gas/NEWS

   1 -*- text -*-
   2
   3 * Support for the Ubicom IP2xxx microcontroller added.
   4
   5 Changes in 2.13:
   6
   7 * Support for the Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat. Models for FR400
   8   and FR500 included.
   9
  10 * Support for DLX processor added.
  11
  12 * GASP has now been deprecated and will be removed in a future release.  Use
  13   the macro facilities in GAS instead.
  14
  15 * GASP now correctly parses floating point numbers. Unless the base is
  16   explicitly specified, they are interpreted as decimal numbers regardless of
  17   the currently specified base.
  18
  19 Changes in 2.12:
  20
  21 * Support for Don Knuth's MMIX, by Hans-Peter Nilsson.
  22
  23 * Support for the OpenRISC 32-bit embedded processor by OpenCores.
  24
  25 * The ARM assembler now accepts -march=..., -mcpu=... and -mfpu=... for
  26   specifying the target instruction set.  The old method of specifying the
  27   target processor has been deprecated, but is still accepted for
  28   compatibility.
  29
  30 * Support for the VFP floating-point instruction set has been added to
  31   the ARM assembler.
  32
  33 * New psuedo op: .incbin to include a set of binary data at a given point
  34   in the assembly.  Contributed by Anders Norlander.
  35
  36 * The MIPS assembler now accepts -march/-mtune. -mcpu has been deprecated
  37   but still works for compatability.
  38
  39 * The MIPS assembler no longer issues a warning by default when it
  40   generates a nop instruction from a macro. The new command line option
  41   -n will turn on the warning.
  42
  43 Changes in 2.11:
  44
  45 * Support for PDP-11 and 2.11BSD a.out format, by Lars Brinkhoff.
  46
  47 * x86 gas now supports the full Pentium4 instruction set.
  48
  49 * Support for AMD x86-64 architecture, by Jan Hubicka, SuSE Labs.
  50
  51 * Support for Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12.
  52
  53 * Support for Texas Instruments TMS320C54x (tic54x).
  54
  55 * Support for IA-64.
  56
  57 * Support for i860, by Jason Eckhardt.
  58
  59 * Support for CRIS (Axis Communications ETRAX series).
  60
  61 * x86 gas has a new .arch pseudo op to specify the target CPU architecture.
  62
  63 * x86 gas -q command line option quietens warnings about register size changes
  64   due to suffix, indirect jmp/call without `*', stand-alone prefixes, and
  65   translating various deprecated floating point instructions.
  66
  67 Changes in 2.10:
  68
  69 * Support for the ARM msr instruction was changed to only allow an immediate
  70   operand when altering the flags field.
  71
  72 * Support for ATMEL AVR.
  73
  74 * Support for IBM 370 ELF.  Somewhat experimental.
  75
  76 * Support for numbers with suffixes.
  77
  78 * Added support for breaking to the end of repeat loops.
  79
  80 * Added support for parallel instruction syntax (DOUBLEBAR_PARALLEL).
  81
  82 * New .elseif pseudo-op added.
  83
  84 * New --fatal-warnings option.
  85
  86 * picoJava architecture support added.
  87
  88 * Motorola MCore 210 processor support added.
  89
  90 * A new pseudo-op .intel_syntax has been implemented to allow gas to parse i386
  91   assembly programs with intel syntax.
  92
  93 * New pseudo-ops .func,.endfunc to aid in debugging user-written assembler code.
  94
  95 * Added -gdwarf2 option to generate DWARF 2 debugging information.
  96
  97 * Full 16-bit mode support for i386.
  98
  99 * Greatly improved instruction operand checking for i386.  This change will
 100   produce errors or warnings on incorrect assembly code that previous versions
 101   of gas accepted.  If you get unexpected messages from code that worked with
 102   older versions of gas, please double check the code before reporting a bug.
 103
 104 * Weak symbol support added for COFF targets.
 105
 106 * Mitsubishi D30V support added.
 107
 108 * Texas Instruments c80 (tms320c80) support added.
 109
 110 * i960 ELF support added.
 111
 112 * ARM ELF support added.
 113
 114 Changes in 2.9:
 115
 116 * Texas Instruments c30 (tms320c30) support added.
 117
 118 * The assembler now optimizes the exception frame information generated by egcs
 119   and gcc 2.8.  The new --traditional-format option disables this optimization.
 120
 121 * Added --gstabs option to generate stabs debugging information.
 122
 123 * The -a option takes a new suboption, m (e.g., -alm) to expand macros in a
 124   listing.
 125
 126 * Added -MD option to print dependencies.
 127
 128 Changes in 2.8:
 129
 130 * BeOS support added.
 131
 132 * MIPS16 support added.
 133
 134 * Motorola ColdFire 5200 support added (configure for m68k and use -m5200).
 135
 136 * Alpha/VMS support added.
 137
 138 * m68k options --base-size-default-16, --base-size-default-32,
 139   --disp-size-default-16, and --disp-size-default-32 added.
 140
 141 * The alignment directives now take an optional third argument, which is the
 142   maximum number of bytes to skip.  If doing the alignment would require
 143   skipping more than the given number of bytes, the alignment is not done at
 144   all.
 145
 146 * The ELF assembler has a new pseudo-op, .symver, used for symbol versioning.
 147
 148 * The -a option takes a new suboption, c (e.g., -alc), to skip false
 149   conditionals in listings.
 150
 151 * Added new pseudo-op, .equiv; it's like .equ, except that it is an error if
 152   the symbol is already defined.
 153
 154 Changes in 2.7:
 155
 156 * The PowerPC assembler now allows the use of symbolic register names (r0,
 157   etc.) if -mregnames is used.  Symbolic names preceded by a '%' (%r0, etc.)
 158   can be used any time.  PowerPC 860 move to/from SPR instructions have been
 159   added.
 160
 161 * Alpha Linux (ELF) support added.
 162
 163 * PowerPC ELF support added.
 164
 165 * m68k Linux (ELF) support added.
 166
 167 * i960 Hx/Jx support added.
 168
 169 * i386/PowerPC gnu-win32 support added.
 170
 171 * SCO ELF support added.  For OpenServer 5 targets (i386-unknown-sco3.2v5) the
 172   default is to build COFF-only support.  To get a set of tools that generate
 173   ELF (they'll understand both COFF and ELF), you must configure with
 174   target=i386-unknown-sco3.2v5elf.
 175
 176 * m88k-motorola-sysv3* support added.
 177
 178 Changes in 2.6:
 179
 180 * Gas now directly supports macros, without requiring GASP.
 181
 182 * Gas now has an MRI assembler compatibility mode.  Use -M or --mri to select
 183   MRI mode.  The pseudo-op ``.mri 1'' will switch into the MRI mode until the
 184   ``.mri 0'' is seen; this can be convenient for inline assembler code.
 185
 186 * Added --defsym SYM=VALUE option.
 187
 188 * Added -mips4 support to MIPS assembler.
 189
 190 * Added PIC support to Solaris and SPARC SunOS 4 assembler.
 191
 192 Changes in 2.4:
 193
 194 * Converted this directory to use an autoconf-generated configure script.
 195
 196 * ARM support, from Richard Earnshaw.
 197
 198 * Updated VMS support, from Pat Rankin, including considerably improved
 199   debugging support.
 200
 201 * Support for the control registers in the 68060.
 202
 203 * Handles (ignores) a new directive ".this_GCC_requires_the_GNU_assembler", to
 204   provide for possible future gcc changes, for targets where gas provides some
 205   features not available in the native assembler.  If the native assembler is
 206   used, it should become obvious pretty quickly what the problem is.
 207
 208 * Usage message is available with "--help".
 209
 210 * The GNU Assembler Preprocessor (gasp) is included.  (Actually, it was in 2.3
 211   also, but didn't get into the NEWS file.)
 212
 213 * Weak symbol support for a.out.
 214
 215 * A bug in the listing code which could cause an infinite loop has been fixed.
 216   Bugs in listings when generating a COFF object file have also been fixed.
 217
 218 * Initial i386-svr4 PIC implementation from Eric Youngdale, based on code by
 219   Paul Kranenburg.
 220
 221 * Improved Alpha support.  Immediate constants can have a much larger range
 222   now. Support for the 21164 has been contributed by Digital.
 223
 224 * Updated ns32k (pc532-mach, netbsd532) support from Ian Dall.
 225
 226 Changes in 2.3:
 227
 228 * Mach i386 support, by David Mackenzie and Ken Raeburn.
 229
 230 * RS/6000 and PowerPC support by Ian Taylor.
 231
 232 * VMS command scripts (make-gas.com, config-gas.com) have been worked on a bit,
 233   based on mail received from various people.  The `-h#' option should work
 234   again too.
 235
 236 * HP-PA work, by Jeff Law.  Note, for the PA, gas-2.3 has been designed to work
 237   with gdb-4.12 and gcc-2.6.  As gcc-2.6 has not been released yet, a special
 238   version of gcc-2.5.8 has been patched to work with gas-2.3.  You can retrieve
 239   this special version of gcc-2.5.8 via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu
 240   in the "dist" directory.
 241
 242 * Vax support in gas fixed for BSD, so it builds and seems to run a couple
 243   simple tests okay.  I haven't put it through extensive testing.  (GNU make is
 244   currently required for BSD 4.3 builds.)
 245
 246 * Support for the DEC Alpha, running OSF/1 (ECOFF format).  The gas support is
 247   based on code donated by CMU, which used an a.out-based format.  I'm afraid
 248   the alpha-a.out support is pretty badly mangled, and much of it removed;
 249   making it work will require rewriting it as BFD support for the format anyways.
 250
 251 * Irix 5 support.
 252
 253 * The test suites have been fixed up a bit, so that they should work with a
 254   couple different versions of expect and dejagnu.
 255
 256 * Symbols' values are now handled internally as expressions, permitting more
 257   flexibility in evaluating them in some cases.  Some details of relocation
 258   handling have also changed, and simple constant pool management has been
 259   added, to make the Alpha port easier.
 260
 261 * New option "--statistics" for printing out program run times.  This is
 262   intended to be used with the gcc "-Q" option, which prints out times spent in
 263   various phases of compilation.  (You should be able to get all of them
 264   printed out with "gcc -Q -Wa,--statistics", I think.)
 265
 266 Changes in 2.2:
 267
 268 * RS/6000 AIX and MIPS SGI Irix 5 support has been added.
 269
 270 * Configurations that are still in development (and therefore are convenient to
 271   have listed in configure.in) still get rejected without a minor change to
 272   gas/Makefile.in, so people not doing development work shouldn't get the
 273   impression that support for such configurations is actually believed to be
 274   reliable.
 275
 276 * The program name (usually "as") is printed when a fatal error message is
 277   displayed.  This should prevent some confusion about the source of occasional
 278   messages about "internal errors".
 279
 280 * ELF support is falling into place.  Support for the 386 should be working.
 281   Support for SPARC Solaris is in.  HPPA support from Utah is being integrated.
 282
 283 * Symbol values are maintained as expressions instead of being immediately
 284   boiled down to add-symbol, sub-symbol, and constant.  This permits slightly
 285   more complex calculations involving symbols whose values are not alreadey
 286   known.
 287
 288 * DBX-style debugging info ("stabs") is now supported for COFF formats.
 289   If any stabs directives are seen in the source, GAS will create two new
 290   sections: a ".stab" and a ".stabstr" section.  The format of the .stab
 291   section is nearly identical to the a.out symbol format, and .stabstr is
 292   its string table.  For this to be useful, you must have configured GCC
 293   to generate stabs (by defining DBX_DEBUGGING_INFO), and must have a GDB
 294   that can use the stab sections (4.11 or later).
 295
 296 * LynxOS, on i386 and m68k platforms, is now supported.  SPARC LynxOS
 297   support is in progress.
 298
 299 Changes in 2.1:
 300
 301 * Several small fixes for i386-aix (PS/2) support from Minh Tran-Le have been
 302   incorporated, but not well tested yet.
 303
 304 * Altered the opcode table split for m68k; it should require less VM to compile
 305   with gcc now.
 306
 307 * Some minor adjustments to add (Convergent Technologies') Miniframe support,
 308   suggested by Ronald Cole.
 309
 310 * HPPA support (running OSF only, not HPUX) has been contributed by Utah.  This
 311   includes improved ELF support, which I've started adapting for SPARC Solaris
 312   2.x.  Integration isn't completely, so it probably won't work.
 313
 314 * HP9000/300 support, donated by HP, has been merged in.
 315
 316 * Ian Taylor has finished the MIPS ECOFF (Ultrix, Irix) support.
 317
 318 * Better error messages for unsupported configurations (e.g., hppa-hpux).
 319
 320 * Test suite framework is starting to become reasonable.
 321
 322 Changes in 2.0:
 323
 324 * Mostly bug fixes.
 325
 326 * Some more merging of BFD and ELF code, but ELF still doesn't work.
 327
 328 Changes in 1.94:
 329
 330 * BFD merge is partly done.  Adventurous souls may try giving configure the
 331   "--with-bfd-assembler" option.  Currently, ELF format requires it, a.out
 332   format accepts it; SPARC CPU accepts it.  It's the default only for OS "elf"
 333   or "solaris".  (ELF isn't really supported yet.  It needs work.  I've got
 334   some code from Utah for HP-PA ELF, and from DG for m88k ELF, but they're not
 335   fully merged yet.)
 336
 337 * The 68K opcode table has been split in half.  It should now compile under gcc
 338   without consuming ridiculous amounts of memory.
 339
 340 * A couple data structures have been reduced in size.  This should result in
 341   saving a little bit of space at runtime.
 342
 343 * Support for MIPS, from OSF and Ralph Campbell, has been merged in.  The OSF
 344   code provided ROSE format support, which I haven't merged in yet.  (I can
 345   make it available, if anyone wants to try it out.)  Ralph's code, for BSD
 346   4.4, supports a.out format.  We don't have ECOFF support in just yet; it's
 347   coming.
 348
 349 * Support for the Hitachi H8/500 has been added.
 350
 351 * VMS host and target support should be working now, thanks chiefly to Eric
 352   Youngdale.
 353
 354 Changes in 1.93.01:
 355
 356 * For m68k, support for more processors has been added: 68040, CPU32, 68851.
 357
 358 * For i386, .align is now power-of-two; was number-of-bytes.
 359
 360 * For m68k, "%" is now accepted before register names.  For COFF format, which
 361   doesn't use underscore prefixes for C labels, it is required, so variable "a0"
 362   can be distinguished from the register.
 363
 364 * Last public release was 1.38.  Lots of configuration changes since then, lots
 365   of new CPUs and formats, lots of bugs fixed.
 366
 367 \f
 368 Local variables:
 369 fill-column: 79
 370 End: