1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB 6.8
6 * Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
7 which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
9 * The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
10 list of section offsets.
12 * New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
14 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
15 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
21 Display timestamps with GDB debugging output.
26 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
28 set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
30 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
31 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
32 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
34 *** Changes in GDB 6.8
36 * New native configurations
38 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
39 Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
43 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
44 Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
46 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
48 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
49 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
50 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
51 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
53 * GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
54 (mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
56 * Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
59 * GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
60 including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
61 and in inlined functions.
63 * GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
64 accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
65 more than one contiguous range of addresses.
67 * Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
69 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
70 registers on PowerPC targets.
72 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
73 targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
75 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
76 commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
78 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
81 * hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
82 The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
83 error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
84 The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
86 * GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
87 building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
90 * GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
91 Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
92 now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
93 stored in two consecutive float registers.
95 * The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
98 * Improved support for debugging Ada
99 Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
101 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
102 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
103 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
104 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
106 - Improved command completion in Ada
111 set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
112 show print frame-arguments
113 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
114 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
119 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
126 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
135 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
137 * GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
141 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
145 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
147 *** Changes in GDB 6.7
149 * Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
150 bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
151 Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
153 * When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
154 symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
155 -Bsymbolic linker option.
157 * When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
158 recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
161 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
162 frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
164 * GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
165 32-bit or 64-bit register values.
167 * Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
169 * GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
170 target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
171 a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
173 * Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
174 automatically displayed as character or string data.
176 * The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
177 arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
180 * Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
181 for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
182 only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
184 * GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
187 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
188 ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
189 has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
191 * GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
193 * GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
195 * The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
196 layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
197 segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
199 * The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
200 immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
202 * The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
203 "library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
204 packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
205 where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
206 Windows and SymbianOS).
208 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
209 (DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
211 * GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
212 according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
218 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
219 when debugging using remote targets.
221 set mem inaccessible-by-default
222 show mem inaccessible-by-default
223 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
224 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
225 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
226 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
227 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
229 set breakpoint auto-hw
230 show breakpoint auto-hw
231 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
232 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
233 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
234 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
235 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
236 including "next" and "finish".
239 catch exception unhandled
240 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
243 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
247 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
248 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
249 an alias to "set sysroot".
252 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
253 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
256 * New native configurations
258 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
263 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
264 not query the target for its built-in description.
268 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
269 MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
270 Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
275 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
276 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
279 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
284 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
285 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
287 qXfer:libraries:read:
288 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
289 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
290 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
291 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
295 Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
304 i[34567]86-*-netware*
305 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
306 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
308 i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
311 i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
312 i[34567]86-*-unixware*
321 * Other removed features
328 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
335 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
340 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
341 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
346 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
347 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
349 Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
351 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
352 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
353 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
354 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
358 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
359 in debugging information.
363 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
364 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
366 set mips stack-arg-size
367 set mips saved-gpreg-size
369 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
371 *** Changes in GDB 6.6
376 Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
378 * GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
379 (mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
380 running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
382 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
383 Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
386 * The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
387 broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
389 * The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
390 stub provides the required support.
392 * Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
393 longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
398 unset substitute-path
400 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
401 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
402 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
403 between compilation and debugging.
407 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
408 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
409 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
413 The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
415 Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
416 an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
418 The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
423 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
424 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
425 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
426 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
430 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
431 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
433 qXfer:memory-map:read:
434 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
435 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
440 Erase and program a flash memory device.
442 * Removed remote packets
445 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
446 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
448 *** Changes in GDB 6.5
452 Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
454 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
458 init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
459 only if it doesn't already have a value.
461 The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
463 checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
465 restart <n> Return the program state to a
466 previously saved state.
468 info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
470 delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
472 set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
473 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
475 info forks List forks of the user program that
476 are available to be debugged.
478 fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
479 forks of the user program that are
480 available to be debugged.
482 delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
483 that are available to be debugged (and
484 kill the forked process).
486 detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
487 that are available to be debugged (and
488 allow the process to continue).
492 Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
494 * Improved Windows host support
496 GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
497 native console support, and remote communications using either
498 network sockets or serial ports.
500 * Improved Modula-2 language support
502 GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
503 basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
504 pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
505 printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
506 written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
507 GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
511 The ARM rdi-share module.
513 The Netware NLM debug server.
515 *** Changes in GDB 6.4
517 * New native configurations
519 OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
520 OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
524 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
526 * New command line options
528 --batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
529 --return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
530 the child (debugged) program exited with.
531 --eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
532 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
533 specified multiple times and in conjunction
534 with the --command (-x) option.
536 * Deprecated commands removed
538 The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
542 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
543 othernames set arm disassembler
544 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
545 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
546 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
549 * New BSD user-level threads support
551 It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
552 library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
555 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
556 FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
557 OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
559 Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
560 are not yet supported.
562 * New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
563 (Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
565 * REMOVED configurations and files
567 VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
568 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
569 National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
571 * New "set print array-indexes" command
573 After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
574 when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
577 * VAX floating point support
579 GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
581 * User-defined command support
583 In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
584 to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
585 section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
587 *** Changes in GDB 6.3:
589 * New command line option
591 GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
594 * GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
596 GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
597 information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
598 by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
599 proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
600 to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
602 * Internationalization
604 When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
605 internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
606 continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
610 Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
611 implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
612 into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
614 * New native configurations
616 GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
620 GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
621 packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
623 * END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
625 GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
626 The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
627 features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
630 GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
631 compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
632 continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
644 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
645 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
647 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
649 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
650 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
651 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
661 *** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
663 * MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
665 When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
666 heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
669 * MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
671 When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
672 fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
673 IRIX long double values).
677 A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
678 command. This problem has been fixed.
680 *** Changes in GDB 6.2:
682 * Fix for ``many threads''
684 On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
685 rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
688 ptrace: No such process.
689 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
691 This problem has been fixed.
693 * "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
695 Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
698 * New ``start'' command.
700 This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
702 * New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
704 Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
705 live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
706 platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
708 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
709 FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
710 NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
711 NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
712 NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
713 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
714 OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
715 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
716 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
718 * Signal trampoline code overhauled
720 Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
721 These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
722 of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
723 call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
724 signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
726 Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
727 features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
728 include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
730 * Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
732 * New native configurations
734 GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
735 OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
736 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
737 OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
738 OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
739 NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
740 OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
742 * END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
744 GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
745 The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
746 including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
747 migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
748 compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
749 work, was also included.
751 GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
752 module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
762 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
763 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
765 * REMOVED configurations and files
767 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
768 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
769 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
770 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
771 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
772 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
773 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
774 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
775 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
777 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
779 *** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
781 * TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
783 The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
784 GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
785 command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
786 program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
789 * Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
791 Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
792 libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
793 cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
794 GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
795 shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
796 the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
799 Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
801 * Fixed ISO-C build problems
803 The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
804 non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
805 compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
807 * Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
809 Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
810 wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
812 * Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
814 The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
815 permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
816 systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
818 * Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
820 Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
821 has been updated to use constant array sizes.
823 * Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
825 GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
826 its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
827 panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
829 * Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
831 When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
832 by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
833 not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
835 *** Changes in GDB 6.1:
837 * Removed --with-mmalloc
839 Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
840 conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
842 * Changes in AMD64 configurations
844 The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
845 the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
846 and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
847 you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
849 * Revised SPARC target
851 The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
852 FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
853 support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
854 from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
855 (Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
859 GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
860 names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
861 with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
864 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
866 GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
867 arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
870 * C++ nested types and namespaces
872 GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
873 improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
874 is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
875 Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
876 namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
877 "Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
878 frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
879 if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
880 GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
882 * New native configurations
884 NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
885 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
886 OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
887 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
888 OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
890 * New debugging protocols
892 M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
894 * "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
896 The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
897 and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
898 tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
900 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
902 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
903 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
904 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
907 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
908 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
909 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
910 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
911 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
912 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
913 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
914 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
915 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
917 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
919 * REMOVED configurations and files
921 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
922 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
923 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
924 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
925 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
926 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
927 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
928 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
929 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
930 386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
931 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
932 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
933 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
934 SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
935 SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
936 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
937 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
939 *** Changes in GDB 6.0:
943 Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
946 * New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
948 DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
949 information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
950 By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
953 The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
954 have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
959 GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
960 file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
961 remote protocol documentation for details.
963 * All targets using the new architecture framework.
965 All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
966 architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
967 to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
970 * GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
972 GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
973 per-thread variables.
975 * GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
977 GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
978 GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
980 * Separate debug info.
982 GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
983 automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
984 of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
985 system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
986 and optional debug files.
988 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
990 DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
991 describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
994 GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
995 for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
999 A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
1000 Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
1001 considered "useable".
1003 * GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
1005 The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
1006 commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
1009 * GDB supports logging output to a file
1011 There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
1012 used to capture GDB's output to a file.
1014 * The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
1016 The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
1017 disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
1020 * d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
1022 The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
1023 registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
1027 A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
1028 be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
1029 session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
1030 "--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
1031 data, for more informative profiling results.
1033 * Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
1035 The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
1036 option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
1037 "mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
1039 Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
1042 Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
1043 Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
1044 Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
1045 in a subsequent -var-update.
1047 * New native configurations.
1049 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1051 * Multi-arched targets.
1053 HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
1054 Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
1056 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1058 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1059 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1060 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1061 permanently REMOVED.
1063 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1064 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1065 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1066 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
1067 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1068 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
1069 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
1070 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
1071 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
1072 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
1073 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1074 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
1076 * REMOVED configurations and files
1079 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1080 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
1081 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1082 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1083 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
1084 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1086 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
1087 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1088 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1089 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1090 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1091 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1093 * MIPS $fp behavior changed
1095 The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
1096 the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
1097 context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
1098 address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
1099 The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
1101 *** Changes in GDB 5.3:
1103 * GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
1105 When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
1106 `/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
1107 in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
1108 library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
1109 shared libs like mad''.
1111 * ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
1113 Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
1114 the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
1115 arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
1116 powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
1118 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
1120 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
1121 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
1124 The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
1125 invocations in expression, and shows the result.
1127 The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
1128 macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
1130 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
1131 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
1132 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
1133 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
1135 * Multi-arched targets.
1137 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
1138 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
1140 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
1141 Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
1142 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
1146 Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
1149 * New native configurations
1151 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
1152 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
1153 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
1154 UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
1156 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1158 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1159 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1160 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1161 permanently REMOVED.
1163 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1164 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1165 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
1166 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1167 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1168 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1169 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1170 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1171 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
1172 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1174 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
1175 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1177 * OBSOLETE languages
1179 CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
1181 * REMOVED configurations and files
1183 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1184 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1185 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1186 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1187 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1189 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
1191 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
1193 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
1194 commands. The default is 1024.
1196 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
1198 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
1200 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
1202 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
1203 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
1204 from a file into memory (restore).
1206 * Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
1208 The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
1209 including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
1210 of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
1212 *** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
1220 gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
1221 mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
1222 Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
1224 gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
1225 dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
1226 Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
1228 Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
1229 Surprisingly enough, it works now.
1230 By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
1232 i386 hardware watchpoint support:
1233 avoid misses on second run for some targets.
1234 By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
1236 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
1238 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
1240 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
1241 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
1242 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
1243 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
1244 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
1245 (notably embedded) targets.
1247 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
1249 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
1250 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
1251 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
1252 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
1254 * New command line option
1256 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
1258 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
1260 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
1261 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
1262 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
1263 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
1264 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
1265 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
1266 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
1267 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
1268 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
1269 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
1271 * Changes in ARM configurations.
1273 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
1274 configuration is fully multi-arch.
1276 * New native configurations
1278 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
1279 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
1280 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
1281 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
1285 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
1287 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1289 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1290 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1291 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1292 permanently REMOVED.
1294 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1295 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1296 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1297 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1298 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1300 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
1302 * REMOVED configurations and files
1304 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1306 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1307 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1308 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
1309 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1310 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1311 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
1312 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
1313 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1314 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1315 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
1316 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
1318 * Changes to command line processing
1320 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
1321 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
1323 * Changes to key bindings
1325 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
1327 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
1329 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
1331 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
1334 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
1336 Numerous documentation fixes.
1338 Numerous testsuite fixes.
1340 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
1342 * New native configurations
1344 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
1345 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
1346 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
1347 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1348 ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
1349 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
1353 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
1355 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
1357 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1359 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
1360 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1361 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1362 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
1363 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1365 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1366 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1367 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1368 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
1369 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
1370 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1371 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
1372 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
1374 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
1375 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
1377 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1378 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1379 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1380 permanently REMOVED.
1382 * REMOVED configurations and files
1384 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1385 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
1387 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
1391 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
1393 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
1394 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
1399 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
1401 * The MI enabled by default.
1403 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
1404 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
1405 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
1406 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
1407 which is now deprecated.
1409 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
1411 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
1412 main features are supported:
1414 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
1416 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
1419 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
1421 - a Pascal expression parser.
1423 However, some important features are not yet supported.
1425 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
1427 - there are some problems with boolean types;
1429 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
1430 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
1432 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
1434 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
1436 * Changes in completion.
1438 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
1439 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
1440 users expect at the shell prompt.
1442 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
1443 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
1444 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
1445 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
1446 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
1447 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
1448 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
1450 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
1452 * New platform-independent commands:
1454 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
1455 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
1456 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
1458 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
1460 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
1461 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
1462 many threads as your system allows you to have.
1464 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
1466 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
1467 multi-threaded programs though.
1469 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
1471 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
1473 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
1474 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
1477 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
1479 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
1480 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
1481 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
1482 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
1483 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
1486 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
1487 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
1488 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
1490 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
1492 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
1493 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
1495 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
1496 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
1499 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
1500 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
1501 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
1502 a given linear address.
1504 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
1505 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
1506 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
1508 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
1510 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
1512 * Changes in documentation.
1514 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
1515 Documentation License.
1517 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1520 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
1522 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1525 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
1526 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
1527 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
1529 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
1531 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
1532 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
1533 contents of this file.
1537 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
1539 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
1541 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
1543 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
1544 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
1545 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
1546 greater level of detail.
1548 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
1550 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
1551 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
1552 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
1555 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
1557 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
1558 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
1559 machines ``out of the box''.
1561 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
1562 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
1563 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
1564 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
1565 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
1567 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
1568 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
1569 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
1570 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
1571 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
1573 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
1574 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
1577 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
1580 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
1581 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
1582 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
1583 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
1585 * New native configurations
1587 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
1588 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
1592 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
1593 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
1594 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
1595 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1597 * OBSOLETE configurations
1599 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1600 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
1602 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
1605 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1606 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1607 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1608 be permanently REMOVED.
1610 * Gould support removed
1612 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
1614 * New features for SVR4
1616 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
1617 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
1618 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
1620 * Many C++ enhancements
1622 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
1623 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
1625 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
1627 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
1628 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
1629 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
1630 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
1632 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
1633 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
1635 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
1637 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
1638 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
1639 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
1641 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
1642 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
1644 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
1646 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
1647 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
1648 include ``set remote P-packet''.
1650 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
1652 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
1653 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
1654 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
1656 * ``apropos'' command added.
1658 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
1659 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
1660 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
1664 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
1665 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
1666 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
1667 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
1668 enabled by configuring with:
1670 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
1672 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
1674 * New native configurations
1676 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
1677 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
1678 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
1682 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1683 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
1684 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1686 * OBSOLETE configurations
1688 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
1690 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
1691 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
1692 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
1693 be permanently REMOVED.
1697 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
1698 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
1699 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
1700 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
1701 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
1703 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
1708 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
1710 * set extension-language
1712 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
1713 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
1714 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
1715 set extension-language .c c++
1716 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
1717 and their associated languages.
1719 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
1721 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
1722 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
1723 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
1727 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
1728 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
1730 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
1731 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
1733 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
1734 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
1735 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
1736 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
1737 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
1738 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
1739 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
1740 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
1742 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
1743 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
1744 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
1745 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
1749 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
1750 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
1751 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
1752 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
1753 for xdb and dbx commands.
1757 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
1758 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
1759 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
1761 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
1762 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
1763 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
1765 * Debugging across forks
1767 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
1772 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
1773 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
1774 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
1776 * GDB remote protocol additions
1778 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
1779 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
1780 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
1781 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
1783 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
1784 full 64-bit address. The command
1786 set remoteaddresssize 32
1788 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
1789 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
1792 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
1793 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
1795 maint packet heythere
1797 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
1798 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
1801 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
1802 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
1803 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
1805 * Tracing can collect general expressions
1807 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
1808 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
1809 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
1811 * mask-address variable for Mips
1813 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
1814 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
1815 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
1817 * Higher serial baud rates
1819 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
1820 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
1821 to achieve all of these rates.)
1825 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
1826 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
1829 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
1831 * New native configurations
1833 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
1834 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
1835 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1836 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
1837 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1838 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
1839 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
1843 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1844 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
1845 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1846 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
1847 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
1848 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
1849 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
1850 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
1851 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
1852 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1853 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
1855 * New debugging protocols
1857 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
1858 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
1859 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
1860 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1861 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1862 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
1866 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
1867 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
1872 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
1873 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
1875 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
1877 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
1878 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
1879 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
1881 * Live range splitting
1883 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
1884 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
1885 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
1889 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
1890 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
1894 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
1895 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
1896 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
1901 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
1906 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
1907 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
1908 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
1909 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
1910 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
1911 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
1915 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
1916 the symbol at the specified address.
1920 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
1921 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
1922 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
1923 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
1924 file tracepoint.c for more details.
1928 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
1929 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
1930 of most MIPS variants.
1934 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
1935 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
1936 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
1940 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
1941 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
1942 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
1943 the possible architectures.
1945 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
1947 * New native configurations
1949 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
1950 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
1951 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
1952 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
1953 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1954 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
1958 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
1959 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1960 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
1961 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
1962 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
1964 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1968 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
1969 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
1970 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
1971 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
1972 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
1976 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
1978 * Windows 95/NT native
1980 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
1981 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
1982 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
1983 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
1984 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
1986 * dont-repeat command
1988 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
1989 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
1990 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
1991 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
1993 * Send break instead of ^C
1995 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
1996 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
1997 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
1999 * Remote protocol timeout
2001 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
2002 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
2003 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
2005 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
2007 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
2008 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
2009 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
2010 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
2011 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
2013 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
2014 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
2015 automatically on hpux10.
2017 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
2019 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
2021 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
2023 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
2024 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
2025 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
2026 every character. The default value is 1050.
2028 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
2030 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
2031 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
2032 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
2033 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
2034 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
2035 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
2037 * Speedups for remote debugging
2039 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
2040 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
2041 and more efficient S-record downloading.
2043 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
2045 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
2046 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
2048 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
2050 * Psymtabs for XCOFF
2052 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
2053 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
2055 * Remote targets use caching
2057 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
2058 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
2059 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
2060 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
2061 off' turns the the data cache off.
2063 * Remote targets may have threads
2065 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
2066 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
2067 gdb/remote.c for details.
2071 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
2072 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
2073 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
2074 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
2075 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
2076 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
2077 sequence is something like
2079 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
2081 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
2085 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
2086 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
2087 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
2088 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
2089 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
2090 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
2091 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
2092 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
2096 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
2097 but does simplify configuration and building.
2101 GDB now supports hpux10.
2103 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
2105 * New native configurations
2107 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
2108 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
2109 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
2110 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
2114 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2115 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
2116 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
2117 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
2120 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
2122 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
2123 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
2124 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
2125 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
2126 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
2128 * Arguments to user-defined commands
2130 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
2131 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
2134 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
2136 To execute the command use:
2139 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
2140 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
2141 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
2143 * New `if' and `while' commands
2145 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
2146 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
2147 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
2148 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
2149 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
2150 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
2151 if the expression is zero.
2153 * Fortran source language mode
2155 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
2156 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
2157 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
2158 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
2161 * Better HPUX support
2163 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
2164 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
2165 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
2166 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
2167 that behavior do the following before running the program:
2173 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
2174 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
2180 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
2181 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
2184 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
2185 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
2187 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
2189 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
2190 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
2191 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
2192 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
2193 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
2194 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
2196 * New DOS host serial code
2198 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
2199 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
2202 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
2204 * New "complete" command
2206 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
2207 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
2209 * Trailing space optional in prompt
2211 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
2212 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
2214 * Breakpoint hit counts
2216 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
2217 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
2218 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
2219 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
2220 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
2223 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
2225 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
2226 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
2227 arrays actually contain only short strings.
2229 * Shared library breakpoints
2231 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
2232 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
2234 * Hardware watchpoints
2236 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
2237 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
2239 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
2243 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
2244 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
2246 * Improved Irix 5 support
2248 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
2250 * Improved HPPA support
2252 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
2254 * New native configurations
2256 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
2257 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2258 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
2259 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
2263 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2264 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
2267 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
2269 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
2270 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
2274 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
2275 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
2277 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
2279 * Irix 5 is now supported
2283 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
2284 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
2285 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
2286 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
2287 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
2290 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
2292 * User visible changes:
2296 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
2297 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
2298 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
2299 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
2300 debugging info for the mips target).
2302 * DEC Alpha native support
2304 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
2305 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
2306 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
2307 Alpha-specific notes.
2309 * Preliminary thread implementation
2311 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
2313 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
2315 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
2316 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
2319 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
2321 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
2322 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
2323 call methods, ...etc.
2325 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
2327 * User visible changes:
2329 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
2330 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
2331 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
2332 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
2334 Filename completion now works.
2336 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
2337 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
2338 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
2340 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
2341 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
2342 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
2343 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
2344 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
2348 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
2349 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
2352 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
2356 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
2357 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
2358 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
2362 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
2363 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
2364 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
2365 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
2366 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
2370 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
2371 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
2372 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
2374 * New targets supported
2376 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2377 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2378 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
2379 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2380 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
2382 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
2383 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
2384 GO32 memory extender.
2386 * New remote protocols
2388 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
2390 * New source languages supported
2392 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
2393 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
2394 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
2397 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
2399 * HP Precision Architecture supported
2401 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
2402 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
2403 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
2404 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
2405 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
2406 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
2408 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
2410 * Faster and better demangling
2412 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
2413 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
2414 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
2415 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
2416 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
2417 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
2420 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
2421 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
2422 compiler does not actually implement.
2424 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
2426 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
2427 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
2428 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
2429 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
2430 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
2431 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
2434 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
2435 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
2437 * Improved configure script
2439 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
2440 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
2441 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
2442 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
2444 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
2445 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
2446 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
2447 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
2448 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
2449 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
2451 * Documentation improvements
2453 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
2454 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
2455 before submitting changes.
2457 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
2458 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
2459 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
2460 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
2461 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
2463 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
2464 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
2465 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
2466 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
2467 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
2468 around this problem.
2472 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
2473 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
2474 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
2477 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
2478 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
2480 * New native hosts supported
2482 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
2483 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
2485 * New targets supported
2487 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
2489 * New file formats supported
2491 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
2492 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
2496 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
2498 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
2499 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
2501 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
2502 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
2503 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
2505 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
2506 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
2508 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
2509 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
2510 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
2513 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
2514 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
2515 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
2516 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
2517 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
2519 * Internal improvements
2521 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
2522 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
2524 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
2525 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
2526 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
2527 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
2528 shared code that handles any of them.
2530 * New command line options
2532 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
2536 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
2537 General Public License.
2539 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
2541 * Host/native/target split
2543 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
2544 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
2545 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
2546 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
2547 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
2549 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
2550 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
2551 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
2552 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
2553 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
2554 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
2555 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
2557 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
2558 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
2559 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
2561 * New hosts supported
2563 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
2564 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2565 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
2567 * New targets supported
2569 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
2570 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
2572 * New native hosts supported
2574 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2575 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
2576 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
2578 * New file formats supported
2580 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
2581 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
2582 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
2586 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
2587 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
2588 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
2590 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
2592 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
2593 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
2594 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
2595 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
2599 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
2600 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
2601 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
2603 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
2607 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
2608 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
2611 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
2612 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
2614 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
2615 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
2616 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
2617 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
2618 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
2619 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
2621 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
2622 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
2623 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
2624 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
2628 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
2629 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
2630 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
2631 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
2632 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
2634 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
2635 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
2636 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
2637 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
2641 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
2642 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
2643 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
2644 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
2645 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
2646 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
2647 each instruction being stepped through.
2649 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
2650 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
2652 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
2653 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
2654 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
2655 processor with a serial port.
2659 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
2660 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
2661 supported, and what files each one uses.
2665 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
2666 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
2667 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
2668 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
2670 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
2671 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
2672 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
2673 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
2677 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
2678 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
2679 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
2680 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
2681 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
2684 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
2687 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
2689 * Better support for C++ function names
2691 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
2692 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
2693 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
2694 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
2695 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
2697 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
2698 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
2699 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
2700 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
2701 for the list of formats.
2703 * G++ symbol mangling problem
2705 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
2706 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
2707 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
2708 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
2709 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
2710 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
2713 * New 'maintenance' command
2715 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
2716 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
2717 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
2719 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
2720 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
2721 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
2722 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
2723 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
2724 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
2726 The following commands are new:
2728 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
2729 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
2730 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
2732 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
2734 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
2735 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
2736 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
2737 read after argv processing.
2739 * New hosts supported
2741 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
2743 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
2745 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
2746 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
2747 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
2748 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
2749 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
2752 * New targets supported
2754 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2756 * More smarts about finding #include files
2758 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
2759 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
2760 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
2761 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
2762 the one that contains your sources.
2764 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
2765 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
2766 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
2768 * Interesting infernals change
2770 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
2771 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
2772 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
2773 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
2775 * Bug fixes (of course!)
2777 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
2778 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
2779 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
2781 See the ChangeLog for details.
2783 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
2785 * New machines supported (host and target)
2787 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
2789 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
2791 * New malloc package
2793 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
2794 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
2795 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
2796 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
2797 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
2798 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
2802 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
2803 'help info proc' for details.
2805 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
2807 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
2808 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
2811 * File name changes for MS-DOS
2813 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
2814 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
2815 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
2816 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
2817 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
2818 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
2820 * Cross byte order fixes
2822 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
2823 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
2825 * New -mapped and -readnow options
2827 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
2828 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
2829 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
2830 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
2831 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
2832 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
2833 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
2834 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
2835 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
2836 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
2838 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
2839 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
2840 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
2841 slower, but makes future operations faster.
2843 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
2844 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
2845 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
2848 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
2850 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
2851 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
2852 shared across multiple host platforms.
2854 * longjmp() handling
2856 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
2857 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
2858 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
2859 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
2863 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
2864 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
2869 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
2870 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
2871 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
2873 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
2875 * New machines supported (host and target)
2877 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2879 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
2880 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
2882 * New machines supported (target)
2884 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2888 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
2889 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
2890 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
2892 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
2893 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
2894 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
2895 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
2896 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
2899 * New features for SVR4
2901 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
2902 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
2903 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
2905 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
2906 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
2907 it prints the address mappings of the process.
2909 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
2912 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
2914 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
2915 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
2916 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
2917 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
2918 same code linked statically.
2922 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
2923 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
2924 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
2925 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
2926 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
2927 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
2931 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
2932 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
2933 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
2936 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
2938 * New machines supported (host and target)
2940 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
2941 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
2942 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2944 * Almost SCO Unix support
2946 We had hoped to support:
2947 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
2948 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
2949 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
2950 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
2952 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
2954 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
2955 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
2956 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
2962 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
2963 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
2964 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
2968 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
2969 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
2970 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
2972 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
2974 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
2975 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
2976 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
2978 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
2979 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
2980 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
2981 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
2984 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
2985 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
2986 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
2987 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
2990 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
2991 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
2994 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
2995 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
2996 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
2999 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
3001 * Improved configuration
3003 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
3004 Porting BFD is simpler.
3008 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
3009 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
3010 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
3011 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
3015 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
3017 * New host supported (not target)
3019 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
3022 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
3024 * Multiple source language support
3026 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
3027 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
3028 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
3029 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
3030 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
3031 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
3035 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
3036 currently under development at the State University of New York at
3037 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
3038 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
3040 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
3041 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
3042 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
3044 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
3045 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
3049 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
3050 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
3051 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
3052 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
3055 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
3057 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
3058 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
3059 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
3060 examining core files.
3064 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
3067 * New machines supported (host and target)
3069 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
3070 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
3071 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
3073 * New hosts supported (not targets)
3075 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
3077 * New targets supported (not hosts)
3079 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
3080 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
3081 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
3083 * New remote interfaces
3089 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
3093 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
3095 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
3096 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
3097 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
3098 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
3099 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
3100 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
3101 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
3102 stub on the target system.
3104 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
3106 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
3107 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
3108 object file types such as a.out and coff.
3110 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
3111 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
3114 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
3116 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
3117 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
3119 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
3120 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
3121 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
3123 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
3124 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
3125 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
3126 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
3128 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
3129 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
3130 it is already running. Default is ON.
3132 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
3133 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
3134 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
3135 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
3138 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
3139 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
3140 or the value of the environment variable
3143 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
3144 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
3147 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
3148 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
3149 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
3151 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
3152 history expansion will be performed on
3153 command line input. The default is OFF.
3155 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
3156 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
3157 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
3159 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
3160 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
3161 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3164 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
3165 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
3166 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3169 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
3170 ``set width'' instead.
3172 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
3173 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
3174 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
3175 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
3177 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
3180 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
3183 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
3186 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
3189 * Support for Epoch Environment.
3191 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
3192 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
3193 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
3197 * Support for Shared Libraries
3199 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
3200 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
3201 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
3202 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
3203 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
3204 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
3205 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
3206 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
3208 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
3209 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
3210 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
3212 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
3217 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
3218 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
3219 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
3220 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
3221 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
3222 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
3224 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
3226 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
3228 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3229 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3230 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3233 * C++ multiple inheritance
3235 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
3238 * C++ exception handling
3240 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
3241 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
3242 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
3245 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
3246 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
3247 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
3249 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
3250 current stack frame.
3253 * Minor command changes
3255 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
3256 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
3257 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
3259 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
3260 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
3261 frames without printing.
3263 * New directory command
3265 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
3266 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
3267 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
3268 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
3269 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
3271 * Configuring GDB for compilation
3273 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
3276 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
3277 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
3278 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
3279 where the program that you are debugging will run.
projects / binutils.git / blob