binutils/NEWS

   1 -*- text -*-
   2 * Add a new command line option, --insn-width=WIDTH, to objdump to specify
   3 number of bytes to be displayed on a single line when disassembling
   4 instructions.
   5
   6 * Readelf can now display the relocated contents of a section as a sequence
   7   of bytes via the --relocated-dump=<name|number> command line option.
   8
   9 * The gprof program has been given a new command line option:
  10   --external-symbols-table=<filename> which reads in symbols from a specified
  11   file.
  12
  13 * The plugin target has been added to bfd. It can load the same shared objects
  14   used by gold and uses them to provide basic support for new file formats.
  15
  16 * The verilog memory hex dump file format is now supported as an output format
  17   for objcopy.
  18
  19 * Add --file-alignment, --heap, --image-base, --section-alignment,
  20   --stack and --subsystem command line options to objcopy, which will
  21   set PE optional header.
  22
  23 * Option --dwarf/-W of objdump is now as flexible as readelf --debug-dump/-w.
  24
  25 * --as-needed now links in a dynamic library if it satisfies undefined
  26   symbols in regular objects, or in other dynamic libraries.  In the
  27   latter case the library is not linked if it is found in a DT_NEEDED
  28   entry of one of the libraries already linked.
  29
  30 * Added --prefix=PREFIX and --prefix-strip=LEVEL switches to objdump to
  31   add absolute paths for -S.
  32
  33 * Add new option --use-nul-prefixed-import-tables to dlltool to allow fall-
  34   back to old import table generation with null element prefix.
  35
  36 * Added --identify-strict switch to cause --identify <implib> to
  37   report an error when the import library is associated with
  38   multiple DLLs.
  39
  40 * Added --identify <implib> option to dlltool, which determines the
  41   name of the DLL associated with the specified <implib>.
  42
  43 * Support for PowerPC booke64 instructions has been removed.  The assembler no
  44   longer accepts -mbooke32 or -mbooke64 and the disassembler no longer accepts
  45   -Mbooke32 or -Mbooke64.  Instead, -mbooke and -Mbooke should be used.
  46
  47 Changes in 2.19:
  48
  49 * Added -wL switch to dump decoded contents of .debug_line.
  50
  51 * Added support for "thin" archives which contain pathnames pointing to
  52   object files rather than the files themselves and which contain a
  53   flattened symbol index for all objects, and archives, which have been
  54   added to the archive.
  55
  56 * Added -F switch to objdump to include file offsets in the disassembly.
  57
  58 * Added -c switch to readelf to allow string dumps of archive symbol index.
  59
  60 * Support for SSE5 has been added to the i386 port.
  61
  62 * Added -p switch to readelf to allow string dumps of sections.
  63
  64 Changes in 2.18:
  65
  66 * Resolved 37 coding problems in bfd including static array overruns, null
  67   pointer dereferences and use of a malloc buffer after it has been freed, as
  68   revealed by static analysis donated by Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
  69
  70 * The binutils sources are now released under version 3 of the GNU General
  71   Public License.
  72
  73 * A new tool "windmc" has been added for some targets.  This is a message
  74   compiler which attempts to be compatible with the MS version.
  75
  76 * Add codepage support to the windres tool.  It now supports many new
  77   resource types (e.g. MANIFEST, TOOLBAR, etc).  The output generation
  78   for binary files is done now via bfd itself.  The endianess problems
  79   for different hosts are solved.  Dumps of .res files can now be
  80   re-compiled by windres without lossing resources or compilation errors.
  81   Some problems on dialog resource translations are corrected.
  82
  83 * Add --extract-symbol command line option to objcopy, which will
  84   strip everything out of an ordinary object file or executable except
  85   for its symbol table.  Files containing just symbols can be useful
  86   to some OSes.
  87
  88 Changes in 2.17:
  89
  90 * Add "-x NAME" to readelf in addition to "-x NUMBER".
  91
  92 * Add -i and -t switches to cxxfilt.  -i disables the display of implementation
  93   specific extra demangling information (if any) and -t disables the demangling
  94   of types.
  95
  96 * Add support for the "@<file>" syntax to the command lines of all tools, so
  97   that extra switches can be read from <file>.
  98
  99 * Add "-W/--dwarf" to objdump to display the contents of the DWARF
 100   debug sections.
 101
 102 * Add "-t/--section-details" to readelf to display section details.
 103   "-N/--full-section-name" is deprecated.
 104
 105 * powerpc-linux ld now supports a variant form of PLT and GOT for the security
 106   conscious.  This form will automatically be chosen when ld detects that all
 107   code in regular object files was generated by gcc -msecure-plt.  The old PLT
 108   and GOT may be forced by a new ld option, --bss-plt.
 109
 110 * Add "-i/--inlines" to addr2line to print enclosing scope information
 111   for inlined function chains, back to first non-inlined function.
 112
 113 * Add "-N/--full-section-name" to readelf to display full section name.
 114
 115 * Add "-M entry:<addr>" switch to objdump to specify a function entry address
 116   when disassembling VAX binaries.
 117
 118 * Add "--globalize-symbol <name>" and "--globalize-symbols <filename>" switches
 119   to objcopy to convert local symbols into global symbols.
 120
 121 * gprof now allows input files to have histogram records for
 122   several memory ranges, provided those ranges are disjoint.
 123
 124 Changes in 2.16:
 125
 126 * Add "-g/--section-groups" to readelf to display section groups.
 127
 128 * objcopy recognizes two new options --strip-unneeded-symbol and
 129   --strip-unneeded-symbols, namely for use together with the wildcard
 130   matching the original --strip-symbol/--strip-symbols provided, but
 131   retaining any symbols matching but needed by relocations.
 132
 133 * readelf can now display address ranges from .debug_range sections.  This
 134   happens automatically when a DW_AT_range attribute is encountered.  The
 135   command line switch --debug-dump=Ranges (or -wR) can also be used to display
 136   the contents of the .debug_range section.
 137
 138 * nm and objdump now have a switch "--special-syms" to enable the displaying of
 139   symbols which the target considers to be special.  By default these symbols
 140   are no longer displayed.  Currently the only special symbols are the Mapping
 141   symbols used by the ARM port to mark transitions between text and data and
 142   between ARM and THUMB code.
 143
 144 * dlltool has a switch "--ext-prefix-alias <prefix>" to generate additional
 145   import and export symbols with <preifx> prepended to them.
 146
 147 Changes in 2.15:
 148
 149 * objcopy for MIPS targets now accepts "-M no-aliases" as an option to the
 150   disassembler to print the "raw" mips instruction mnemonic instead of some
 151   pseudo instruction name.  I.E. print "daddu" or "or" instead of "move",
 152   "sll" instead of "nop", etc.
 153
 154 * objcopy and strip can now take wildcard patterns in symbol names specified on
 155   the command line provided that the --wildcard switch is used to enable them.
 156
 157 * readelf can now parse archives.
 158
 159 * objdump now accepts --debugging-tags to print the debug information in a
 160   format compatible with ctags tool.
 161
 162 * objcopy and strip now accept --only-keep-debug to create a file containing
 163   those sections that would be stripped out by --strip-debug.  The idea is that
 164   this can be used in conjunction with the --add-gnu-debuglink switch to create
 165   a two part program distribution - one a stripped executable and the other the
 166   debugging info.
 167
 168 * objcopy now accepts --add-gnu-debuglink=<file> to insert a .gnu_debuglink
 169   section into a (presumably stripped) executable.  This allows the debug
 170   information for the file to be held in a separate file.
 171
 172 * BFD marks the sections .comment and .note as 'n' in the BSD/POSIX
 173   single-character representation.  This can be checked by running nm
 174   with the -a switch.
 175
 176 Changes in 2.14:
 177
 178 * Added --info switch to objcopy and strip.
 179
 180 * Support for Vitesse IQ2000 added by Red Hat.
 181
 182 * Added 'S' encoding to strings to allow the display of 8-bit characters.
 183
 184 * Added --prefix-symbols=<text>, --prefix-sections=<text> and
 185   --prefix-alloc-sections=<text> to objcopy.
 186
 187 * readelf can handle the extensions to the DWARF2 spec used by the Unified
 188   Parallel C compiler.
 189
 190 * BFD no longer declares a "boolean" type, to avoid clashes with other
 191   headers that declare the same.  Users of BFD should replace boolean,
 192   false and true, with int, 0 and 1, or define their own boolean type.
 193
 194 * Support for IP2K added by Denis Chertykov.
 195
 196 Changes in 2.13:
 197
 198 * Support for the Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat. Models for FR400
 199   and FR500 included.
 200
 201 Changes in version 2.12:
 202
 203 * Support for Don Knuth's MMIX, by Hans-Peter Nilsson.
 204
 205 * size: Add --totals to display summary of sizes (Berkeley format only).
 206
 207 * readelf: Add --wide option to not break section header or segment listing
 208   lines to fit into 80 columns.
 209
 210 * strings: Add --encoding to display wide character strings.  By Markus Kuhn.
 211
 212 * objcopy: Add --rename-section to change section names.
 213
 214 * readelf: Support added for DWARF 2.1 extensions.  Support added for
 215   displaying the contents of .debug.macinfo sections.
 216
 217 * New command line switches added to objcopy to allow symbols to be kept as
 218   global symbols, and also to specify files containing lists of such symbols.
 219   by Honda Hiroki.
 220
 221 * Support for OpenRISC by Johan Rydberg.
 222
 223 * New command line switch to objcopy --alt-machine-code which creates a binary
 224   with an alternate machine code if one is defined in the architecture
 225   description.  Only supported for ELF targets.  By Alexandre Oliva.
 226
 227 * New command line switch to objcopy -B (or --binary-architecture) which sets
 228   the architecture of the output file to the given argument.  This option only
 229   makes sense, if the input target is binary.  Otherwise it is ignored.
 230   By Stefan Geuken.
 231
 232 * Support for PDP-11 by Lars Brinkhoff.
 233
 234 Changes in binutils 2.11:
 235
 236 * Add support for ARM v5t and v5te architectures and Intel's XScale ARM
 237   extenstions.
 238
 239 * Add --srec-len and --srec-forceS3 command line switch to objcopy.
 240   By Luciano Gemme.
 241
 242 * Support for the MIPS32, by Anders Norlander.
 243
 244 * Support for the i860, by Jason Eckhardt.
 245
 246 * Support for CRIS (Axis Communications ETRAX series).
 247
 248 Changes in binutils 2.10:
 249
 250 * Support for 64-bit ELF on HPPA.
 251
 252 * New command line switch to objdump --file-start-context which shows the
 253   entire file contents up to the source line first encountered for a given
 254   file.
 255
 256 * New command line switch to objdump -M (or --disassembler-options) which takes
 257   a parameter which can then be interpreted on a per-target basis by the
 258   disassembler.  Used by ARM targets to select register name sets, ISA, APCS or
 259   raw verions.
 260
 261 * objdump support for -mi386:intel which causes disassembly to be displayed
 262   with intel syntax.
 263
 264 * New program: readelf.  This displays the contents of ELF format files,
 265   regardless of target machine.
 266
 267 * objcopy now takes --change-section-lma, --change-section-vma, and
 268   --change-section-address options.  The old --adjust-section-vma option is
 269   equivalent to --change-section-address.  The other --adjust-* options are now
 270   renamed to --change-*, although --adjust-* continues to work.
 271
 272 * objcopy has a --redefine-sym option that lets you rename symbols.
 273
 274 * objcopy now takes a -j/--only-section option to copy only the specified
 275   sections.
 276
 277 * dlltool now supports the IMPORTS command.
 278
 279 * dlltool now takes --export-all-symbols, --no-export-all-symbols,
 280   --exclude-symbols, and --no-default-excludes options.
 281
 282 Changes in binutils 2.9:
 283
 284 * Added windres program, which can be used to manipulate resources in WIN32
 285   files as used on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
 286
 287 * The objcopy --gap-fill and --pad-to options operate on the LMA rather than
 288   the VMA of the sections.
 289
 290 * Added S modifier to ar to not build a symbol table.
 291
 292 Changes in binutils 2.8:
 293
 294 * The objdump disassembly format has been changed, and hopefully improved.  Use
 295   the new --prefix-addresses option to get the old format.  There are also new
 296   --disassemble-zeroes and --no-show-raw-insn options which affect disassembler
 297   output.
 298
 299 * Formats may now be specified as configuration triplets.  For example,
 300   objdump -b i386-pc-linux.  The triplets are not passed through config.sub,
 301   so they must be in canonical form.
 302
 303 * Added new addr2line program.  This uses the debugging information to convert
 304   an address into a file name and line number within a program.
 305
 306 * Added --change-leading-char argument to objcopy.
 307
 308 * Added --weaken argument to objcopy.
 309
 310 * objdump --dynamic-reloc now works on ELF executables and shared libraries.
 311
 312 * Added --adjust-vma option to objdump.
 313
 314 * Added -C/--demangle option to objdump.
 315
 316 * Added -p/--preserve-dates option to strip and objcopy.
 317
 318 Changes in binutils 2.7:
 319
 320 * Added --enable-shared and --enable-commonbfdlib options to configure.
 321
 322 * Added --debugging argument to objdump and objcopy.
 323
 324 * Added --defined-only argument to nm.
 325
 326 * Added --remove-leading-char argument to objcopy.
 327
 328 * The objdump --line-numbers option is now meaningful with --reloc.
 329
 330 * Added --line-numbers option to nm.
 331
 332 * Added --endian/-EB/-EL option to objdump.
 333
 334 * Added support for Alpha OpenVMS/AXP.
 335
 336 Changes in binutils 2.6:
 337
 338 * Added -N/--strip-symbol and -K/--keep-symbol arguments to strip and objcopy.
 339
 340 * Added several arguments to objcopy to provide some control over how the new
 341   file is laid out in memory.  Also added binary output format to BFD to permit
 342   generating plain binary files.
 343
 344 * Added --start-address and --stop-address options to objdump.
 345
 346 * ar and ranlib now work on AIX.  The tools are now built by default on AIX.
 347
 348 Changes in binutils 2.5:
 349
 350 * Changed objdump -dr to dump the relocs interspersed with the assembly
 351   listing, for a more useful listing of relocatable files.
 352
 353 * Changed objdump -d/--disassemble to only disassemble SEC_CODE sections.
 354   Added -D/--disassemble-all option to disassemble all sections.
 355
 356 * Added --size-sort option to nm.
 357
 358 * strip and objcopy should now be able to handle dynamically linked ELF
 359   executables.
 360
 361 Changes in binutils 2.4:
 362
 363 * Support for HP-PA (by Jeff Law), i386 Mach (by David Mackenzie), RS/6000 and
 364   PowerPC (except ar and ranlib; by Ian Taylor).
 365
 366 * Support for Irix 5.
 367
 368 * Programs `strip' and `objcopy' will not attempt to write dynamically linked
 369   ELF output files, since BFD currently can't create them properly.
 370
 371 Changes in binutils 2.3:
 372
 373 * A new --stabs argument has been added to objdump to dump stabs sections in
 374   ELF and COFF files.
 375
 376 * A new program, nlmconv, has been added.  It can convert object files into
 377   Novell NetWare Loadable Modules.
 378
 379 * The strings program has been added.
 380
 381 Changes in binutils 2.2:
 382
 383 * The 'copy' program has been renamed to 'objcopy', for consistency with
 384   'objdump', and because 'copy' might more plausibly be used as a synonym for
 385   'cp'.
 386
 387 * The new stand-alone program c++filt is a filter that converts encoded
 388   (mangled) C++ assembly-level identifiers to user-level names.  (Note: This
 389   may get moved to the gcc distribution.)
 390
 391 * nm -o on an archive now prefixes each line with the archive name, matching
 392   the output from BSD nm.
 393
 394 * ar (and ld) can now read (but not write) BSD4.4-style archives.
 395
 396 * New support for H8500, Z8000, and the Hitach SH.
 397
 398 * Dis-assembler interface changed to allow sharing with gdb.
 399
 400 * There is new Elf code, but it is not yet ready for general use.
 401
 402 * There is the beginnings of a test suite.
 403
 404 Changes in binutils 2.1:
 405
 406 * There is now support for writing ECOFF files, so ld and the other utilities
 407   should work on Risc/Ultrix and Irix.  Please let us know how well this works.
 408
 409 * ar now automatically creates a symbol table (a __.SYMDEF member, in the BSD
 410   version), if there are any object files in the archive.  So running ranlib is
 411   now redundant (unless the non-standard q command is used).  This is required
 412   for Posix.2 conformance.
 413
 414 * The archive-reading code now reads both BSD-style and SYSV-style archives
 415   independently of the selected target format.  This is to encourage people to
 416   switch to SYSV-format, which has a number of advantages.
 417
 418 * The strip and copy programs now have options to remove debug-symbols only
 419   and/or local symbols only.  They now also support long options.
 420
 421 \f
 422 Local variables:
 423 fill-column: 79
 424 End: