objects.
360 Control display of debugging info regarding bfd caching.
364 Control display of debugging info regarding FreeBSD threads.
366 set remote multiprocess-extensions-packet
367 show remote multiprocess-extensions-packet
368 Set/show the use of the remote protocol multiprocess extensions.
370 set remote thread-events
371 show remote thread-events
372 Set/show the use of thread create/exit events.
374 set ada print-signatures on|off
375 show ada print-signatures"
376 Control whether parameter types and return types are displayed in overloads
377 selection menus. It is activaled (@code{on}) by default.
381 Controls the maximum size of memory, in bytes, that GDB will
382 allocate for value contents. Prevents incorrect programs from
383 causing GDB to allocate overly large buffers. Default is 64k.
385 * The "disassemble" command accepts a new modifier: /s.
386 It prints mixed source+disassembly like /m with two differences:
387 - disassembled instructions are now printed in program order, and
388 - and source for all relevant files is now printed.
389 The "/m" option is now considered deprecated: its "source-centric"
390 output hasn't proved useful in practice.
392 * The "record instruction-history" command accepts a new modifier: /s.
393 It behaves exactly like /m and prints mixed source+disassembly.
395 * The "set scheduler-locking" command supports a new mode "replay".
396 It behaves like "off" in record mode and like "on" in replay mode.
398 * Support for various ROM monitors has been removed:
400 target dbug dBUG ROM monitor for Motorola ColdFire
401 target picobug Motorola picobug monitor
402 target dink32 DINK32 ROM monitor for PowerPC
403 target m32r Renesas M32R/D ROM monitor
404 target mon2000 mon2000 ROM monitor
405 target ppcbug PPCBUG ROM monitor for PowerPC
407 * Support for reading/writing memory and extracting values on architectures
408 whose memory is addressable in units of any integral multiple of 8 bits.
413 Indicates that an exec system call was executed.
415 exec-events feature in qSupported
416 The qSupported packet allows GDB to request support for exec
417 events using the new 'gdbfeature' exec-event, and the qSupported
418 response can contain the corresponding 'stubfeature'. Set and
419 show commands can be used to display whether these features are enabled.
422 Equivalent to interrupting with the ^C character, but works in
425 thread created stop reason (T05 create:...)
426 Indicates that the thread was just created and is stopped at entry.
428 thread exit stop reply (w exitcode;tid)
429 Indicates that the thread has terminated.
432 Enables/disables thread create and exit event reporting. For
433 example, this is used in non-stop mode when GDB stops a set of
434 threads and synchronously waits for the their corresponding stop
435 replies. Without exit events, if one of the threads exits, GDB
436 would hang forever not knowing that it should no longer expect a
437 stop for that same thread.
440 Indicates that there are no resumed threads left in the target (all
441 threads are stopped). The remote stub reports support for this stop
442 reply to GDB's qSupported query.
445 Enables/disables catching syscalls from the inferior process.
446 The remote stub reports support for this packet to GDB's qSupported query.
448 syscall_entry stop reason
449 Indicates that a syscall was just called.
451 syscall_return stop reason
452 Indicates that a syscall just returned.
454 * Extended-remote exec events
456 ** GDB now has support for exec events on extended-remote Linux targets.
457 For such targets with Linux kernels 2.5.46 and later, this enables
458 follow-exec-mode and exec catchpoints.
460 set remote exec-event-feature-packet
461 show remote exec-event-feature-packet
462 Set/show the use of the remote exec event feature.
464 * Thread names in remote protocol
466 The reply to qXfer:threads:read may now include a name attribute for each
469 * Target remote mode fork and exec events
471 ** GDB now has support for fork and exec events on target remote mode
472 Linux targets. For such targets with Linux kernels 2.5.46 and later,
473 this enables follow-fork-mode, detach-on-fork, follow-exec-mode, and
474 fork and exec catchpoints.
476 * Remote syscall events
478 ** GDB now has support for catch syscall on remote Linux targets,
479 currently enabled on x86/x86_64 architectures.
481 set remote catch-syscall-packet
482 show remote catch-syscall-packet
483 Set/show the use of the remote catch syscall feature.
487 ** The -var-set-format command now accepts the zero-hexadecimal
488 format. It outputs data in hexadecimal format with zero-padding on the
493 ** gdb.InferiorThread objects have a new attribute "global_num",
494 which refers to the thread's global thread ID. The existing
495 "num" attribute now refers to the thread's per-inferior number.
496 See "Per-inferior thread numbers" above.
497 ** gdb.InferiorThread objects have a new attribute "inferior", which
498 is the Inferior object the thread belongs to.
500 *** Changes in GDB 7.10
502 * Support for process record-replay and reverse debugging on aarch64*-linux*
503 targets has been added. GDB now supports recording of A64 instruction set
504 including advance SIMD instructions.
506 * Support for Sun's version of the "stabs" debug file format has been removed.
508 * GDB now honors the content of the file /proc/PID/coredump_filter
509 (PID is the process ID) on GNU/Linux systems. This file can be used
510 to specify the types of memory mappings that will be included in a
511 corefile. For more information, please refer to the manual page of
512 "core(5)". GDB also has a new command: "set use-coredump-filter
513 on|off". It allows to set whether GDB will read the content of the
514 /proc/PID/coredump_filter file when generating a corefile.
516 * The "info os" command on GNU/Linux can now display information on
518 "info os cpus" Listing of all cpus/cores on the system
520 * GDB has two new commands: "set serial parity odd|even|none" and
521 "show serial parity". These allows to set or show parity for the
524 * The "info source" command now displays the producer string if it was
525 present in the debug info. This typically includes the compiler version
526 and may include things like its command line arguments.
528 * The "info dll", an alias of the "info sharedlibrary" command,
529 is now available on all platforms.
531 * Directory names supplied to the "set sysroot" commands may be
532 prefixed with "target:" to tell GDB to access shared libraries from
533 the target system, be it local or remote. This replaces the prefix
534 "remote:". The default sysroot has been changed from "" to
535 "target:". "remote:" is automatically converted to "target:" for
536 backward compatibility.
538 * The system root specified by "set sysroot" will be prepended to the
539 filename of the main executable (if reported to GDB as absolute by
540 the operating system) when starting processes remotely, and when
541 attaching to already-running local or remote processes.
543 * GDB now supports automatic location and retrieval of executable
544 files from remote targets. Remote debugging can now be initiated
545 using only a "target remote" or "target extended-remote" command
546 (no "set sysroot" or "file" commands are required). See "New remote
549 * The "dump" command now supports verilog hex format.
551 * GDB now supports the vector ABI on S/390 GNU/Linux targets.
553 * On GNU/Linux, GDB and gdbserver are now able to access executable
554 and shared library files without a "set sysroot" command when
555 attaching to processes running in different mount namespaces from
556 the debugger. This makes it possible to attach to processes in
557 containers as simply as "gdb -p PID" or "gdbserver --attach PID".
558 See "New remote packets" below.
560 * The "tui reg" command now provides completion for all of the
561 available register groups, including target specific groups.
563 * The HISTSIZE environment variable is no longer read when determining
564 the size of GDB's command history. GDB now instead reads the dedicated
565 GDBHISTSIZE environment variable. Setting GDBHISTSIZE to "-1" or to "" now
566 disables truncation of command history. Non-numeric values of GDBHISTSIZE
571 ** Memory ports can now be unbuffered.
575 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "username",
576 which is the name of the objfile as specified by the user,
577 without, for example, resolving symlinks.
578 ** You can now write frame unwinders in Python.
579 ** gdb.Type objects have a new method "optimized_out",
580 returning optimized out gdb.Value instance of this type.
581 ** gdb.Value objects have new methods "reference_value" and
582 "const_value" which return a reference to the value and a
583 "const" version of the value respectively.
587 maint print symbol-cache
588 Print the contents of the symbol cache.
590 maint print symbol-cache-statistics
591 Print statistics of symbol cache usage.
593 maint flush-symbol-cache
594 Flush the contents of the symbol cache.
598 Start branch trace recording using Branch Trace Store (BTS) format.
601 Evaluate expression by using the compiler and print result.
605 Explicit commands for enabling and disabling tui mode.
608 set mpx bound on i386 and amd64
609 Support for bound table investigation on Intel MPX enabled applications.
613 Start branch trace recording using Intel Processor Trace format.
616 Print information about branch tracing internals.
618 maint btrace packet-history
619 Print the raw branch tracing data.
621 maint btrace clear-packet-history
622 Discard the stored raw branch tracing data.
625 Discard all branch tracing data. It will be fetched and processed
626 anew by the next "record" command.
631 Renamed from "set debug dwarf2-die".
633 Renamed from "show debug dwarf2-die".
636 Renamed from "set debug dwarf2-read".
637 show debug dwarf-read
638 Renamed from "show debug dwarf2-read".
640 maint set dwarf always-disassemble
641 Renamed from "maint set dwarf2 always-disassemble".
642 maint show dwarf always-disassemble
643 Renamed from "maint show dwarf2 always-disassemble".
645 maint set dwarf max-cache-age
646 Renamed from "maint set dwarf2 max-cache-age".
647 maint show dwarf max-cache-age
648 Renamed from "maint show dwarf2 max-cache-age".
651 show debug dwarf-line
652 Control display of debugging info regarding DWARF line processing.
656 Set the maximum number of candidates to be considered during
657 completion. The default value is 200. This limit allows GDB
658 to avoid generating large completion lists, the computation of
659 which can cause the debugger to become temporarily unresponsive.
661 set history remove-duplicates
662 show history remove-duplicates
663 Control the removal of duplicate history entries.
665 maint set symbol-cache-size
666 maint show symbol-cache-size
667 Control the size of the symbol cache.
669 set|show record btrace bts buffer-size
670 Set and show the size of the ring buffer used for branch tracing in
672 The obtained size may differ from the requested size. Use "info
673 record" to see the obtained buffer size.
675 set debug linux-namespaces
676 show debug linux-namespaces
677 Control display of debugging info regarding Linux namespaces.
679 set|show record btrace pt buffer-size
680 Set and show the size of the ring buffer used for branch tracing in
681 Intel Processor Trace format.
682 The obtained size may differ from the requested size. Use "info
683 record" to see the obtained buffer size.
685 maint set|show btrace pt skip-pad
686 Set and show whether PAD packets are skipped when computing the
689 * The command 'thread apply all' can now support new option '-ascending'
690 to call its specified command for all threads in ascending order.
692 * Python/Guile scripting
694 ** GDB now supports auto-loading of Python/Guile scripts contained in the
695 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts'.
699 qXfer:btrace-conf:read
700 Return the branch trace configuration for the current thread.
702 Qbtrace-conf:bts:size
703 Set the requested ring buffer size for branch tracing in BTS format.
706 Enable Intel Procesor Trace-based branch tracing for the current
707 process. The remote stub reports support for this packet to GDB's
711 Set the requested ring buffer size for branch tracing in Intel Processor
715 Indicates a memory breakpoint instruction was executed, irrespective
716 of whether it was GDB that planted the breakpoint or the breakpoint
717 is hardcoded in the program. This is required for correct non-stop
721 Indicates the target stopped for a hardware breakpoint. This is
722 required for correct non-stop mode operation.
725 Return information about files on the remote system.
728 Return the full absolute name of the file that was executed to
729 create a process running on the remote system.
732 Select the filesystem on which vFile: operations with filename
733 arguments will operate. This is required for GDB to be able to
734 access files on remote targets where the remote stub does not
735 share a common filesystem with the inferior(s).
738 Indicates that a fork system call was executed.
741 Indicates that a vfork system call was executed.
743 vforkdone stop reason
744 Indicates that a vfork child of the specified process has executed
745 an exec or exit, allowing the vfork parent to resume execution.
747 fork-events and vfork-events features in qSupported
748 The qSupported packet allows GDB to request support for fork and
749 vfork events using new 'gdbfeatures' fork-events and vfork-events,
750 and the qSupported response can contain the corresponding
751 'stubfeatures'. Set and show commands can be used to display
752 whether these features are enabled.
754 * Extended-remote fork events
756 ** GDB now has support for fork events on extended-remote Linux
757 targets. For targets with Linux kernels 2.5.60 and later, this
758 enables follow-fork-mode and detach-on-fork for both fork and
759 vfork, as well as fork and vfork catchpoints.
761 * The info record command now shows the recording format and the
762 branch tracing configuration for the current thread when using
763 the btrace record target.
764 For the BTS format, it shows the ring buffer size.
766 * GDB now has support for DTrace USDT (Userland Static Defined
767 Tracing) probes. The supported targets are x86_64-*-linux-gnu.
769 * GDB now supports access to vector registers on S/390 GNU/Linux
772 * Removed command line options
774 -xdb HP-UX XDB compatibility mode.
776 * Removed targets and native configurations
778 HP/PA running HP-UX hppa*-*-hpux*
779 Itanium running HP-UX ia64-*-hpux*
781 * New configure options
784 This configure option allows the user to build GDB with support for
785 Intel Processor Trace (default: auto). This requires libipt.
787 --with-libipt-prefix=PATH
788 Specify the path to the version of libipt that GDB should use.
789 $PATH/include should contain the intel-pt.h header and
790 $PATH/lib should contain the libipt.so library.
792 *** Changes in GDB 7.9.1
796 ** Xmethods can now specify a result type.
798 *** Changes in GDB 7.9
800 * GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on x86 GNU Hurd.
804 ** You can now access frame registers from Python scripts.
805 ** New attribute 'producer' for gdb.Symtab objects.
806 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "progspace",
807 which is the gdb.Progspace object of the containing program space.
808 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "owner".
809 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "build_id",
810 which is the build ID generated when the file was built.
811 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new method "add_separate_debug_file".
812 ** A new event "gdb.clear_objfiles" has been added, triggered when
813 selecting a new file to debug.
814 ** You can now add attributes to gdb.Objfile and gdb.Progspace objects.
815 ** New function gdb.lookup_objfile.
817 New events which are triggered when GDB modifies the state of the
820 ** gdb.events.inferior_call_pre: Function call is about to be made.
821 ** gdb.events.inferior_call_post: Function call has just been made.
822 ** gdb.events.memory_changed: A memory location has been altered.
823 ** gdb.events.register_changed: A register has been altered.
825 * New Python-based convenience functions:
827 ** $_caller_is(name [, number_of_frames])
828 ** $_caller_matches(regexp [, number_of_frames])
829 ** $_any_caller_is(name [, number_of_frames])
830 ** $_any_caller_matches(regexp [, number_of_frames])
832 * GDB now supports the compilation and injection of source code into
833 the inferior. GDB will use GCC 5.0 or higher built with libcc1.so
834 to compile the source code to object code, and if successful, inject
835 and execute that code within the current context of the inferior.
836 Currently the C language is supported. The commands used to
837 interface with this new feature are:
839 compile code [-raw|-r] [--] [source code]
840 compile file [-raw|-r] filename
844 demangle [-l language] [--] name
845 Demangle "name" in the specified language, or the current language
846 if elided. This command is renamed from the "maint demangle" command.
847 The latter is kept as a no-op to avoid "maint demangle" being interpreted
848 as "maint demangler-warning".
850 queue-signal signal-name-or-number
851 Queue a signal to be delivered to the thread when it is resumed.
853 add-auto-load-scripts-directory directory
854 Add entries to the list of directories from which to load auto-loaded
857 maint print user-registers
858 List all currently available "user" registers.
860 compile code [-r|-raw] [--] [source code]
861 Compile, inject, and execute in the inferior the executable object
862 code produced by compiling the provided source code.
864 compile file [-r|-raw] filename
865 Compile and inject into the inferior the executable object code
866 produced by compiling the source code stored in the filename
869 * On resume, GDB now always passes the signal the program had stopped
870 for to the thread the signal was sent to, even if the user changed
871 threads before resuming. Previously GDB would often (but not
872 always) deliver the signal to the thread that happens to be current
875 * Conversely, the "signal" command now consistently delivers the
876 requested signal to the current thread. GDB now asks for
877 confirmation if the program had stopped for a signal and the user
878 switched threads meanwhile.
880 * "breakpoint always-inserted" modes "off" and "auto" merged.
882 Now, when 'breakpoint always-inserted mode' is set to "off", GDB
883 won't remove breakpoints from the target until all threads stop,
884 even in non-stop mode. The "auto" mode has been removed, and "off"
885 is now the default mode.
889 set debug symbol-lookup
890 show debug symbol-lookup
891 Control display of debugging info regarding symbol lookup.
895 ** The -list-thread-groups command outputs an exit-code field for
896 inferiors that have exited.
900 MIPS SDE mips*-sde*-elf*
904 Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
906 Alpha running OSF/1 (or Tru64) alpha*-*-osf*
907 SGI Irix-5.x mips-*-irix5*
908 SGI Irix-6.x mips-*-irix6*
909 VAX running (4.2 - 4.3 Reno) BSD vax-*-bsd*
910 VAX running Ultrix vax-*-ultrix*
912 * The "dll-symbols" command, and its two aliases ("add-shared-symbol-files"
913 and "assf"), have been removed. Use the "sharedlibrary" command, or
914 its alias "share", instead.
916 *** Changes in GDB 7.8
918 * New command line options
921 This is an alias for the --data-directory option.
923 * GDB supports printing and modifying of variable length automatic arrays
924 as specified in ISO C99.
926 * The ARM simulator now supports instruction level tracing
927 with or without disassembly.
931 GDB now has support for scripting using Guile. Whether this is
932 available is determined at configure time.
933 Guile version 2.0 or greater is required.
934 Guile version 2.0.9 is well tested, earlier 2.0 versions are not.
936 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
940 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Guile interpreter.
944 Start a Guile interactive prompt (or "repl" for "read-eval-print loop").
946 info auto-load guile-scripts [regexp]
947 Print the list of automatically loaded Guile scripts.
949 * The source command is now capable of sourcing Guile scripts.
950 This feature is dependent on the debugger being built with Guile support.
954 set print symbol-loading (off|brief|full)
955 show print symbol-loading
956 Control whether to print informational messages when loading symbol
957 information for a file. The default is "full", but when debugging
958 programs with large numbers of shared libraries the amount of output
961 set guile print-stack (none|message|full)
962 show guile print-stack
963 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Guile script.
965 set auto-load guile-scripts (on|off)
966 show auto-load guile-scripts
967 Control auto-loading of Guile script files.
969 maint ada set ignore-descriptive-types (on|off)
970 maint ada show ignore-descriptive-types
971 Control whether the debugger should ignore descriptive types in Ada
972 programs. The default is not to ignore the descriptive types. See
973 the user manual for more details on descriptive types and the intended
974 usage of this option.
976 set auto-connect-native-target
978 Control whether GDB is allowed to automatically connect to the
979 native target for the run, attach, etc. commands when not connected
980 to any target yet. See also "target native" below.
982 set record btrace replay-memory-access (read-only|read-write)
983 show record btrace replay-memory-access
984 Control what memory accesses are allowed during replay.
986 maint set target-async (on|off)
987 maint show target-async
988 This controls whether GDB targets operate in synchronous or
989 asynchronous mode. Normally the default is asynchronous, if it is
990 available; but this can be changed to more easily debug problems
991 occurring only in synchronous mode.
993 set mi-async (on|off)
995 Control whether MI asynchronous mode is preferred. This supersedes
996 "set target-async" of previous GDB versions.
998 * "set target-async" is deprecated as a CLI option and is now an alias
999 for "set mi-async" (only puts MI into async mode).
1001 * Background execution commands (e.g., "c&", "s&", etc.) are now
1002 possible ``out of the box'' if the target supports them. Previously
1003 the user would need to explicitly enable the possibility with the
1004 "set target-async on" command.
1006 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
1008 ** New option --debug-format=option1[,option2,...] allows one to add
1009 additional text to each output. At present only timestamps
1010 are supported: --debug-format=timestamps.
1011 Timestamps can also be turned on with the
1012 "monitor set debug-format timestamps" command from GDB.
1014 * The 'record instruction-history' command now starts counting instructions
1015 at one. This also affects the instruction ranges reported by the
1016 'record function-call-history' command when given the /i modifier.
1018 * The command 'record function-call-history' supports a new modifier '/c' to
1019 indent the function names based on their call stack depth.
1020 The fields for the '/i' and '/l' modifier have been reordered.
1021 The source line range is now prefixed with 'at'.
1022 The instruction range is now prefixed with 'inst'.
1023 Both ranges are now printed as '<from>, <to>' to allow copy&paste to the
1024 "record instruction-history" and "list" commands.
1026 * The ranges given as arguments to the 'record function-call-history' and
1027 'record instruction-history' commands are now inclusive.
1029 * The btrace record target now supports the 'record goto' command.
1030 For locations inside the execution trace, the back trace is computed
1031 based on the information stored in the execution trace.
1033 * The btrace record target supports limited reverse execution and replay.
1034 The target does not record data and therefore does not allow reading
1035 memory or registers.
1037 * The "catch syscall" command now works on s390*-linux* targets.
1039 * The "compare-sections" command is no longer specific to target
1040 remote. It now works with all targets.
1042 * All native targets are now consistently called "native".
1043 Consequently, the "target child", "target GNU", "target djgpp",
1044 "target procfs" (Solaris/Irix/OSF/AIX) and "target darwin-child"
1045 commands have been replaced with "target native". The QNX/NTO port
1046 leaves the "procfs" target in place and adds a "native" target for
1047 consistency with other ports. The impact on users should be minimal
1048 as these commands previously either throwed an error, or were
1049 no-ops. The target's name is visible in the output of the following
1050 commands: "help target", "info target", "info files", "maint print
1053 * The "target native" command now connects to the native target. This
1054 can be used to launch native programs even when "set
1055 auto-connect-native-target" is set to off.
1057 * GDB now supports access to Intel MPX registers on GNU/Linux.
1059 * Support for Intel AVX-512 registers on GNU/Linux.
1060 Support displaying and modifying Intel AVX-512 registers
1061 $zmm0 - $zmm31 and $k0 - $k7 on GNU/Linux.
1063 * New remote packets
1065 qXfer:btrace:read's annex
1066 The qXfer:btrace:read packet supports a new annex 'delta' to read
1067 branch trace incrementally.
1071 ** Valid Python operations on gdb.Value objects representing
1072 structs/classes invoke the corresponding overloaded operators if
1074 ** New `Xmethods' feature in the Python API. Xmethods are
1075 additional methods or replacements for existing methods of a C++
1076 class. This feature is useful for those cases where a method
1077 defined in C++ source code could be inlined or optimized out by
1078 the compiler, making it unavailable to GDB.
1081 PowerPC64 GNU/Linux little-endian powerpc64le-*-linux*
1083 * The "dll-symbols" command, and its two aliases ("add-shared-symbol-files"
1084 and "assf"), have been deprecated. Use the "sharedlibrary" command, or
1085 its alias "share", instead.
1087 * The commands "set remotebaud" and "show remotebaud" are no longer
1088 supported. Use "set serial baud" and "show serial baud" (respectively)
1093 ** A new option "-gdb-set mi-async" replaces "-gdb-set
1094 target-async". The latter is left as a deprecated alias of the
1095 former for backward compatibility. If the target supports it,
1096 CLI background execution commands are now always possible by
1097 default, independently of whether the frontend stated a
1098 preference for asynchronous execution with "-gdb-set mi-async".
1099 Previously "-gdb-set target-async off" affected both MI execution
1100 commands and CLI execution commands.
1102 *** Changes in GDB 7.7
1104 * Improved support for process record-replay and reverse debugging on
1105 arm*-linux* targets. Support for thumb32 and syscall instruction
1106 recording has been added.
1108 * GDB now supports SystemTap SDT probes on AArch64 GNU/Linux.
1110 * GDB now supports Fission DWP file format version 2.
1111 http://gcc.gnu.org/wiki/DebugFission
1113 * New convenience function "$_isvoid", to check whether an expression
1114 is void. A void expression is an expression where the type of the
1115 result is "void". For example, some convenience variables may be
1116 "void" when evaluated (e.g., "$_exitcode" before the execution of
1117 the program being debugged; or an undefined convenience variable).
1118 Another example, when calling a function whose return type is
1121 * The "maintenance print objfiles" command now takes an optional regexp.
1123 * The "catch syscall" command now works on arm*-linux* targets.
1125 * GDB now consistently shows "<not saved>" when printing values of
1126 registers the debug info indicates have not been saved in the frame
1127 and there's nowhere to retrieve them from
1128 (callee-saved/call-clobbered registers):
1133 (gdb) info registers rax
1136 Before, the former would print "<optimized out>", and the latter
1137 "*value not available*".
1139 * New script contrib/gdb-add-index.sh for adding .gdb_index sections
1144 ** Frame filters and frame decorators have been added.
1145 ** Temporary breakpoints are now supported.
1146 ** Line tables representation has been added.
1147 ** New attribute 'parent_type' for gdb.Field objects.
1148 ** gdb.Field objects can be used as subscripts on gdb.Value objects.
1149 ** New attribute 'name' for gdb.Type objects.
1153 Nios II ELF nios2*-*-elf
1154 Nios II GNU/Linux nios2*-*-linux
1155 Texas Instruments MSP430 msp430*-*-elf
1157 * Removed native configurations
1159 Support for these a.out NetBSD and OpenBSD obsolete configurations has
1160 been removed. ELF variants of these configurations are kept supported.
1162 arm*-*-netbsd* but arm*-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
1163 i[34567]86-*-netbsd* but i[34567]86-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
1164 i[34567]86-*-openbsd[0-2].* but i[34567]86-*-openbsd* is kept supported.
1165 i[34567]86-*-openbsd3.[0-3]
1166 m68*-*-netbsd* but m68*-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
1167 sparc-*-netbsd* but sparc-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
1168 vax-*-netbsd* but vax-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
1172 Like "catch throw", but catches a re-thrown exception.
1173 maint check-psymtabs
1174 Renamed from old "maint check-symtabs".
1176 Perform consistency checks on symtabs.
1177 maint expand-symtabs
1178 Expand symtabs matching an optional regexp.
1181 Display the details of GDB configure-time options.
1183 maint set|show per-command
1184 maint set|show per-command space
1185 maint set|show per-command time
1186 maint set|show per-command symtab
1187 Enable display of per-command gdb resource usage.
1189 remove-symbol-file FILENAME
1190 remove-symbol-file -a ADDRESS
1191 Remove a symbol file added via add-symbol-file. The file to remove
1192 can be identified by its filename or by an address that lies within
1193 the boundaries of this symbol file in memory.
1196 info exceptions REGEXP
1197 Display the list of Ada exceptions defined in the program being
1198 debugged. If provided, only the exceptions whose names match REGEXP
1203 set debug symfile off|on
1205 Control display of debugging info regarding reading symbol files and
1206 symbol tables within those files
1208 set print raw frame-arguments
1209 show print raw frame-arguments
1210 Set/show whether to print frame arguments in raw mode,
1211 disregarding any defined pretty-printers.
1213 set remote trace-status-packet
1214 show remote trace-status-packet
1215 Set/show the use of remote protocol qTStatus packet.
1219 Control display of debugging messages related to Nios II targets.
1223 Control whether target-assisted range stepping is enabled.
1225 set startup-with-shell
1226 show startup-with-shell
1227 Specifies whether Unix child processes are started via a shell or
1232 Use the target memory cache for accesses to the code segment. This
1233 improves performance of remote debugging (particularly disassembly).
1235 * You can now use a literal value 'unlimited' for options that
1236 interpret 0 or -1 as meaning "unlimited". E.g., "set
1237 trace-buffer-size unlimited" is now an alias for "set
1238 trace-buffer-size -1" and "set height unlimited" is now an alias for
1241 * The "set debug symtab-create" debugging option of GDB has been changed to
1242 accept a verbosity level. 0 means "off", 1 provides basic debugging
1243 output, and values of 2 or greater provides more verbose output.
1245 * New command-line options
1247 Display the details of GDB configure-time options.
1249 * The command 'tsave' can now support new option '-ctf' to save trace
1250 buffer in Common Trace Format.
1252 * Newly installed $prefix/bin/gcore acts as a shell interface for the
1255 * GDB now implements the the C++ 'typeid' operator.
1257 * The new convenience variable $_exception holds the exception being
1258 thrown or caught at an exception-related catchpoint.
1260 * The exception-related catchpoints, like "catch throw", now accept a
1261 regular expression which can be used to filter exceptions by type.
1263 * The new convenience variable $_exitsignal is automatically set to
1264 the terminating signal number when the program being debugged dies
1265 due to an uncaught signal.
1269 ** All MI commands now accept an optional "--language" option.
1270 Support for this feature can be verified by using the "-list-features"
1271 command, which should contain "language-option".
1273 ** The new command -info-gdb-mi-command allows the user to determine
1274 whether a GDB/MI command is supported or not.
1276 ** The "^error" result record returned when trying to execute an undefined
1277 GDB/MI command now provides a variable named "code" whose content is the
1278 "undefined-command" error code. Support for this feature can be verified
1279 by using the "-list-features" command, which should contain
1280 "undefined-command-error-code".
1282 ** The -trace-save MI command can optionally save trace buffer in Common
1285 ** The new command -dprintf-insert sets a dynamic printf breakpoint.
1287 ** The command -data-list-register-values now accepts an optional
1288 "--skip-unavailable" option. When used, only the available registers
1291 ** The new command -trace-frame-collected dumps collected variables,
1292 computed expressions, tvars, memory and registers in a traceframe.
1294 ** The commands -stack-list-locals, -stack-list-arguments and
1295 -stack-list-variables now accept an option "--skip-unavailable".
1296 When used, only the available locals or arguments are displayed.
1298 ** The -exec-run command now accepts an optional "--start" option.
1299 When used, the command follows the same semantics as the "start"
1300 command, stopping the program's execution at the start of its
1301 main subprogram. Support for this feature can be verified using
1302 the "-list-features" command, which should contain
1303 "exec-run-start-option".
1305 ** The new commands -catch-assert and -catch-exceptions insert
1306 catchpoints stopping the program when Ada exceptions are raised.
1308 ** The new command -info-ada-exceptions provides the equivalent of
1309 the new "info exceptions" command.
1311 * New system-wide configuration scripts
1312 A GDB installation now provides scripts suitable for use as system-wide
1313 configuration scripts for the following systems:
1317 * GDB now supports target-assigned range stepping with remote targets.
1318 This improves the performance of stepping source lines by reducing
1319 the number of control packets from/to GDB. See "New remote packets"
1322 * GDB now understands the element 'tvar' in the XML traceframe info.
1323 It has the id of the collected trace state variables.
1325 * On S/390 targets that provide the transactional-execution feature,
1326 the program interruption transaction diagnostic block (TDB) is now
1327 represented as a number of additional "registers" in GDB.
1329 * New remote packets
1333 The vCont packet supports a new 'r' action, that tells the remote
1334 stub to step through an address range itself, without GDB
1335 involvemement at each single-step.
1337 qXfer:libraries-svr4:read's annex
1338 The previously unused annex of the qXfer:libraries-svr4:read packet
1339 is now used to support passing an argument list. The remote stub
1340 reports support for this argument list to GDB's qSupported query.
1341 The defined arguments are "start" and "prev", used to reduce work
1342 necessary for library list updating, resulting in significant
1345 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
1347 ** GDBserver now supports target-assisted range stepping. Currently
1348 enabled on x86/x86_64 GNU/Linux targets.
1350 ** GDBserver now adds element 'tvar' in the XML in the reply to
1351 'qXfer:traceframe-info:read'. It has the id of the collected
1352 trace state variables.
1354 ** GDBserver now supports hardware watchpoints on the MIPS GNU/Linux
1357 * New 'z' formatter for printing and examining memory, this displays the
1358 value as hexadecimal zero padded on the left to the size of the type.
1360 * GDB can now use Windows x64 unwinding data.
1362 * The "set remotebaud" command has been replaced by "set serial baud".
1363 Similarly, "show remotebaud" has been replaced by "show serial baud".
1364 The "set remotebaud" and "show remotebaud" commands are still available
1365 to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
1367 *** Changes in GDB 7.6
1369 * Target record has been renamed to record-full.
1370 Record/replay is now enabled with the "record full" command.
1371 This also affects settings that are associated with full record/replay
1372 that have been moved from "set/show record" to "set/show record full":
1374 set|show record full insn-number-max
1375 set|show record full stop-at-limit
1376 set|show record full memory-query
1378 * A new record target "record-btrace" has been added. The new target
1379 uses hardware support to record the control-flow of a process. It
1380 does not support replaying the execution, but it implements the
1381 below new commands for investigating the recorded execution log.
1382 This new recording method can be enabled using:
1386 The "record-btrace" target is only available on Intel Atom processors
1387 and requires a Linux kernel 2.6.32 or later.
1389 * Two new commands have been added for record/replay to give information
1390 about the recorded execution without having to replay the execution.
1391 The commands are only supported by "record btrace".
1393 record instruction-history prints the execution history at
1394 instruction granularity
1396 record function-call-history prints the execution history at
1397 function granularity
1399 * New native configurations
1401 ARM AArch64 GNU/Linux aarch64*-*-linux-gnu
1402 FreeBSD/powerpc powerpc*-*-freebsd
1403 x86_64/Cygwin x86_64-*-cygwin*
1404 Tilera TILE-Gx GNU/Linux tilegx*-*-linux-gnu
1408 ARM AArch64 aarch64*-*-elf
1409 ARM AArch64 GNU/Linux aarch64*-*-linux
1410 Lynx 178 PowerPC powerpc-*-lynx*178
1411 x86_64/Cygwin x86_64-*-cygwin*
1412 Tilera TILE-Gx GNU/Linux tilegx*-*-linux
1414 * If the configured location of system.gdbinit file (as given by the
1415 --with-system-gdbinit option at configure time) is in the
1416 data-directory (as specified by --with-gdb-datadir at configure
1417 time) or in one of its subdirectories, then GDB will look for the
1418 system-wide init file in the directory specified by the
1419 --data-directory command-line option.
1421 * New command line options:
1423 -nh Disables auto-loading of ~/.gdbinit, but still executes all the
1424 other initialization files, unlike -nx which disables all of them.
1426 * Removed command line options
1428 -epoch This was used by the gdb mode in Epoch, an ancient fork of
1431 * The 'ptype' and 'whatis' commands now accept an argument to control
1434 * 'info proc' now works on some core files.
1438 ** Vectors can be created with gdb.Type.vector.
1440 ** Python's atexit.register now works in GDB.
1442 ** Types can be pretty-printed via a Python API.
1444 ** Python 3 is now supported (in addition to Python 2.4 or later)
1446 ** New class gdb.Architecture exposes GDB's internal representation
1447 of architecture in the Python API.
1449 ** New method Frame.architecture returns the gdb.Architecture object
1450 corresponding to the frame's architecture.
1452 * New Python-based convenience functions:
1454 ** $_memeq(buf1, buf2, length)
1455 ** $_streq(str1, str2)
1457 ** $_regex(str, regex)
1459 * The 'cd' command now defaults to using '~' (the home directory) if not
1462 * The C++ ABI now defaults to the GNU v3 ABI. This has been the
1463 default for GCC since November 2000.
1465 * The command 'forward-search' can now be abbreviated as 'fo'.
1467 * The command 'info tracepoints' can now display 'installed on target'
1468 or 'not installed on target' for each non-pending location of tracepoint.
1470 * New configure options
1472 --enable-libmcheck/--disable-libmcheck
1473 By default, development versions are built with -lmcheck on hosts
1474 that support it, in order to help track memory corruption issues.
1475 Release versions, on the other hand, are built without -lmcheck
1476 by default. The --enable-libmcheck/--disable-libmcheck configure
1477 options allow the user to override that default.
1478 --with-babeltrace/--with-babeltrace-include/--with-babeltrace-lib
1479 This configure option allows the user to build GDB with
1480 libbabeltrace using which GDB can read Common Trace Format data.
1482 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
1485 Catch signals. This is similar to "handle", but allows commands and
1486 conditions to be attached.
1489 List the BFDs known to GDB.
1491 python-interactive [command]
1493 Start a Python interactive prompt, or evaluate the optional command
1494 and print the result of expressions.
1497 "py" is a new alias for "python".
1499 enable type-printer [name]...
1500 disable type-printer [name]...
1501 Enable or disable type printers.
1505 ** For the Renesas Super-H architecture, the "regs" command has been removed
1506 (has been deprecated in GDB 7.5), and "info all-registers" should be used
1511 set print type methods (on|off)
1512 show print type methods
1513 Control whether method declarations are displayed by "ptype".
1514 The default is to show them.
1516 set print type typedefs (on|off)
1517 show print type typedefs
1518 Control whether typedef definitions are displayed by "ptype".
1519 The default is to show them.
1521 set filename-display basename|relative|absolute
1522 show filename-display
1523 Control the way in which filenames is displayed.
1524 The default is "relative", which preserves previous behavior.
1526 set trace-buffer-size
1527 show trace-buffer-size
1528 Request target to change the size of trace buffer.
1530 set remote trace-buffer-size-packet auto|on|off
1531 show remote trace-buffer-size-packet
1532 Control the use of the remote protocol `QTBuffer:size' packet.
1536 Control display of debugging messages related to ARM AArch64.
1539 set debug coff-pe-read
1540 show debug coff-pe-read
1541 Control display of debugging messages related to reading of COFF/PE
1546 Control display of debugging messages related to Mach-O symbols
1549 set debug notification
1550 show debug notification
1551 Control display of debugging info for async remote notification.
1555 ** Command parameter changes are now notified using new async record
1556 "=cmd-param-changed".
1557 ** Trace frame changes caused by command "tfind" are now notified using
1558 new async record "=traceframe-changed".
1559 ** The creation, deletion and modification of trace state variables
1560 are now notified using new async records "=tsv-created",
1561 "=tsv-deleted" and "=tsv-modified".
1562 ** The start and stop of process record are now notified using new
1563 async record "=record-started" and "=record-stopped".
1564 ** Memory changes are now notified using new async record
1566 ** The data-disassemble command response will include a "fullname" field
1567 containing the absolute file name when source has been requested.
1568 ** New optional parameter COUNT added to the "-data-write-memory-bytes"
1569 command, to allow pattern filling of memory areas.
1570 ** New commands "-catch-load"/"-catch-unload" added for intercepting
1571 library load/unload events.
1572 ** The response to breakpoint commands and breakpoint async records
1573 includes an "installed" field containing a boolean state about each
1574 non-pending tracepoint location is whether installed on target or not.
1575 ** Output of the "-trace-status" command includes a "trace-file" field
1576 containing the name of the trace file being examined. This field is
1577 optional, and only present when examining a trace file.
1578 ** The "fullname" field is now always present along with the "file" field,
1579 even if the file cannot be found by GDB.
1581 * GDB now supports the "mini debuginfo" section, .gnu_debugdata.
1582 You must have the LZMA library available when configuring GDB for this
1583 feature to be enabled. For more information, see:
1584 http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Features/MiniDebugInfo
1586 * New remote packets
1589 Set the size of trace buffer. The remote stub reports support for this
1590 packet to gdb's qSupported query.
1593 Enable Branch Trace Store (BTS)-based branch tracing for the current
1594 thread. The remote stub reports support for this packet to gdb's
1598 Disable branch tracing for the current thread. The remote stub reports
1599 support for this packet to gdb's qSupported query.
1602 Read the traced branches for the current thread. The remote stub
1603 reports support for this packet to gdb's qSupported query.
1605 *** Changes in GDB 7.5
1607 * GDB now supports x32 ABI. Visit <http://sites.google.com/site/x32abi/>
1608 for more x32 ABI info.
1610 * GDB now supports access to MIPS DSP registers on Linux targets.
1612 * GDB now supports debugging microMIPS binaries.
1614 * The "info os" command on GNU/Linux can now display information on
1615 several new classes of objects managed by the operating system:
1616 "info os procgroups" lists process groups
1617 "info os files" lists file descriptors
1618 "info os sockets" lists internet-domain sockets
1619 "info os shm" lists shared-memory regions
1620 "info os semaphores" lists semaphores
1621 "info os msg" lists message queues
1622 "info os modules" lists loaded kernel modules
1624 * GDB now has support for SDT (Static Defined Tracing) probes. Currently,
1625 the only implemented backend is for SystemTap probes (<sys/sdt.h>). You
1626 can set a breakpoint using the new "-probe, "-pstap" or "-probe-stap"
1627 options and inspect the probe arguments using the new $_probe_arg family
1628 of convenience variables. You can obtain more information about SystemTap
1629 in <http://sourceware.org/systemtap/>.
1631 * GDB now supports reversible debugging on ARM, it allows you to
1632 debug basic ARM and THUMB instructions, and provides
1633 record/replay support.
1635 * The option "symbol-reloading" has been deleted as it is no longer used.
1639 ** GDB commands implemented in Python can now be put in command class
1642 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" is now deleted.
1644 ** A new class, gdb.printing.FlagEnumerationPrinter, can be used to
1645 apply "flag enum"-style pretty-printing to any enum.
1647 ** gdb.lookup_symbol can now work when there is no current frame.
1649 ** gdb.Symbol now has a 'line' attribute, holding the line number in
1650 the source at which the symbol was defined.
1652 ** gdb.Symbol now has the new attribute 'needs_frame' and the new
1653 method 'value'. The former indicates whether the symbol needs a
1654 frame in order to compute its value, and the latter computes the
1657 ** A new method 'referenced_value' on gdb.Value objects which can
1658 dereference pointer as well as C++ reference values.
1660 ** New methods 'global_block' and 'static_block' on gdb.Symtab objects
1661 which return the global and static blocks (as gdb.Block objects),
1662 of the underlying symbol table, respectively.
1664 ** New function gdb.find_pc_line which returns the gdb.Symtab_and_line
1665 object associated with a PC value.
1667 ** gdb.Symtab_and_line has new attribute 'last' which holds the end
1668 of the address range occupied by code for the current source line.
1670 * Go language support.
1671 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the Go programming
1674 * GDBserver now supports stdio connections.
1675 E.g. (gdb) target remote | ssh myhost gdbserver - hello
1677 * The binary "gdbtui" can no longer be built or installed.
1678 Use "gdb -tui" instead.
1680 * GDB will now print "flag" enums specially. A flag enum is one where
1681 all the enumerator values have no bits in common when pairwise
1682 "and"ed. When printing a value whose type is a flag enum, GDB will
1683 show all the constants, e.g., for enum E { ONE = 1, TWO = 2}:
1684 (gdb) print (enum E) 3
1687 * The filename part of a linespec will now match trailing components
1688 of a source file name. For example, "break gcc/expr.c:1000" will
1689 now set a breakpoint in build/gcc/expr.c, but not
1690 build/libcpp/expr.c.
1692 * The "info proc" and "generate-core-file" commands will now also
1693 work on remote targets connected to GDBserver on Linux.
1695 * The command "info catch" has been removed. It has been disabled
1696 since December 2007.
1698 * The "catch exception" and "catch assert" commands now accept
1699 a condition at the end of the command, much like the "break"
1700 command does. For instance:
1702 (gdb) catch exception Constraint_Error if Barrier = True
1704 Previously, it was possible to add a condition to such catchpoints,
1705 but it had to be done as a second step, after the catchpoint had been
1706 created, using the "condition" command.
1708 * The "info static-tracepoint-marker" command will now also work on
1709 native Linux targets with in-process agent.
1711 * GDB can now set breakpoints on inlined functions.
1713 * The .gdb_index section has been updated to include symbols for
1714 inlined functions. GDB will ignore older .gdb_index sections by
1715 default, which could cause symbol files to be loaded more slowly
1716 until their .gdb_index sections can be recreated. The new command
1717 "set use-deprecated-index-sections on" will cause GDB to use any older
1718 .gdb_index sections it finds. This will restore performance, but the
1719 ability to set breakpoints on inlined functions will be lost in symbol
1720 files with older .gdb_index sections.
1722 The .gdb_index section has also been updated to record more information
1723 about each symbol. This speeds up the "info variables", "info functions"
1724 and "info types" commands when used with programs having the .gdb_index
1725 section, as well as speeding up debugging with shared libraries using
1726 the .gdb_index section.
1728 * Ada support for GDB/MI Variable Objects has been added.
1730 * GDB can now support 'breakpoint always-inserted mode' in 'record'
1735 ** New command -info-os is the MI equivalent of "info os".
1737 ** Output logs ("set logging" and related) now include MI output.
1741 ** "set use-deprecated-index-sections on|off"
1742 "show use-deprecated-index-sections on|off"
1743 Controls the use of deprecated .gdb_index sections.
1745 ** "catch load" and "catch unload" can be used to stop when a shared
1746 library is loaded or unloaded, respectively.
1748 ** "enable count" can be used to auto-disable a breakpoint after
1751 ** "info vtbl" can be used to show the virtual method tables for
1752 C++ and Java objects.
1754 ** "explore" and its sub commands "explore value" and "explore type"
1755 can be used to recursively explore values and types of
1756 expressions. These commands are available only if GDB is
1757 configured with '--with-python'.
1759 ** "info auto-load" shows status of all kinds of auto-loaded files,
1760 "info auto-load gdb-scripts" shows status of auto-loading GDB canned
1761 sequences of commands files, "info auto-load python-scripts"
1762 shows status of auto-loading Python script files,
1763 "info auto-load local-gdbinit" shows status of loading init file
1764 (.gdbinit) from current directory and "info auto-load libthread-db" shows
1765 status of inferior specific thread debugging shared library loading.
1767 ** "info auto-load-scripts", "set auto-load-scripts on|off"
1768 and "show auto-load-scripts" commands have been deprecated, use their
1769 "info auto-load python-scripts", "set auto-load python-scripts on|off"
1770 and "show auto-load python-scripts" counterparts instead.
1772 ** "dprintf location,format,args..." creates a dynamic printf, which
1773 is basically a breakpoint that does a printf and immediately
1774 resumes your program's execution, so it is like a printf that you
1775 can insert dynamically at runtime instead of at compiletime.
1777 ** "set print symbol"
1779 Controls whether GDB attempts to display the symbol, if any,
1780 corresponding to addresses it prints. This defaults to "on", but
1781 you can set it to "off" to restore GDB's previous behavior.
1783 * Deprecated commands
1785 ** For the Renesas Super-H architecture, the "regs" command has been
1786 deprecated, and "info all-registers" should be used instead.
1790 Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
1791 HP OpenVMS ia64 ia64-hp-openvms*
1793 * GDBserver supports evaluation of breakpoint conditions. When
1794 support is advertised by GDBserver, GDB may be told to send the
1795 breakpoint conditions in bytecode form to GDBserver. GDBserver
1796 will only report the breakpoint trigger to GDB when its condition
1801 set mips compression
1802 show mips compression
1803 Select the compressed ISA encoding used in functions that have no symbol
1804 information available. The encoding can be set to either of:
1807 and is updated automatically from ELF file flags if available.
1809 set breakpoint condition-evaluation
1810 show breakpoint condition-evaluation
1811 Control whether breakpoint conditions are evaluated by GDB ("host") or by
1812 GDBserver ("target"). Default option "auto" chooses the most efficient
1814 This option can improve debugger efficiency depending on the speed of the
1818 Disable auto-loading globally.
1821 Show auto-loading setting of all kinds of auto-loaded files.
1823 set auto-load gdb-scripts on|off
1824 show auto-load gdb-scripts
1825 Control auto-loading of GDB canned sequences of commands files.
1827 set auto-load python-scripts on|off
1828 show auto-load python-scripts
1829 Control auto-loading of Python script files.
1831 set auto-load local-gdbinit on|off
1832 show auto-load local-gdbinit
1833 Control loading of init file (.gdbinit) from current directory.
1835 set auto-load libthread-db on|off
1836 show auto-load libthread-db
1837 Control auto-loading of inferior specific thread debugging shared library.
1839 set auto-load scripts-directory <dir1>[:<dir2>...]
1840 show auto-load scripts-directory
1841 Set a list of directories from which to load auto-loaded scripts.
1842 Automatically loaded Python scripts and GDB scripts are located in one
1843 of the directories listed by this option.
1844 The delimiter (':' above) may differ according to the host platform.
1846 set auto-load safe-path <dir1>[:<dir2>...]
1847 show auto-load safe-path
1848 Set a list of directories from which it is safe to auto-load files.
1849 The delimiter (':' above) may differ according to the host platform.
1851 set debug auto-load on|off
1852 show debug auto-load
1853 Control display of debugging info for auto-loading the files above.
1855 set dprintf-style gdb|call|agent
1857 Control the way in which a dynamic printf is performed; "gdb"
1858 requests a GDB printf command, while "call" causes dprintf to call a
1859 function in the inferior. "agent" requests that the target agent
1860 (such as GDBserver) do the printing.
1862 set dprintf-function <expr>
1863 show dprintf-function
1864 set dprintf-channel <expr>
1865 show dprintf-channel
1866 Set the function and optional first argument to the call when using
1867 the "call" style of dynamic printf.
1869 set disconnected-dprintf on|off
1870 show disconnected-dprintf
1871 Control whether agent-style dynamic printfs continue to be in effect
1872 after GDB disconnects.
1874 * New configure options
1876 --with-auto-load-dir
1877 Configure default value for the 'set auto-load scripts-directory'
1878 setting above. It defaults to '$debugdir:$datadir/auto-load',
1879 $debugdir representing global debugging info directories (available
1880 via 'show debug-file-directory') and $datadir representing GDB's data
1881 directory (available via 'show data-directory').
1883 --with-auto-load-safe-path
1884 Configure default value for the 'set auto-load safe-path' setting
1885 above. It defaults to the --with-auto-load-dir setting.
1887 --without-auto-load-safe-path
1888 Set 'set auto-load safe-path' to '/', effectively disabling this
1891 * New remote packets
1893 z0/z1 conditional breakpoints extension
1895 The z0/z1 breakpoint insertion packets have been extended to carry
1896 a list of conditional expressions over to the remote stub depending on the
1897 condition evaluation mode. The use of this extension can be controlled
1898 via the "set remote conditional-breakpoints-packet" command.
1902 Specify the signals which the remote stub may pass to the debugged
1903 program without GDB involvement.
1905 * New command line options
1907 --init-command=FILE, -ix Like --command, -x but execute it
1908 before loading inferior.
1909 --init-eval-command=COMMAND, -iex Like --eval-command=COMMAND, -ex but
1910 execute it before loading inferior.
1912 *** Changes in GDB 7.4
1914 * GDB now handles ambiguous linespecs more consistently; the existing
1915 FILE:LINE support has been expanded to other types of linespecs. A
1916 breakpoint will now be set on all matching locations in all
1917 inferiors, and locations will be added or removed according to
1920 * GDB now allows you to skip uninteresting functions and files when
1921 stepping with the "skip function" and "skip file" commands.
1923 * GDB has two new commands: "set remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit"
1924 and "show remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit". These allows to
1925 set or show the maximum length limit (in bytes) of a remote
1926 target hardware watchpoint.
1928 This allows e.g. to use "unlimited" hardware watchpoints with the
1929 gdbserver integrated in Valgrind version >= 3.7.0. Such Valgrind
1930 watchpoints are slower than real hardware watchpoints but are
1931 significantly faster than gdb software watchpoints.
1935 ** The register_pretty_printer function in module gdb.printing now takes
1936 an optional `replace' argument. If True, the new printer replaces any
1939 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" command has been
1940 deprecated and will be deleted in GDB 7.5.
1941 A new command: "set python print-stack none|full|message" has
1942 replaced it. Additionally, the default for "print-stack" is
1943 now "message", which just prints the error message without
1946 ** A prompt substitution hook (prompt_hook) is now available to the
1949 ** A new Python module, gdb.prompt has been added to the GDB Python
1950 modules library. This module provides functionality for
1951 escape sequences in prompts (used by set/show
1952 extended-prompt). These escape sequences are replaced by their
1953 corresponding value.
1955 ** Python commands and convenience-functions located in
1956 'data-directory'/python/gdb/command and
1957 'data-directory'/python/gdb/function are now automatically loaded
1960 ** Blocks now provide four new attributes. global_block and
1961 static_block will return the global and static blocks
1962 respectively. is_static and is_global are boolean attributes
1963 that indicate if the block is one of those two types.
1965 ** Symbols now provide the "type" attribute, the type of the symbol.
1967 ** The "gdb.breakpoint" function has been deprecated in favor of
1970 ** A new class "gdb.FinishBreakpoint" is provided to catch the return
1971 of a function. This class is based on the "finish" command
1972 available in the CLI.
1974 ** Type objects for struct and union types now allow access to
1975 the fields using standard Python dictionary (mapping) methods.
1976 For example, "some_type['myfield']" now works, as does
1977 "some_type.items()".
1979 ** A new event "gdb.new_objfile" has been added, triggered by loading a
1982 ** A new function, "deep_items" has been added to the gdb.types
1983 module in the GDB Python modules library. This function returns
1984 an iterator over the fields of a struct or union type. Unlike
1985 the standard Python "iteritems" method, it will recursively traverse
1986 any anonymous fields.
1990 ** "*stopped" events can report several new "reason"s, such as
1993 ** Breakpoint changes are now notified using new async records, like
1994 "=breakpoint-modified".
1996 ** New command -ada-task-info.
1998 * libthread-db-search-path now supports two special values: $sdir and $pdir.
1999 $sdir specifies the default system locations of shared libraries.
2000 $pdir specifies the directory where the libpthread used by the application
2003 GDB no longer looks in $sdir and $pdir after it has searched the directories
2004 mentioned in libthread-db-search-path. If you want to search those
2005 directories, they must be specified in libthread-db-search-path.
2006 The default value of libthread-db-search-path on GNU/Linux and Solaris
2007 systems is now "$sdir:$pdir".
2009 $pdir is not supported by gdbserver, it is currently ignored.
2010 $sdir is supported by gdbserver.
2012 * New configure option --with-iconv-bin.
2013 When using the internationalization support like the one in the GNU C
2014 library, GDB will invoke the "iconv" program to get a list of supported
2015 character sets. If this program lives in a non-standard location, one can
2016 use this option to specify where to find it.
2018 * When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
2019 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports masked hardware
2020 watchpoints, which specify a mask in addition to an address to watch.
2021 The mask specifies that some bits of an address (the bits which are
2022 reset in the mask) should be ignored when matching the address accessed
2023 by the inferior against the watchpoint address. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
2024 section in the user manual for more details.
2026 * The new option --once causes GDBserver to stop listening for connections once
2027 the first connection is made. The listening port used by GDBserver will
2028 become available after that.
2030 * New commands "info macros" and "alias" have been added.
2032 * New function parameters suffix @entry specifies value of function parameter
2033 at the time the function got called. Entry values are available only since
2039 "!" is now an alias of the "shell" command.
2040 Note that no space is needed between "!" and SHELL COMMAND.
2044 watch EXPRESSION mask MASK_VALUE
2045 The watch command now supports the mask argument which allows creation
2046 of masked watchpoints, if the current architecture supports this feature.
2048 info auto-load-scripts [REGEXP]
2049 This command was formerly named "maintenance print section-scripts".
2050 It is now generally useful and is no longer a maintenance-only command.
2052 info macro [-all] [--] MACRO
2053 The info macro command has new options `-all' and `--'. The first for
2054 printing all definitions of a macro. The second for explicitly specifying
2055 the end of arguments and the beginning of the macro name in case the macro
2056 name starts with a hyphen.
2058 collect[/s] EXPRESSIONS
2059 The tracepoint collect command now takes an optional modifier "/s"
2060 that directs it to dereference pointer-to-character types and
2061 collect the bytes of memory up to a zero byte. The behavior is
2062 similar to what you see when you use the regular print command on a
2063 string. An optional integer following the "/s" sets a bound on the
2064 number of bytes that will be collected.
2067 The trace start command now interprets any supplied arguments as a
2068 note to be recorded with the trace run, with an effect similar to
2069 setting the variable trace-notes.
2072 The trace stop command now interprets any arguments as a note to be
2073 mentioned along with the tstatus report that the trace was stopped
2074 with a command. The effect is similar to setting the variable
2077 * Tracepoints can now be enabled and disabled at any time after a trace
2078 experiment has been started using the standard "enable" and "disable"
2079 commands. It is now possible to start a trace experiment with no enabled
2080 tracepoints; GDB will display a warning, but will allow the experiment to
2081 begin, assuming that tracepoints will be enabled as needed while the trace
2084 * Fast tracepoints on 32-bit x86-architectures can now be placed at
2085 locations with 4-byte instructions, when they were previously
2086 limited to locations with instructions of 5 bytes or longer.
2090 set debug dwarf2-read
2091 show debug dwarf2-read
2092 Turns on or off display of debugging messages related to reading
2093 DWARF debug info. The default is off.
2095 set debug symtab-create
2096 show debug symtab-create
2097 Turns on or off display of debugging messages related to symbol table
2098 creation. The default is off.
2101 show extended-prompt
2102 Set the GDB prompt, and allow escape sequences to be inserted to
2103 display miscellaneous information (see 'help set extended-prompt'
2104 for the list of sequences). This prompt (and any information
2105 accessed through the escape sequences) is updated every time the
2106 prompt is displayed.
2108 set print entry-values (both|compact|default|if-needed|no|only|preferred)
2109 show print entry-values
2110 Set printing of frame argument values at function entry. In some cases
2111 GDB can determine the value of function argument which was passed by the
2112 function caller, even if the value was modified inside the called function.
2114 set debug entry-values
2115 show debug entry-values
2116 Control display of debugging info for determining frame argument values at
2117 function entry and virtual tail call frames.
2119 set basenames-may-differ
2120 show basenames-may-differ
2121 Set whether a source file may have multiple base names.
2122 (A "base name" is the name of a file with the directory part removed.
2123 Example: The base name of "/home/user/hello.c" is "hello.c".)
2124 If set, GDB will canonicalize file names (e.g., expand symlinks)
2125 before comparing them. Canonicalization is an expensive operation,
2126 but it allows the same file be known by more than one base name.
2127 If not set (the default), all source files are assumed to have just
2128 one base name, and gdb will do file name comparisons more efficiently.
2134 Set a user name and notes for the current and any future trace runs.
2135 This is useful for long-running and/or disconnected traces, to
2136 inform others (or yourself) as to who is running the trace, supply
2137 contact information, or otherwise explain what is going on.
2139 set trace-stop-notes
2140 show trace-stop-notes
2141 Set a note attached to the trace run, that is displayed when the
2142 trace has been stopped by a tstop command. This is useful for
2143 instance as an explanation, if you are stopping a trace run that was
2144 started by someone else.
2146 * New remote packets
2150 Dynamically enable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
2154 Dynamically disable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
2158 Set the user and notes of the trace run.
2162 Query the current status of a tracepoint.
2166 Query the minimum length of instruction at which a fast tracepoint may
2169 * Dcache size (number of lines) and line-size are now runtime-configurable
2170 via "set dcache line" and "set dcache line-size" commands.
2174 Texas Instruments TMS320C6x tic6x-*-*
2178 Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
2180 *** Changes in GDB 7.3.1
2182 * The build failure for NetBSD and OpenBSD targets have now been fixed.
2184 *** Changes in GDB 7.3
2186 * GDB has a new command: "thread find [REGEXP]".
2187 It finds the thread id whose name, target id, or thread extra info
2188 matches the given regular expression.
2190 * The "catch syscall" command now works on mips*-linux* targets.
2192 * The -data-disassemble MI command now supports modes 2 and 3 for
2193 dumping the instruction opcodes.
2195 * New command line options
2197 -data-directory DIR Specify DIR as the "data-directory".
2198 This is mostly for testing purposes.
2200 * The "maint set python auto-load on|off" command has been renamed to
2201 "set auto-load-scripts on|off".
2203 * GDB has a new command: "set directories".
2204 It is like the "dir" command except that it replaces the
2205 source path list instead of augmenting it.
2207 * GDB now understands thread names.
2209 On GNU/Linux, "info threads" will display the thread name as set by
2210 prctl or pthread_setname_np.
2212 There is also a new command, "thread name", which can be used to
2213 assign a name internally for GDB to display.
2216 Initial support for the OpenCL C language (http://www.khronos.org/opencl)
2217 has been integrated into GDB.
2221 ** The function gdb.Write now accepts an optional keyword 'stream'.
2222 This keyword, when provided, will direct the output to either
2223 stdout, stderr, or GDB's logging output.
2225 ** Parameters can now be be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
2226 you may implement the get_set_doc and get_show_doc functions.
2227 This improves how Parameter set/show documentation is processed
2228 and allows for more dynamic content.
2230 ** Symbols, Symbol Table, Symbol Table and Line, Object Files,
2231 Inferior, Inferior Thread, Blocks, and Block Iterator APIs now
2232 have an is_valid method.
2234 ** Breakpoints can now be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
2235 you may implement a 'stop' function that is executed each time
2236 the inferior reaches that breakpoint.
2238 ** New function gdb.lookup_global_symbol looks up a global symbol.
2240 ** GDB values in Python are now callable if the value represents a
2241 function. For example, if 'some_value' represents a function that
2242 takes two integer parameters and returns a value, you can call
2243 that function like so:
2245 result = some_value (10,20)
2247 ** Module gdb.types has been added.
2248 It contains a collection of utilities for working with gdb.Types objects:
2249 get_basic_type, has_field, make_enum_dict.
2251 ** Module gdb.printing has been added.
2252 It contains utilities for writing and registering pretty-printers.
2253 New classes: PrettyPrinter, SubPrettyPrinter,
2254 RegexpCollectionPrettyPrinter.
2255 New function: register_pretty_printer.
2257 ** New commands "info pretty-printers", "enable pretty-printer" and
2258 "disable pretty-printer" have been added.
2260 ** gdb.parameter("directories") is now available.
2262 ** New function gdb.newest_frame returns the newest frame in the
2265 ** The gdb.InferiorThread class has a new "name" attribute. This
2266 holds the thread's name.
2268 ** Python Support for Inferior events.
2269 Python scripts can add observers to be notified of events
2270 occurring in the process being debugged.
2271 The following events are currently supported:
2272 - gdb.events.cont Continue event.
2273 - gdb.events.exited Inferior exited event.
2274 - gdb.events.stop Signal received, and Breakpoint hit events.
2278 ** GDB now puts template parameters in scope when debugging in an
2279 instantiation. For example, if you have:
2281 template<int X> int func (void) { return X; }
2283 then if you step into func<5>, "print X" will show "5". This
2284 feature requires proper debuginfo support from the compiler; it
2285 was added to GCC 4.5.
2287 ** The motion commands "next", "finish", "until", and "advance" now
2288 work better when exceptions are thrown. In particular, GDB will
2289 no longer lose control of the inferior; instead, the GDB will
2290 stop the inferior at the point at which the exception is caught.
2291 This functionality requires a change in the exception handling
2292 code that was introduced in GCC 4.5.
2294 * GDB now follows GCC's rules on accessing volatile objects when
2295 reading or writing target state during expression evaluation.
2296 One notable difference to prior behavior is that "print x = 0"
2297 no longer generates a read of x; the value of the assignment is
2298 now always taken directly from the value being assigned.
2300 * GDB now has some support for using labels in the program's source in
2301 linespecs. For instance, you can use "advance label" to continue
2302 execution to a label.
2304 * GDB now has support for reading and writing a new .gdb_index
2305 section. This section holds a fast index of DWARF debugging
2306 information and can be used to greatly speed up GDB startup and
2307 operation. See the documentation for `save gdb-index' for details.
2309 * The "watch" command now accepts an optional "-location" argument.
2310 When used, this causes GDB to watch the memory referred to by the
2311 expression. Such a watchpoint is never deleted due to it going out
2314 * GDB now supports thread debugging of core dumps on GNU/Linux.
2316 GDB now activates thread debugging using the libthread_db library
2317 when debugging GNU/Linux core dumps, similarly to when debugging
2318 live processes. As a result, when debugging a core dump file, GDB
2319 is now able to display pthread_t ids of threads. For example, "info
2320 threads" shows the same output as when debugging the process when it
2321 was live. In earlier releases, you'd see something like this:
2324 * 1 LWP 6780 main () at main.c:10
2326 While now you see this:
2329 * 1 Thread 0x7f0f5712a700 (LWP 6780) main () at main.c:10
2331 It is also now possible to inspect TLS variables when debugging core
2334 When debugging a core dump generated on a machine other than the one
2335 used to run GDB, you may need to point GDB at the correct
2336 libthread_db library with the "set libthread-db-search-path"
2337 command. See the user manual for more details on this command.
2339 * When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
2340 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports ranged breakpoints,
2341 which stop execution of the inferior whenever it executes an instruction
2342 at any address within the specified range. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
2343 section in the user manual for more details.
2345 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
2347 ** GDBserver is now supported on PowerPC LynxOS (versions 4.x and 5.x),
2348 and i686 LynxOS (version 5.x).
2350 ** GDBserver is now supported on Blackfin Linux.
2352 * New native configurations
2354 ia64 HP-UX ia64-*-hpux*
2358 Analog Devices, Inc. Blackfin Processor bfin-*
2360 * Ada task switching is now supported on sparc-elf targets when
2361 debugging a program using the Ravenscar Profile. For more information,
2362 see the "Tasking Support when using the Ravenscar Profile" section
2363 in the GDB user manual.
2365 * Guile support was removed.
2367 * New features in the GNU simulator
2369 ** The --map-info flag lists all known core mappings.
2371 ** CFI flashes may be simulated via the "cfi" device.
2373 *** Changes in GDB 7.2
2375 * Shared library support for remote targets by default
2377 When GDB is configured for a generic, non-OS specific target, like
2378 for example, --target=arm-eabi or one of the many *-*-elf targets,
2379 GDB now queries remote stubs for loaded shared libraries using the
2380 `qXfer:libraries:read' packet. Previously, shared library support
2381 was always disabled for such configurations.
2385 ** Argument Dependent Lookup (ADL)
2387 In C++ ADL lookup directs function search to the namespaces of its
2388 arguments even if the namespace has not been imported.
2398 Here the compiler will search for `foo' in the namespace of 'b'
2399 and find A::foo. GDB now supports this. This construct is commonly
2400 used in the Standard Template Library for operators.
2402 ** Improved User Defined Operator Support
2404 In addition to member operators, GDB now supports lookup of operators
2405 defined in a namespace and imported with a `using' directive, operators
2406 defined in the global scope, operators imported implicitly from an
2407 anonymous namespace, and the ADL operators mentioned in the previous
2409 GDB now also supports proper overload resolution for all the previously
2410 mentioned flavors of operators.
2412 ** static const class members
2414 Printing of static const class members that are initialized in the
2415 class definition has been fixed.
2417 * Windows Thread Information Block access.
2419 On Windows targets, GDB now supports displaying the Windows Thread
2420 Information Block (TIB) structure. This structure is visible either
2421 by using the new command `info w32 thread-information-block' or, by
2422 dereferencing the new convenience variable named `$_tlb', a
2423 thread-specific pointer to the TIB. This feature is also supported
2424 when remote debugging using GDBserver.
2426 * Static tracepoints
2428 Static tracepoints are calls in the user program into a tracing
2429 library. One such library is a port of the LTTng kernel tracer to
2430 userspace --- UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer, http://lttng.org/ust).
2431 When debugging with GDBserver, GDB now supports combining the GDB
2432 tracepoint machinery with such libraries. For example: the user can
2433 use GDB to probe a static tracepoint marker (a call from the user
2434 program into the tracing library) with the new "strace" command (see
2435 "New commands" below). This creates a "static tracepoint" in the
2436 breakpoint list, that can be manipulated with the same feature set
2437 as fast and regular tracepoints. E.g., collect registers, local and
2438 global variables, collect trace state variables, and define
2439 tracepoint conditions. In addition, the user can collect extra
2440 static tracepoint marker specific data, by collecting the new
2441 $_sdata internal variable. When analyzing the trace buffer, you can
2442 inspect $_sdata like any other variable available to GDB. For more
2443 information, see the "Tracepoints" chapter in GDB user manual. New
2444 remote packets have been defined to support static tracepoints, see
2445 the "New remote packets" section below.
2447 * Better reconstruction of tracepoints after disconnected tracing
2449 GDB will attempt to download the original source form of tracepoint
2450 definitions when starting a trace run, and then will upload these
2451 upon reconnection to the target, resulting in a more accurate
2452 reconstruction of the tracepoints that are in use on the target.
2456 You can now exercise direct control over the ways that GDB can
2457 affect your program. For instance, you can disallow the setting of
2458 breakpoints, so that the program can run continuously (assuming
2459 non-stop mode). In addition, the "observer" variable is available
2460 to switch all of the different controls; in observer mode, GDB
2461 cannot affect the target's behavior at all, which is useful for
2462 tasks like diagnosing live systems in the field.
2464 * The new convenience variable $_thread holds the number of the
2467 * New remote packets
2471 Return the address of the Windows Thread Information Block of a given thread.
2475 In response to several of the tracepoint packets, the target may now
2476 also respond with a number of intermediate `qRelocInsn' request
2477 packets before the final result packet, to have GDB handle
2478 relocating an instruction to execute at a different address. This
2479 is particularly useful for stubs that support fast tracepoints. GDB
2480 reports support for this feature in the qSupported packet.
2484 List static tracepoint markers in the target program.
2488 List static tracepoint markers at a given address in the target
2491 qXfer:statictrace:read
2493 Read the static trace data collected (by a `collect $_sdata'
2494 tracepoint action). The remote stub reports support for this packet
2495 to gdb's qSupported query.
2499 Send the current settings of GDB's permission flags.
2503 Send part of the source (textual) form of a tracepoint definition,
2504 which includes location, conditional, and action list.
2506 * The source command now accepts a -s option to force searching for the
2507 script in the source search path even if the script name specifies
2510 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
2512 - GDBserver now support tracepoints (including fast tracepoints, and
2513 static tracepoints). The feature is currently supported by the
2514 i386-linux and amd64-linux builds. See the "Tracepoints support
2515 in gdbserver" section in the manual for more information.
2517 GDBserver JIT compiles the tracepoint's conditional agent
2518 expression bytecode into native code whenever possible for low
2519 overhead dynamic tracepoints conditionals. For such tracepoints,
2520 an expression that examines program state is evaluated when the
2521 tracepoint is reached, in order to determine whether to capture
2522 trace data. If the condition is simple and false, processing the
2523 tracepoint finishes very quickly and no data is gathered.
2525 GDBserver interfaces with the UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer) library
2526 for static tracepoints support.
2528 - GDBserver now supports x86_64 Windows 64-bit debugging.
2530 * GDB now sends xmlRegisters= in qSupported packet to indicate that
2531 it understands register description.
2533 * The --batch flag now disables pagination and queries.
2535 * X86 general purpose registers
2537 GDB now supports reading/writing byte, word and double-word x86
2538 general purpose registers directly. This means you can use, say,
2539 $ah or $ax to refer, respectively, to the byte register AH and
2540 16-bit word register AX that are actually portions of the 32-bit
2541 register EAX or 64-bit register RAX.
2543 * The `commands' command now accepts a range of breakpoints to modify.
2544 A plain `commands' following a command that creates multiple
2545 breakpoints affects all the breakpoints set by that command. This
2546 applies to breakpoints set by `rbreak', and also applies when a
2547 single `break' command creates multiple breakpoints (e.g.,
2548 breakpoints on overloaded c++ functions).
2550 * The `rbreak' command now accepts a filename specification as part of
2551 its argument, limiting the functions selected by the regex to those
2552 in the specified file.
2554 * Support for remote debugging Windows and SymbianOS shared libraries
2555 from Unix hosts has been improved. Non Windows GDB builds now can
2556 understand target reported file names that follow MS-DOS based file
2557 system semantics, such as file names that include drive letters and
2558 use the backslash character as directory separator. This makes it
2559 possible to transparently use the "set sysroot" and "set
2560 solib-search-path" on Unix hosts to point as host copies of the
2561 target's shared libraries. See the new command "set
2562 target-file-system-kind" described below, and the "Commands to
2563 specify files" section in the user manual for more information.
2567 eval template, expressions...
2568 Convert the values of one or more expressions under the control
2569 of the string template to a command line, and call it.
2571 set target-file-system-kind unix|dos-based|auto
2572 show target-file-system-kind
2573 Set or show the assumed file system kind for target reported file
2576 save breakpoints <filename>
2577 Save all current breakpoint definitions to a file suitable for use
2578 in a later debugging session. To read the saved breakpoint
2579 definitions, use the `source' command.
2581 `save tracepoints' is a new alias for `save-tracepoints'. The latter
2584 info static-tracepoint-markers
2585 Display information about static tracepoint markers in the target.
2587 strace FN | FILE:LINE | *ADDR | -m MARKER_ID
2588 Define a static tracepoint by probing a marker at the given
2589 function, line, address, or marker ID.
2593 Enable and disable observer mode.
2595 set may-write-registers on|off
2596 set may-write-memory on|off
2597 set may-insert-breakpoints on|off
2598 set may-insert-tracepoints on|off
2599 set may-insert-fast-tracepoints on|off
2600 set may-interrupt on|off
2601 Set individual permissions for GDB effects on the target. Note that
2602 some of these settings can have undesirable or surprising
2603 consequences, particularly when changed in the middle of a session.
2604 For instance, disabling the writing of memory can prevent
2605 breakpoints from being inserted, cause single-stepping to fail, or
2606 even crash your program, if you disable after breakpoints have been
2607 inserted. However, GDB should not crash.
2609 set record memory-query on|off
2610 show record memory-query
2611 Control whether to stop the inferior if memory changes caused
2612 by an instruction cannot be recorded.
2617 The disassemble command now supports "start,+length" form of two arguments.
2621 ** GDB now provides a new directory location, called the python directory,
2622 where Python scripts written for GDB can be installed. The location
2623 of that directory is <data-directory>/python, where <data-directory>
2624 is the GDB data directory. For more details, see section `Scripting
2625 GDB using Python' in the manual.
2627 ** The GDB Python API now has access to breakpoints, symbols, symbol
2628 tables, program spaces, inferiors, threads and frame's code blocks.
2629 Additionally, GDB Parameters can now be created from the API, and
2630 manipulated via set/show in the CLI.
2632 ** New functions gdb.target_charset, gdb.target_wide_charset,
2633 gdb.progspaces, gdb.current_progspace, and gdb.string_to_argv.
2635 ** New exception gdb.GdbError.
2637 ** Pretty-printers are now also looked up in the current program space.
2639 ** Pretty-printers can now be individually enabled and disabled.
2641 ** GDB now looks for names of Python scripts to auto-load in a
2642 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts', in addition to looking
2643 for a OBJFILE-gdb.py script when OBJFILE is read by the debugger.
2645 * Tracepoint actions were unified with breakpoint commands. In particular,
2646 there are no longer differences in "info break" output for breakpoints and
2647 tracepoints and the "commands" command can be used for both tracepoints and
2648 regular breakpoints.
2652 ARM Symbian arm*-*-symbianelf*
2654 * D language support.
2655 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the D programming
2658 * GDB now supports the extended ptrace interface for PowerPC which is
2659 available since Linux kernel version 2.6.34. This automatically enables
2660 any hardware breakpoints and additional hardware watchpoints available in
2661 the processor. The old ptrace interface exposes just one hardware
2662 watchpoint and no hardware breakpoints.
2664 * GDB is now able to use the Data Value Compare (DVC) register available on
2665 embedded PowerPC processors to implement in hardware simple watchpoint
2666 conditions of the form:
2668 watch ADDRESS|VARIABLE if ADDRESS|VARIABLE == CONSTANT EXPRESSION
2670 This works in native GDB running on Linux kernels with the extended ptrace
2671 interface mentioned above.
2673 *** Changes in GDB 7.1
2677 ** Namespace Support
2679 GDB now supports importing of namespaces in C++. This enables the
2680 user to inspect variables from imported namespaces. Support for
2681 namepace aliasing has also been added. So, if a namespace is
2682 aliased in the current scope (e.g. namepace C=A; ) the user can
2683 print variables using the alias (e.g. (gdb) print C::x).
2687 All known bugs relating to the printing of virtual base class were
2688 fixed. It is now possible to call overloaded static methods using a
2693 The C++ cast operators static_cast<>, dynamic_cast<>, const_cast<>,
2694 and reinterpret_cast<> are now handled by the C++ expression parser.
2698 Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze-*-*
2703 Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze
2706 * Multi-program debugging.
2708 GDB now has support for multi-program (a.k.a. multi-executable or
2709 multi-exec) debugging. This allows for debugging multiple inferiors
2710 simultaneously each running a different program under the same GDB
2711 session. See "Debugging Multiple Inferiors and Programs" in the
2712 manual for more information. This implied some user visible changes
2713 in the multi-inferior support. For example, "info inferiors" now
2714 lists inferiors that are not running yet or that have exited
2715 already. See also "New commands" and "New options" below.
2717 * New tracing features
2719 GDB's tracepoint facility now includes several new features:
2721 ** Trace state variables
2723 GDB tracepoints now include support for trace state variables, which
2724 are variables managed by the target agent during a tracing
2725 experiment. They are useful for tracepoints that trigger each
2726 other, so for instance one tracepoint can count hits in a variable,
2727 and then a second tracepoint has a condition that is true when the
2728 count reaches a particular value. Trace state variables share the
2729 $-syntax of GDB convenience variables, and can appear in both
2730 tracepoint actions and condition expressions. Use the "tvariable"
2731 command to create, and "info tvariables" to view; see "Trace State
2732 Variables" in the manual for more detail.
2736 GDB now includes an option for defining fast tracepoints, which
2737 targets may implement more efficiently, such as by installing a jump
2738 into the target agent rather than a trap instruction. The resulting
2739 speedup can be by two orders of magnitude or more, although the
2740 tradeoff is that some program locations on some target architectures
2741 might not allow fast tracepoint installation, for instance if the
2742 instruction to be replaced is shorter than the jump. To request a
2743 fast tracepoint, use the "ftrace" command, with syntax identical to
2744 the regular trace command.
2746 ** Disconnected tracing
2748 It is now possible to detach GDB from the target while it is running
2749 a trace experiment, then reconnect later to see how the experiment
2750 is going. In addition, a new variable disconnected-tracing lets you
2751 tell the target agent whether to continue running a trace if the
2752 connection is lost unexpectedly.
2756 GDB now has the ability to save the trace buffer into a file, and
2757 then use that file as a target, similarly to you can do with
2758 corefiles. You can select trace frames, print data that was
2759 collected in them, and use tstatus to display the state of the
2760 tracing run at the moment that it was saved. To create a trace
2761 file, use "tsave <filename>", and to use it, do "target tfile
2764 ** Circular trace buffer
2766 You can ask the target agent to handle the trace buffer as a
2767 circular buffer, discarding the oldest trace frames to make room for
2768 newer ones, by setting circular-trace-buffer to on. This feature may
2769 not be available for all target agents.
2774 The disassemble command, when invoked with two arguments, now requires
2775 the arguments to be comma-separated.
2778 The info variables command now displays variable definitions. Files
2779 which only declare a variable are not shown.
2782 The source command is now capable of sourcing Python scripts.
2783 This feature is dependent on the debugger being build with Python
2786 Related to this enhancement is also the introduction of a new command
2787 "set script-extension" (see below).
2789 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
2791 record save [<FILENAME>]
2792 Save a file (in core file format) containing the process record
2793 execution log for replay debugging at a later time.
2795 record restore <FILENAME>
2796 Restore the process record execution log that was saved at an
2797 earlier time, for replay debugging.
2799 add-inferior [-copies <N>] [-exec <FILENAME>]
2802 clone-inferior [-copies <N>] [ID]
2803 Make a new inferior ready to execute the same program another
2804 inferior has loaded.
2809 maint info program-spaces
2810 List the program spaces loaded into GDB.
2812 set remote interrupt-sequence [Ctrl-C | BREAK | BREAK-g]
2813 show remote interrupt-sequence
2814 Allow the user to select one of ^C, a BREAK signal or BREAK-g
2815 as the sequence to the remote target in order to interrupt the execution.
2816 Ctrl-C is a default. Some system prefers BREAK which is high level of
2817 serial line for some certain time. Linux kernel prefers BREAK-g, a.k.a
2818 Magic SysRq g. It is BREAK signal and character 'g'.
2820 set remote interrupt-on-connect [on | off]
2821 show remote interrupt-on-connect
2822 When interrupt-on-connect is ON, gdb sends interrupt-sequence to
2823 remote target when gdb connects to it. This is needed when you debug
2826 set remotebreak [on | off]
2828 Deprecated. Use "set/show remote interrupt-sequence" instead.
2830 tvariable $NAME [ = EXP ]
2831 Create or modify a trace state variable.
2834 List trace state variables and their values.
2836 delete tvariable $NAME ...
2837 Delete one or more trace state variables.
2840 Evaluate the given expressions without collecting anything into the
2841 trace buffer. (Valid in tracepoint actions only.)
2843 ftrace FN / FILE:LINE / *ADDR
2844 Define a fast tracepoint at the given function, line, or address.
2846 * New expression syntax
2848 GDB now parses the 0b prefix of binary numbers the same way as GCC does.
2849 GDB now parses 0b101010 identically with 42.
2853 set follow-exec-mode new|same
2854 show follow-exec-mode
2855 Control whether GDB reuses the same inferior across an exec call or
2856 creates a new one. This is useful to be able to restart the old
2857 executable after the inferior having done an exec call.
2859 set default-collect EXPR, ...
2860 show default-collect
2861 Define a list of expressions to be collected at each tracepoint.
2862 This is a useful way to ensure essential items are not overlooked,
2863 such as registers or a critical global variable.
2865 set disconnected-tracing
2866 show disconnected-tracing
2867 If set to 1, the target is instructed to continue tracing if it
2868 loses its connection to GDB. If 0, the target is to stop tracing
2871 set circular-trace-buffer
2872 show circular-trace-buffer
2873 If set to on, the target is instructed to use a circular trace buffer
2874 and discard the oldest trace frames instead of stopping the trace due
2875 to a full trace buffer. If set to off, the trace stops when the buffer
2876 fills up. Some targets may not support this.
2878 set script-extension off|soft|strict
2879 show script-extension
2880 If set to "off", the debugger does not perform any script language
2881 recognition, and all sourced files are assumed to be GDB scripts.
2882 If set to "soft" (the default), files are sourced according to
2883 filename extension, falling back to GDB scripts if the first
2885 If set to "strict", files are sourced according to filename extension.
2887 set ada trust-PAD-over-XVS on|off
2888 show ada trust-PAD-over-XVS
2889 If off, activate a workaround against a bug in the debugging information
2890 generated by the compiler for PAD types (see gcc/exp_dbug.ads in
2891 the GCC sources for more information about the GNAT encoding and
2892 PAD types in particular). It is always safe to set this option to
2893 off, but this introduces a slight performance penalty. The default
2896 * Python API Improvements
2898 ** GDB provides the new class gdb.LazyString. This is useful in
2899 some pretty-printing cases. The new method gdb.Value.lazy_string
2900 provides a simple way to create objects of this type.
2902 ** The fields returned by gdb.Type.fields now have an
2903 `is_base_class' attribute.
2905 ** The new method gdb.Type.range returns the range of an array type.
2907 ** The new method gdb.parse_and_eval can be used to parse and
2908 evaluate an expression.
2910 * New remote packets
2913 Define a trace state variable.
2916 Get the current value of a trace state variable.
2919 Set desired tracing behavior upon disconnection.
2922 Set the trace buffer to be linear or circular.
2925 Get data about the tracepoints currently in use.
2929 Process record now works correctly with hardware watchpoints.
2931 Multiple bug fixes have been made to the mips-irix port, making it
2932 much more reliable. In particular:
2933 - Debugging threaded applications is now possible again. Previously,
2934 GDB would hang while starting the program, or while waiting for
2935 the program to stop at a breakpoint.
2936 - Attaching to a running process no longer hangs.
2937 - An error occurring while loading a core file has been fixed.
2938 - Changing the value of the PC register now works again. This fixes
2939 problems observed when using the "jump" command, or when calling
2940 a function from GDB, or even when assigning a new value to $pc.
2941 - With the "finish" and "return" commands, the return value for functions
2942 returning a small array is now correctly printed.
2943 - It is now possible to break on shared library code which gets executed
2944 during a shared library init phase (code executed while executing
2945 their .init section). Previously, the breakpoint would have no effect.
2946 - GDB is now able to backtrace through the signal handler for
2947 non-threaded programs.
2949 PIE (Position Independent Executable) programs debugging is now supported.
2950 This includes debugging execution of PIC (Position Independent Code) shared
2951 libraries although for that, it should be possible to run such libraries as an
2954 *** Changes in GDB 7.0
2956 * GDB now has an interface for JIT compilation. Applications that
2957 dynamically generate code can create symbol files in memory and register
2958 them with GDB. For users, the feature should work transparently, and
2959 for JIT developers, the interface is documented in the GDB manual in the
2960 "JIT Compilation Interface" chapter.
2962 * Tracepoints may now be conditional. The syntax is as for
2963 breakpoints; either an "if" clause appended to the "trace" command,
2964 or the "condition" command is available. GDB sends the condition to
2965 the target for evaluation using the same bytecode format as is used
2966 for tracepoint actions.
2968 * The disassemble command now supports: an optional /r modifier, print the
2969 raw instructions in hex as well as in symbolic form, and an optional /m
2970 modifier to print mixed source+assembly.
2972 * Process record and replay
2974 In a architecture environment that supports ``process record and
2975 replay'', ``process record and replay'' target can record a log of
2976 the process execution, and replay it with both forward and reverse
2979 * Reverse debugging: GDB now has new commands reverse-continue, reverse-
2980 step, reverse-next, reverse-finish, reverse-stepi, reverse-nexti, and
2981 set execution-direction {forward|reverse}, for targets that support
2984 * GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on MIPS/Linux systems. This
2985 feature is available with a native GDB running on kernel version
2988 * GDB now has support for multi-byte and wide character sets on the
2989 target. Strings whose character type is wchar_t, char16_t, or
2990 char32_t are now correctly printed. GDB supports wide- and unicode-
2991 literals in C, that is, L'x', L"string", u'x', u"string", U'x', and
2992 U"string" syntax. And, GDB allows the "%ls" and "%lc" formats in
2993 `printf'. This feature requires iconv to work properly; if your
2994 system does not have a working iconv, GDB can use GNU libiconv. See
2995 the installation instructions for more information.
2997 * GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
2998 remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
2999 with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
3000 the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
3002 * "info sharedlibrary" now takes an optional regex of libraries to show,
3003 and it now reports if a shared library has no debugging information.
3005 * Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
3006 now complete on file names.
3008 * When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
3009 completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
3010 For instance, consider:
3012 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
3013 # struct example variable;
3016 If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
3017 completions will be "f1" and "f2".
3019 * Inlined functions are now supported. They show up in backtraces, and
3020 the "step", "next", and "finish" commands handle them automatically.
3022 * GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
3023 operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
3026 * GDB now supports inspecting extra signal information, exported by
3027 the new $_siginfo convenience variable. The feature is currently
3028 implemented on linux ARM, i386 and amd64.
3030 * GDB can now display the VFP floating point registers and NEON vector
3031 registers on ARM targets. Both ARM GNU/Linux native GDB and gdbserver
3032 can provide these registers (requires Linux 2.6.30 or later). Remote
3033 and simulator targets may also provide them.
3035 * New remote packets
3038 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
3041 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
3042 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
3043 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
3046 Kill the process with the specified process ID. Use this in preference
3047 to `k' when multiprocess protocol extensions are supported.
3050 Obtains additional operating system information
3054 Read or write additional signal information.
3056 * Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
3058 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
3059 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
3060 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
3062 * GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
3063 DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
3065 * The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
3066 and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
3067 `set/show sh calling-convention'.
3069 * GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
3070 with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
3072 * 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
3074 * Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
3076 * Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
3077 which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
3079 * The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
3080 list of section offsets.
3082 * On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
3083 conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
3084 have also been fixed.
3086 * GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
3087 From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
3088 are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
3090 * GDB now parses C++ symbol and type names more flexibly. For
3093 template<typename T> class C { };
3096 GDB will now correctly handle all of:
3098 ptype C<char const *>
3099 ptype C<char const*>
3100 ptype C<const char *>
3101 ptype C<const char*>
3103 * New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
3105 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
3106 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
3108 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
3109 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
3110 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
3112 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
3113 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
3115 - Support for the sparc64-linux-gnu target is now included in
3118 - The amd64-linux build of gdbserver now supports debugging both
3119 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
3121 - The i386-linux, amd64-linux, and i386-win32 builds of gdbserver
3122 now support hardware watchpoints, and will use them automatically
3127 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
3128 available is determined at configure time.
3130 New GDB commands can now be written in Python.
3132 * Ada tasking support
3134 Ada tasks can now be inspected in GDB. The following commands have
3138 Print the list of Ada tasks.
3140 Print detailed information about task number N.
3142 Print the task number of the current task.
3144 Switch the context of debugging to task number N.
3146 * Support for user-defined prefixed commands. The "define" command can
3147 add new commands to existing prefixes, e.g. "target".
3149 * Multi-inferior, multi-process debugging.
3151 GDB now has generalized support for multi-inferior debugging. See
3152 "Debugging Multiple Inferiors" in the manual for more information.
3153 Although availability still depends on target support, the command
3154 set is more uniform now. The GNU/Linux specific multi-forks support
3155 has been migrated to this new framework. This implied some user
3156 visible changes; see "New commands" and also "Removed commands"
3159 * Target descriptions can now describe the target OS ABI. See the
3160 "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for more
3163 * Target descriptions can now describe "compatible" architectures
3164 to indicate that the target can execute applications for a different
3165 architecture in addition to those for the main target architecture.
3166 See the "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for
3169 * Multi-architecture debugging.
3171 GDB now includes general supports for debugging applications on
3172 hybrid systems that use more than one single processor architecture
3173 at the same time. Each such hybrid architecture still requires
3174 specific support to be added. The only hybrid architecture supported
3175 in this version of GDB is the Cell Broadband Engine.
3177 * GDB now supports integrated debugging of Cell/B.E. applications that
3178 use both the PPU and SPU architectures. To enable support for hybrid
3179 Cell/B.E. debugging, you need to configure GDB to support both the
3180 powerpc-linux or powerpc64-linux and the spu-elf targets, using the
3181 --enable-targets configure option.
3183 * Non-stop mode debugging.
3185 For some targets, GDB now supports an optional mode of operation in
3186 which you can examine stopped threads while other threads continue
3187 to execute freely. This is referred to as non-stop mode, with the
3188 old mode referred to as all-stop mode. See the "Non-Stop Mode"
3189 section in the user manual for more information.
3191 To be able to support remote non-stop debugging, a remote stub needs
3192 to implement the non-stop mode remote protocol extensions, as
3193 described in the "Remote Non-Stop" section of the user manual. The
3194 GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been adjusted to support these
3195 extensions on linux targets.
3197 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
3199 catch syscall [NAME(S) | NUMBER(S)]
3200 Catch system calls. Arguments, which should be names of system
3201 calls or their numbers, mean catch only those syscalls. Without
3202 arguments, every syscall will be caught. When the inferior issues
3203 any of the specified syscalls, GDB will stop and announce the system
3204 call, both when it is called and when its call returns. This
3205 feature is currently available with a native GDB running on the
3206 Linux Kernel, under the following architectures: x86, x86_64,
3207 PowerPC and PowerPC64.
3209 find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
3211 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
3213 maint set python print-stack
3214 maint show python print-stack
3215 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
3218 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
3223 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
3227 Show operating system information about processes.
3230 List the inferiors currently under GDB's control.
3233 Switch focus to inferior number NUM.
3236 Detach from inferior number NUM.
3239 Kill inferior number NUM.
3243 set spu stop-on-load
3244 show spu stop-on-load
3245 Control whether to stop for new SPE threads during Cell/B.E. debugging.
3247 set spu auto-flush-cache
3248 show spu auto-flush-cache
3249 Control whether to automatically flush the software-managed cache
3250 during Cell/B.E. debugging.
3252 set sh calling-convention
3253 show sh calling-convention
3254 Control the calling convention used when calling SH target functions.
3257 show debug timestamp
3258 Control display of timestamps with GDB debugging output.
3260 set disassemble-next-line
3261 show disassemble-next-line
3262 Control display of disassembled source lines or instructions when
3265 set remote noack-packet
3266 show remote noack-packet
3267 Set/show the use of remote protocol QStartNoAckMode packet. See above
3268 under "New remote packets."
3270 set remote query-attached-packet
3271 show remote query-attached-packet
3272 Control use of remote protocol `qAttached' (query-attached) packet.
3274 set remote read-siginfo-object
3275 show remote read-siginfo-object
3276 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:read' (read-siginfo-object)
3279 set remote write-siginfo-object
3280 show remote write-siginfo-object
3281 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:write' (write-siginfo-object)
3284 set remote reverse-continue
3285 show remote reverse-continue
3286 Control use of remote protocol 'bc' (reverse-continue) packet.
3288 set remote reverse-step
3289 show remote reverse-step
3290 Control use of remote protocol 'bs' (reverse-step) packet.
3292 set displaced-stepping
3293 show displaced-stepping
3294 Control displaced stepping mode. Displaced stepping is a way to
3295 single-step over breakpoints without removing them from the debuggee.
3296 Also known as "out-of-line single-stepping".
3299 show debug displaced
3300 Control display of debugging info for displaced stepping.
3302 maint set internal-error
3303 maint show internal-error
3304 Control what GDB does when an internal error is detected.
3306 maint set internal-warning
3307 maint show internal-warning
3308 Control what GDB does when an internal warning is detected.
3313 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
3315 set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
3316 show multiple-symbols
3317 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
3318 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
3319 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
3321 set breakpoint always-inserted
3322 show breakpoint always-inserted
3323 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
3324 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
3325 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
3327 set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
3328 show arm fallback-mode
3329 set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
3331 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
3332 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
3333 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
3334 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
3336 set disable-randomization
3337 show disable-randomization
3338 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
3339 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
3340 multiple debugging sessions.
3344 Control whether other threads are stopped or not when some thread hits
3349 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
3350 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
3351 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
3352 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
3354 set target-wide-charset
3355 show target-wide-charset
3356 The target-wide-charset is the name of the character set that GDB
3357 uses when printing characters whose type is wchar_t.
3359 set tcp auto-retry (on|off)
3361 set tcp connect-timeout
3362 show tcp connect-timeout
3363 These commands allow GDB to retry failed TCP connections to a remote stub
3364 with a specified timeout period; this is useful if the stub is launched
3365 in parallel with GDB but may not be ready to accept connections immediately.
3367 set libthread-db-search-path
3368 show libthread-db-search-path
3369 Control list of directories which GDB will search for appropriate
3372 set schedule-multiple (on|off)
3373 show schedule-multiple
3374 Allow GDB to resume all threads of all processes or only threads of
3375 the current process.
3379 Use more aggressive caching for accesses to the stack. This improves
3380 performance of remote debugging (particularly backtraces) without
3381 affecting correctness.
3383 set interactive-mode (on|off|auto)
3384 show interactive-mode
3385 Control whether GDB runs in interactive mode (on) or not (off).
3386 When in interactive mode, GDB waits for the user to answer all
3387 queries. Otherwise, GDB does not wait and assumes the default
3388 answer. When set to auto (the default), GDB determines which
3389 mode to use based on the stdin settings.
3394 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `info
3395 inferiors' command. To list checkpoints, you can still use the
3396 `info checkpoints' command, which was an alias for the `info forks'
3400 Replaced by the new `inferior' command. To switch between
3401 checkpoints, you can still use the `restart' command, which was an
3402 alias for the `fork' command.
3405 This is removed, since some targets don't have a notion of
3406 processes. To switch between processes, you can still use the
3407 `inferior' command using GDB's own inferior number.
3410 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `kill
3411 inferior' command. To delete a checkpoint, you can still use the
3412 `delete checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `delete
3416 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `detach
3417 inferior' command. To detach a checkpoint, you can still use the
3418 `detach checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `detach
3421 * New native configurations
3423 x86/x86_64 Darwin i[34567]86-*-darwin*
3425 x86_64 MinGW x86_64-*-mingw*
3429 Lattice Mico32 lm32-*
3430 x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
3431 x86_64 DICOS x86_64-*-dicos*
3434 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports x86 Windows CE
3435 (mingw32ce) debugging.
3441 These commands were actually not implemented on any target.
3443 *** Changes in GDB 6.8
3445 * New native configurations
3447 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
3448 Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
3452 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
3453 Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
3455 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
3457 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
3458 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
3459 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
3460 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
3462 * GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
3463 (mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
3465 * Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
3468 * GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
3469 including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
3470 and in inlined functions.
3472 * GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
3473 accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
3474 more than one contiguous range of addresses.
3476 * Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
3478 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
3479 registers on PowerPC targets.
3481 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
3482 targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
3484 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
3485 commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
3487 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
3488 extended-remote mode.
3490 * hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
3491 The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
3492 error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
3493 The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
3495 * GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
3496 building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
3497 target architectures.
3499 * GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
3500 Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
3501 now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
3502 stored in two consecutive float registers.
3504 * The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
3507 * Improved support for debugging Ada
3508 Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
3510 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
3511 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
3512 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
3513 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
3515 - Improved command completion in Ada
3518 * GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
3523 set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
3524 show print frame-arguments
3525 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
3526 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
3531 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
3538 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
3540 * New remote packets
3547 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
3550 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
3554 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
3556 *** Changes in GDB 6.7
3558 * Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
3559 bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
3560 Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
3562 * When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
3563 symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
3564 -Bsymbolic linker option.
3566 * When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
3567 recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
3570 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
3571 frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
3573 * GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
3574 32-bit or 64-bit register values.
3576 * Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
3578 * GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
3579 target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
3580 a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
3582 * Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
3583 automatically displayed as character or string data.
3585 * The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
3586 arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
3589 * Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
3590 for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
3591 only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
3593 * GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
3596 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
3597 ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
3598 has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
3600 * GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
3602 * GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
3604 * The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
3605 layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
3606 segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
3608 * The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
3609 immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
3611 * The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
3612 "library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
3613 packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
3614 where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
3615 Windows and SymbianOS).
3617 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
3618 (DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
3620 * GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
3621 according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
3627 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
3628 when debugging using remote targets.
3630 set mem inaccessible-by-default
3631 show mem inaccessible-by-default
3632 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
3633 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
3634 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
3635 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
3636 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
3638 set breakpoint auto-hw
3639 show breakpoint auto-hw
3640 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
3641 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
3642 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
3643 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
3644 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
3645 including "next" and "finish".
3648 catch exception unhandled
3649 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
3652 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
3656 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
3657 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
3658 an alias to "set sysroot".
3661 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
3662 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
3665 * New native configurations
3667 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
3670 unset tdesc filename
3672 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
3673 not query the target for its built-in description.
3677 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
3678 MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
3679 Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
3681 * New remote packets
3684 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
3685 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
3687 qXfer:features:read:
3688 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
3693 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
3694 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
3696 qXfer:libraries:read:
3697 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
3698 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
3699 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
3700 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
3704 Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
3712 i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
3713 i[34567]86-*-netware*
3714 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
3715 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
3717 i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
3720 i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
3721 i[34567]86-*-unixware*
3730 * Other removed features
3737 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
3744 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
3749 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
3750 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
3755 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
3756 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
3758 Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
3760 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
3761 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
3762 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
3763 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
3765 MIPS ".pdr" sections
3767 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
3768 in debugging information.
3772 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
3773 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
3775 set mips stack-arg-size
3776 set mips saved-gpreg-size
3778 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
3780 *** Changes in GDB 6.6
3785 Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
3787 * GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
3788 (mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
3789 running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
3791 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
3792 Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
3795 * The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
3796 broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
3798 * The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
3799 stub provides the required support.
3801 * Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
3802 longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
3807 unset substitute-path
3808 show substitute-path
3809 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
3810 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
3811 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
3812 between compilation and debugging.
3816 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
3817 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
3818 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
3822 The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
3824 Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
3825 an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
3827 The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
3829 * New remote packets
3832 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
3833 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
3834 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
3835 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
3839 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
3840 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
3842 qXfer:memory-map:read:
3843 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
3844 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
3849 Erase and program a flash memory device.
3851 * Removed remote packets
3854 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
3855 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
3857 *** Changes in GDB 6.5
3861 Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
3863 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
3867 init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
3868 only if it doesn't already have a value.
3870 The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
3872 checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
3874 restart <n> Return the program state to a
3875 previously saved state.
3877 info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
3879 delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
3881 set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
3882 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
3884 info forks List forks of the user program that
3885 are available to be debugged.
3887 fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
3888 forks of the user program that are
3889 available to be debugged.
3891 delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
3892 that are available to be debugged (and
3893 kill the forked process).
3895 detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
3896 that are available to be debugged (and
3897 allow the process to continue).
3901 Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
3903 * Improved Windows host support
3905 GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
3906 native console support, and remote communications using either
3907 network sockets or serial ports.
3909 * Improved Modula-2 language support
3911 GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
3912 basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
3913 pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
3914 printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
3915 written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
3916 GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
3920 The ARM rdi-share module.
3922 The Netware NLM debug server.
3924 *** Changes in GDB 6.4
3926 * New native configurations
3928 OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
3929 OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
3933 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
3935 * New command line options
3937 --batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
3938 --return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
3939 the child (debugged) program exited with.
3940 --eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
3941 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
3942 specified multiple times and in conjunction
3943 with the --command (-x) option.
3945 * Deprecated commands removed
3947 The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
3951 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
3952 othernames set arm disassembler
3953 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
3954 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
3955 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
3958 * New BSD user-level threads support
3960 It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
3961 library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
3964 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
3965 FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
3966 OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
3968 Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
3969 are not yet supported.
3971 * New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
3972 (Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
3974 * REMOVED configurations and files
3976 VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
3977 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
3978 National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
3980 * New "set print array-indexes" command
3982 After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
3983 when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
3986 * VAX floating point support
3988 GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
3990 * User-defined command support
3992 In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
3993 to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
3994 section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
3996 *** Changes in GDB 6.3:
3998 * New command line option
4000 GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
4003 * GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
4005 GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
4006 information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
4007 by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
4008 proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
4009 to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
4011 * Internationalization
4013 When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
4014 internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
4015 continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
4019 Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
4020 implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
4021 into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
4023 * New native configurations
4025 GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
4029 GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
4030 packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
4032 * END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
4034 GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
4035 The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
4036 features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
4039 GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
4040 compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
4041 continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
4051 powerpc bdm protocol
4053 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
4054 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
4056 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
4058 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
4059 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
4060 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
4061 permanently REMOVED.
4070 *** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
4072 * MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
4074 When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
4075 heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
4078 * MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
4080 When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
4081 fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
4082 IRIX long double values).
4086 A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
4087 command. This problem has been fixed.
4089 *** Changes in GDB 6.2:
4091 * Fix for ``many threads''
4093 On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
4094 rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
4097 ptrace: No such process.
4098 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
4100 This problem has been fixed.
4102 * "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
4104 Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
4107 * New ``start'' command.
4109 This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
4111 * New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
4113 Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
4114 live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
4115 platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
4117 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
4118 FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
4119 NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
4120 NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
4121 NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
4122 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
4123 OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
4124 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
4125 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
4127 * Signal trampoline code overhauled
4129 Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
4130 These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
4131 of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
4132 call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
4133 signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
4135 Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
4136 features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
4137 include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
4139 * Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
4141 * New native configurations
4143 GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
4144 OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
4145 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
4146 OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
4147 OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
4148 NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
4149 OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
4151 * END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
4153 GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
4154 The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
4155 including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
4156 migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
4157 compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
4158 work, was also included.
4160 GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
4161 module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
4171 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
4172 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
4174 * REMOVED configurations and files
4176 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
4177 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
4178 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
4179 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
4180 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
4181 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
4182 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
4183 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
4184 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
4185 sonymips mips-sony-*
4186 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
4188 *** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
4190 * TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
4192 The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
4193 GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
4194 command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
4195 program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
4198 * Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
4200 Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
4201 libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
4202 cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
4203 GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
4204 shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
4205 the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
4208 Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
4210 * Fixed ISO-C build problems
4212 The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
4213 non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
4214 compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
4216 * Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
4218 Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
4219 wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
4221 * Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
4223 The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
4224 permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
4225 systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
4227 * Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
4229 Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
4230 has been updated to use constant array sizes.
4232 * Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
4234 GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
4235 its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
4236 panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
4238 * Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
4240 When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
4241 by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
4242 not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
4244 *** Changes in GDB 6.1:
4246 * Removed --with-mmalloc
4248 Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
4249 conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
4251 * Changes in AMD64 configurations
4253 The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
4254 the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
4255 and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
4256 you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
4258 * Revised SPARC target
4260 The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
4261 FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
4262 support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
4263 from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
4264 (Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
4268 GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
4269 names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
4270 with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
4273 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
4275 GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
4276 arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
4279 * C++ nested types and namespaces
4281 GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
4282 improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
4283 is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
4284 Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
4285 namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
4286 "Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
4287 frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
4288 if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
4289 GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
4291 * New native configurations
4293 NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
4294 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
4295 OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
4296 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
4297 OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
4299 * New debugging protocols
4301 M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
4303 * "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
4305 The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
4306 and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
4307 tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
4309 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
4311 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
4312 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
4313 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
4314 permanently REMOVED.
4316 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
4317 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
4318 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
4319 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
4320 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
4321 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
4322 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
4323 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
4324 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
4325 sonymips mips-sony-*
4326 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
4328 * REMOVED configurations and files
4330 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
4331 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4332 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
4333 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
4334 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
4335 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
4336 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
4337 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
4338 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
4339 386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
4340 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
4341 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
4342 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
4343 SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
4344 SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
4345 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
4346 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
4348 *** Changes in GDB 6.0:
4352 Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
4353 integrated into GDB.
4355 * New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
4357 DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
4358 information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
4359 By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
4362 The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
4363 have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
4364 DWARF 2 CFI support.
4368 GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
4369 file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
4370 remote protocol documentation for details.
4372 * All targets using the new architecture framework.
4374 All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
4375 architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
4376 to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
4379 * GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
4381 GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
4382 per-thread variables.
4384 * GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
4386 GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
4387 GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
4389 * Separate debug info.
4391 GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
4392 automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
4393 of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
4394 system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
4395 and optional debug files.
4397 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
4399 DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
4400 describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
4403 GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
4404 for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
4408 A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
4409 Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
4410 considered "useable".
4412 * GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
4414 The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
4415 commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
4418 * GDB supports logging output to a file
4420 There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
4421 used to capture GDB's output to a file.
4423 * The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
4425 The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
4426 disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
4429 * d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
4431 The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
4432 registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
4436 A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
4437 be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
4438 session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
4439 "--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
4440 data, for more informative profiling results.
4442 * Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
4444 The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
4445 option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
4446 "mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
4448 Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
4451 Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
4452 Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
4453 Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
4454 in a subsequent -var-update.
4456 * New native configurations.
4458 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
4460 * Multi-arched targets.
4462 HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
4463 Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
4465 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
4467 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
4468 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
4469 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
4470 permanently REMOVED.
4472 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
4473 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
4474 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
4475 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
4476 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
4477 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
4478 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
4479 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
4480 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
4481 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
4482 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
4483 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
4485 * REMOVED configurations and files
4488 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
4489 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
4490 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
4491 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
4492 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
4493 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
4495 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
4496 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
4497 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
4498 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
4499 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
4500 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
4502 * MIPS $fp behavior changed
4504 The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
4505 the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
4506 context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
4507 address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
4508 The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
4510 *** Changes in GDB 5.3:
4512 * GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
4514 When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
4515 `/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
4516 in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
4517 library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
4518 shared libs like mad''.
4520 * ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
4522 Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
4523 the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
4524 arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
4525 powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
4527 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
4529 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
4530 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
4533 The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
4534 invocations in expression, and shows the result.
4536 The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
4537 macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
4539 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
4540 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
4541 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
4542 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
4544 * Multi-arched targets.
4546 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
4547 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
4549 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
4550 Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
4551 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
4555 Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
4558 * New native configurations
4560 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
4561 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
4562 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
4563 UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
4565 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
4567 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
4568 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
4569 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
4570 permanently REMOVED.
4572 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
4573 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
4574 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
4575 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
4576 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
4577 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
4578 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
4579 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
4580 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
4581 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
4583 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
4584 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
4586 * OBSOLETE languages
4588 CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
4590 * REMOVED configurations and files
4592 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
4593 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
4594 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
4595 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
4596 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
4598 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
4600 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
4602 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
4603 commands. The default is 1024.
4605 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
4607 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
4609 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
4611 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
4612 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
4613 from a file into memory (restore).
4615 * Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
4617 The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
4618 including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
4619 of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
4621 *** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
4629 gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
4630 mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
4631 Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
4633 gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
4634 dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
4635 Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
4637 Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
4638 Surprisingly enough, it works now.
4639 By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
4641 i386 hardware watchpoint support:
4642 avoid misses on second run for some targets.
4643 By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
4645 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
4647 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
4649 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
4650 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
4651 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
4652 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
4653 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
4654 (notably embedded) targets.
4656 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
4658 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
4659 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
4660 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
4661 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
4663 * New command line option
4665 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
4667 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
4669 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
4670 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
4671 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
4672 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
4673 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
4674 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
4675 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
4676 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
4677 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
4678 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
4680 * Changes in ARM configurations.
4682 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
4683 configuration is fully multi-arch.
4685 * New native configurations
4687 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
4688 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
4689 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
4690 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
4694 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
4696 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
4698 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
4699 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
4700 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
4701 permanently REMOVED.
4703 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
4704 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
4705 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
4706 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
4707 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
4709 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
4711 * REMOVED configurations and files
4713 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
4715 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
4716 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
4717 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
4718 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
4719 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
4720 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
4721 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
4722 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
4723 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
4724 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
4725 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
4727 * Changes to command line processing
4729 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
4730 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
4732 * Changes to key bindings
4734 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
4736 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
4738 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
4740 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
4743 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
4745 Numerous documentation fixes.
4747 Numerous testsuite fixes.
4749 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
4751 * New native configurations
4753 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
4754 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
4755 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
4756 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
4757 ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
4758 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
4762 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
4764 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
4766 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
4768 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
4769 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
4770 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
4771 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
4772 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
4774 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
4775 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
4776 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
4777 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
4778 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
4779 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
4780 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
4781 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
4783 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
4784 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
4786 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
4787 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
4788 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
4789 permanently REMOVED.
4791 * REMOVED configurations and files
4793 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
4794 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
4796 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
4800 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
4802 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
4803 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
4808 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
4810 * The MI enabled by default.
4812 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
4813 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
4814 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
4815 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
4816 which is now deprecated.
4818 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
4820 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
4821 main features are supported:
4823 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
4825 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
4828 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
4830 - a Pascal expression parser.
4832 However, some important features are not yet supported.
4834 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
4836 - there are some problems with boolean types;
4838 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
4839 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
4841 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
4843 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
4845 * Changes in completion.
4847 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
4848 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
4849 users expect at the shell prompt.
4851 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
4852 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
4853 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
4854 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
4855 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
4856 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
4857 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
4859 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
4861 * New platform-independent commands:
4863 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
4864 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
4865 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
4867 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
4869 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
4870 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
4871 many threads as your system allows you to have.
4873 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
4875 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
4876 multi-threaded programs though.
4878 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
4880 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
4882 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
4883 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
4886 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
4888 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
4889 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
4890 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
4891 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
4892 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
4895 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
4896 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
4897 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
4899 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
4901 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
4902 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
4904 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
4905 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
4908 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
4909 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
4910 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
4911 a given linear address.
4913 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
4914 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
4915 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
4917 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
4919 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
4921 * Changes in documentation.
4923 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
4924 Documentation License.
4926 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
4929 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
4931 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
4934 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
4935 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
4936 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
4938 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
4940 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
4941 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
4942 contents of this file.
4946 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
4948 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
4950 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
4952 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
4953 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
4954 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
4955 greater level of detail.
4957 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
4959 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
4960 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
4961 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
4964 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
4966 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
4967 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
4968 machines ``out of the box''.
4970 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
4971 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
4972 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
4973 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
4974 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
4976 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
4977 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
4978 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
4979 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
4980 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
4982 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
4983 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
4986 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
4989 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
4990 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
4991 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
4992 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
4994 * New native configurations
4996 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
4997 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
5001 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
5002 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
5003 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
5004 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
5006 * OBSOLETE configurations
5008 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
5009 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
5011 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
5014 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
5015 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
5016 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
5017 be permanently REMOVED.
5019 * Gould support removed
5021 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
5023 * New features for SVR4
5025 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
5026 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
5027 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
5029 * Many C++ enhancements
5031 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
5032 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
5034 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
5036 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
5037 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
5038 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
5039 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
5041 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
5042 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
5044 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
5046 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
5047 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
5048 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
5050 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
5051 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
5053 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
5055 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
5056 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
5057 include ``set remote P-packet''.
5059 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
5061 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
5062 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
5063 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
5065 * ``apropos'' command added.
5067 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
5068 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
5069 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
5073 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
5074 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
5075 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
5076 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
5077 enabled by configuring with:
5079 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
5081 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
5083 * New native configurations
5085 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
5086 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
5087 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
5091 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
5092 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
5093 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
5095 * OBSOLETE configurations
5097 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
5099 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
5100 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
5101 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
5102 be permanently REMOVED.
5106 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
5107 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
5108 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
5109 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
5110 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
5111 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
5112 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
5117 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
5119 * set extension-language
5121 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
5122 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
5123 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
5124 set extension-language .c c++
5125 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
5126 and their associated languages.
5128 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
5130 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
5131 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
5132 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
5136 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
5137 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
5139 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
5140 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
5142 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
5143 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
5144 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
5145 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
5146 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
5147 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
5148 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
5149 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
5151 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
5152 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
5153 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
5154 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
5158 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
5159 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
5160 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
5161 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
5162 for xdb and dbx commands.
5166 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
5167 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
5168 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
5170 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
5171 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
5172 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
5174 * Debugging across forks
5176 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
5181 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
5182 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
5183 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
5185 * GDB remote protocol additions
5187 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
5188 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
5189 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
5190 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
5192 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
5193 full 64-bit address. The command
5195 set remoteaddresssize 32
5197 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
5198 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
5201 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
5202 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
5204 maint packet heythere
5206 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
5207 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
5210 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
5211 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
5212 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
5214 * Tracing can collect general expressions
5216 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
5217 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
5218 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
5220 * mask-address variable for Mips
5222 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
5223 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
5224 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
5226 * Higher serial baud rates
5228 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
5229 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
5230 to achieve all of these rates.)
5234 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
5235 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
5238 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
5240 * New native configurations
5242 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
5243 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
5244 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
5245 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
5246 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
5247 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
5248 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
5252 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
5253 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
5254 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
5255 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
5256 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
5257 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
5258 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
5259 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
5260 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
5261 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
5262 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
5264 * New debugging protocols
5266 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
5267 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
5268 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
5269 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
5270 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
5271 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
5275 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
5276 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
5281 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
5282 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
5284 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
5286 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
5287 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
5288 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
5290 * Live range splitting
5292 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
5293 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
5294 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
5298 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
5299 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
5303 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
5304 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
5305 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
5310 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
5315 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
5316 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
5317 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
5318 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
5319 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
5320 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
5324 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
5325 the symbol at the specified address.
5329 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
5330 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
5331 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
5332 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
5333 file tracepoint.c for more details.
5337 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
5338 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
5339 of most MIPS variants.
5343 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
5344 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
5345 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
5349 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
5350 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
5351 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
5352 the possible architectures.
5354 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
5356 * New native configurations
5358 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
5359 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
5360 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
5361 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
5362 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
5363 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
5367 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
5368 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5369 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
5370 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
5371 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
5373 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
5377 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
5378 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
5379 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
5380 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
5381 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
5385 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
5387 * Windows 95/NT native
5389 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
5390 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
5391 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
5392 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
5393 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
5395 * dont-repeat command
5397 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
5398 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
5399 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
5400 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
5402 * Send break instead of ^C
5404 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
5405 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
5406 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
5408 * Remote protocol timeout
5410 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
5411 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
5412 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
5414 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
5416 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
5417 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
5418 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
5419 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
5420 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
5422 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
5423 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
5424 automatically on hpux10.
5426 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
5428 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
5430 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
5432 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
5433 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
5434 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
5435 every character. The default value is 1050.
5437 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
5439 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
5440 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
5441 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
5442 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
5443 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
5444 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
5446 * Speedups for remote debugging
5448 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
5449 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
5450 and more efficient S-record downloading.
5452 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
5454 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
5455 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
5457 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
5459 * Psymtabs for XCOFF
5461 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
5462 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
5464 * Remote targets use caching
5466 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
5467 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
5468 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
5469 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
5470 off' turns the the data cache off.
5472 * Remote targets may have threads
5474 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
5475 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
5476 gdb/remote.c for details.
5480 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
5481 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
5482 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
5483 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
5484 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
5485 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
5486 sequence is something like
5488 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
5490 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
5494 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
5495 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
5496 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
5497 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
5498 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
5499 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
5500 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
5501 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
5505 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
5506 but does simplify configuration and building.
5510 GDB now supports hpux10.
5512 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
5514 * New native configurations
5516 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
5517 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
5518 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
5519 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
5523 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
5524 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
5525 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
5526 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
5529 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
5531 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
5532 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
5533 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
5534 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
5535 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
5537 * Arguments to user-defined commands
5539 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
5540 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
5543 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
5545 To execute the command use:
5548 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
5549 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
5550 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
5552 * New `if' and `while' commands
5554 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
5555 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
5556 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
5557 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
5558 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
5559 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
5560 if the expression is zero.
5562 * Fortran source language mode
5564 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
5565 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
5566 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
5567 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
5570 * Better HPUX support
5572 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
5573 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
5574 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
5575 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
5576 that behavior do the following before running the program:
5582 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
5583 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
5589 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
5590 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
5593 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
5594 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
5596 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
5598 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
5599 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
5600 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
5601 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
5602 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
5603 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
5605 * New DOS host serial code
5607 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
5608 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
5611 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
5613 * New "complete" command
5615 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
5616 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
5618 * Trailing space optional in prompt
5620 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
5621 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
5623 * Breakpoint hit counts
5625 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
5626 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
5627 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
5628 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
5629 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
5632 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
5634 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
5635 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
5636 arrays actually contain only short strings.
5638 * Shared library breakpoints
5640 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
5641 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
5643 * Hardware watchpoints
5645 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
5646 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
5648 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
5652 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
5653 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
5655 * Improved Irix 5 support
5657 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
5659 * Improved HPPA support
5661 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
5663 * New native configurations
5665 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
5666 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
5667 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
5668 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
5672 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
5673 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
5676 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
5678 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
5679 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
5683 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
5684 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
5686 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
5688 * Irix 5 is now supported
5692 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
5693 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
5694 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
5695 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
5696 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
5699 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
5701 * User visible changes:
5705 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
5706 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
5707 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
5708 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
5709 debugging info for the mips target).
5711 * DEC Alpha native support
5713 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
5714 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
5715 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
5716 Alpha-specific notes.
5718 * Preliminary thread implementation
5720 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
5722 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
5724 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
5725 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
5728 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
5730 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
5731 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
5732 call methods, ...etc.
5734 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
5736 * User visible changes:
5738 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
5739 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
5740 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
5741 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
5743 Filename completion now works.
5745 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
5746 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
5747 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
5749 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
5750 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
5751 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
5752 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
5753 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
5757 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
5758 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
5761 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
5765 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
5766 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
5767 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
5771 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
5772 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
5773 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
5774 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
5775 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
5779 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
5780 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
5781 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
5783 * New targets supported
5785 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
5786 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
5787 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
5788 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
5789 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
5791 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
5792 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
5793 GO32 memory extender.
5795 * New remote protocols
5797 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
5799 * New source languages supported
5801 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
5802 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
5803 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
5806 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
5808 * HP Precision Architecture supported
5810 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
5811 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
5812 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
5813 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
5814 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
5815 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
5817 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
5819 * Faster and better demangling
5821 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
5822 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
5823 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
5824 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
5825 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
5826 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
5829 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
5830 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
5831 compiler does not actually implement.
5833 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
5835 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
5836 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
5837 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
5838 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
5839 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
5840 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
5843 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
5844 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
5846 * Improved configure script
5848 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
5849 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
5850 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
5851 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
5853 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
5854 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
5855 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
5856 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
5857 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
5858 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
5860 * Documentation improvements
5862 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
5863 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
5864 before submitting changes.
5866 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
5867 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
5868 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
5869 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
5870 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
5872 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
5873 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
5874 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
5875 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
5876 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
5877 around this problem.
5881 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
5882 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
5883 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
5886 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
5887 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
5889 * New native hosts supported
5891 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
5892 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
5894 * New targets supported
5896 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
5898 * New file formats supported
5900 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
5901 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
5905 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
5907 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
5908 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
5910 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
5911 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
5912 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
5914 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
5915 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
5917 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
5918 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
5919 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
5922 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
5923 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
5924 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
5925 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
5926 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
5928 * Internal improvements
5930 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
5931 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
5933 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
5934 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
5935 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
5936 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
5937 shared code that handles any of them.
5939 * New command line options
5941 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
5945 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
5946 General Public License.
5948 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
5950 * Host/native/target split
5952 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
5953 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
5954 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
5955 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
5956 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
5958 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
5959 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
5960 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
5961 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
5962 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
5963 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
5964 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
5966 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
5967 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
5968 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
5970 * New hosts supported
5972 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
5973 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
5974 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
5976 * New targets supported
5978 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
5979 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
5981 * New native hosts supported
5983 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
5984 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
5985 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
5987 * New file formats supported
5989 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
5990 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
5991 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
5995 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
5996 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
5997 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
5999 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
6001 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
6002 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
6003 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
6004 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
6008 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
6009 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
6010 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
6012 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
6016 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
6017 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
6020 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
6021 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
6023 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
6024 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
6025 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
6026 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
6027 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
6028 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
6030 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
6031 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
6032 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
6033 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
6037 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
6038 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
6039 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
6040 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
6041 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
6043 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
6044 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
6045 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
6046 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
6050 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
6051 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
6052 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
6053 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
6054 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
6055 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
6056 each instruction being stepped through.
6058 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
6059 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
6061 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
6062 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
6063 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
6064 processor with a serial port.
6068 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
6069 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
6070 supported, and what files each one uses.
6074 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
6075 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
6076 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
6077 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
6079 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
6080 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
6081 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
6082 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
6086 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
6087 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
6088 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
6089 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
6090 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
6091 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
6093 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
6096 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
6098 * Better support for C++ function names
6100 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
6101 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
6102 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
6103 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
6104 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
6106 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
6107 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
6108 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
6109 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
6110 for the list of formats.
6112 * G++ symbol mangling problem
6114 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
6115 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
6116 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
6117 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
6118 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
6119 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
6122 * New 'maintenance' command
6124 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
6125 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
6126 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
6128 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
6129 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
6130 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
6131 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
6132 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
6133 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
6135 The following commands are new:
6137 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
6138 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
6139 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
6141 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
6143 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
6144 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
6145 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
6146 read after argv processing.
6148 * New hosts supported
6150 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
6152 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
6154 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
6155 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
6156 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
6157 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
6158 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
6161 * New targets supported
6163 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
6165 * More smarts about finding #include files
6167 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
6168 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
6169 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
6170 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
6171 the one that contains your sources.
6173 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
6174 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
6175 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
6177 * Interesting infernals change
6179 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
6180 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
6181 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
6182 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
6184 * Bug fixes (of course!)
6186 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
6187 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
6188 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
6190 See the ChangeLog for details.
6192 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
6194 * New machines supported (host and target)
6196 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
6198 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
6200 * New malloc package
6202 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
6203 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
6204 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
6205 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
6206 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
6207 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
6211 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
6212 'help info proc' for details.
6214 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
6216 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
6217 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
6220 * File name changes for MS-DOS
6222 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
6223 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
6224 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
6225 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
6226 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
6227 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
6229 * Cross byte order fixes
6231 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
6232 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
6234 * New -mapped and -readnow options
6236 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
6237 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
6238 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
6239 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
6240 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
6241 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
6242 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
6243 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
6244 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
6245 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
6247 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
6248 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
6249 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
6250 slower, but makes future operations faster.
6252 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
6253 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
6254 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
6257 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
6259 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
6260 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
6261 shared across multiple host platforms.
6263 * longjmp() handling
6265 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
6266 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
6267 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
6268 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
6272 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
6273 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
6278 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
6279 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
6280 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
6282 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
6284 * New machines supported (host and target)
6286 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
6288 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
6289 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
6291 * New machines supported (target)
6293 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
6297 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
6298 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
6299 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
6301 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
6302 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
6303 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
6304 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
6305 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
6308 * New features for SVR4
6310 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
6311 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
6312 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
6314 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
6315 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
6316 it prints the address mappings of the process.
6318 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
6319 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
6321 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
6323 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
6324 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
6325 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
6326 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
6327 same code linked statically.
6331 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
6332 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
6333 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
6334 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
6335 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
6336 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
6340 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
6341 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
6342 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
6345 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
6347 * New machines supported (host and target)
6349 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
6350 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
6351 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
6353 * Almost SCO Unix support
6355 We had hoped to support:
6356 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
6357 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
6358 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
6359 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
6361 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
6363 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
6364 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
6365 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
6366 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
6371 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
6372 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
6373 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
6377 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
6378 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
6379 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
6381 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
6383 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
6384 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
6385 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
6387 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
6388 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
6389 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
6390 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
6393 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
6394 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
6395 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
6396 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
6399 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
6400 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
6403 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
6404 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
6405 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
6408 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
6410 * Improved configuration
6412 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
6413 Porting BFD is simpler.
6417 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
6418 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
6419 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
6420 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
6424 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
6426 * New host supported (not target)
6428 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
6431 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
6433 * Multiple source language support
6435 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
6436 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
6437 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
6438 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
6439 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
6440 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
6444 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
6445 currently under development at the State University of New York at
6446 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
6447 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
6449 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
6450 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
6451 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
6453 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
6454 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
6458 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
6459 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
6460 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
6461 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
6464 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
6466 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
6467 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
6468 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
6469 examining core files.
6473 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
6476 * New machines supported (host and target)
6478 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
6479 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
6480 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
6482 * New hosts supported (not targets)
6484 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
6486 * New targets supported (not hosts)
6488 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
6489 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
6490 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
6492 * New remote interfaces
6498 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
6502 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
6504 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
6505 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
6506 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
6507 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
6508 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
6509 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
6510 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
6511 stub on the target system.
6513 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
6515 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
6516 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
6517 object file types such as a.out and coff.
6519 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
6520 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
6523 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
6525 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
6526 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
6528 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
6529 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
6530 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
6532 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
6533 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
6534 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
6535 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
6537 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
6538 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
6539 it is already running. Default is ON.
6541 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
6542 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
6543 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
6544 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
6547 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
6548 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
6549 or the value of the environment variable
6552 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
6553 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
6556 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
6557 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
6558 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
6560 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
6561 history expansion will be performed on
6562 command line input. The default is OFF.
6564 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
6565 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
6566 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
6568 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
6569 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
6570 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
6573 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
6574 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
6575 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
6578 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
6579 ``set width'' instead.
6581 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
6582 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
6583 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
6584 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
6586 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
6589 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
6592 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
6595 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
6598 * Support for Epoch Environment.
6600 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
6601 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
6602 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
6606 * Support for Shared Libraries
6608 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
6609 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
6610 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
6611 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
6612 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
6613 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
6614 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
6615 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
6617 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
6618 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
6619 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
6621 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
6626 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
6627 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
6628 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
6629 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
6630 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
6631 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
6633 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
6635 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
6637 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
6638 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
6639 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
6642 * C++ multiple inheritance
6644 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
6647 * C++ exception handling
6649 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
6650 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
6651 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
6654 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
6655 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
6656 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
6658 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
6659 current stack frame.
6662 * Minor command changes
6664 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
6665 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
6666 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
6668 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
6669 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
6670 frames without printing.
6672 * New directory command
6674 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
6675 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
6676 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
6677 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
6678 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
6680 * Configuring GDB for compilation
6682 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
6685 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
6686 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
6687 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
6688 where the program that you are debugging will run.
projects / external / binutils.git / blob