gas/NEWS

   1 -*- text -*-
   2
   3 * Support for Motorola MCF521x/5249/547x/548x added.
   4
   5 * Support for ColdFire EMAC instructions added and Motorola syntax for MAC/EMAC
   6   instrucitons.
   7
   8 * The MIPS -membedded-pic option (Embedded-PIC code generation) is
   9   deprecated and will be removed in a future release.
  10
  11 * Added PIC m32r Linux (ELF) and support to M32R assembler.
  12
  13 * Added support for ARM V6.
  14
  15 * Added support for sh4a and variants.
  16
  17 * Support for Renesas M32R2 added.
  18
  19 * Limited support for Mapping Symbols as specified in the ARM ELF
  20   specification has been added to the arm assembler.
  21
  22 * On ARM architectures, added a new gas directive ".unreq" that undoes
  23   definitions created by ".req".
  24
  25 * Support for Motorola ColdFire MCF528x added.
  26
  27 * Added --gstabs+ switch to enable the generation of STABS debug format
  28   information with GNU extensions.
  29
  30 * Added support for MIPS64 Release 2.
  31
  32 * Added support for v850e1.
  33
  34 * Added -n switch for x86 assembler.  By default, x86 GAS replaces
  35   multiple nop instructions used for alignment within code sections
  36   with multi-byte nop instructions such as leal 0(%esi,1),%esi.  This
  37   switch disables the optimization.
  38
  39 * Removed -n option from MIPS assembler.  It was not useful, and confused the
  40   existing -non_shared option.
  41
  42 Changes in 2.14:
  43
  44 * Added support for MIPS32 Release 2.
  45
  46 * Added support for Xtensa architecture.
  47
  48 * Support for Intel's iWMMXt processor (an ARM variant) added.
  49
  50 * An assembler test generator has been contributed and an example file that
  51   uses it (gas/testsuite/gas/all/test-gen.c and test-exmaple.c).
  52
  53 * Support for SH2E added.
  54
  55 * GASP has now been removed.
  56
  57 * Support for Texas Instruments TMS320C4x and TMS320C3x series of
  58   DSP's contributed by Michael Hayes and Svein E. Seldal.
  59
  60 * Support for the Ubicom IP2xxx microcontroller added.
  61
  62 Changes in 2.13:
  63
  64 * Support for the Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat. Models for FR400
  65   and FR500 included.
  66
  67 * Support for DLX processor added.
  68
  69 * GASP has now been deprecated and will be removed in a future release.  Use
  70   the macro facilities in GAS instead.
  71
  72 * GASP now correctly parses floating point numbers. Unless the base is
  73   explicitly specified, they are interpreted as decimal numbers regardless of
  74   the currently specified base.
  75
  76 Changes in 2.12:
  77
  78 * Support for Don Knuth's MMIX, by Hans-Peter Nilsson.
  79
  80 * Support for the OpenRISC 32-bit embedded processor by OpenCores.
  81
  82 * The ARM assembler now accepts -march=..., -mcpu=... and -mfpu=... for
  83   specifying the target instruction set.  The old method of specifying the
  84   target processor has been deprecated, but is still accepted for
  85   compatibility.
  86
  87 * Support for the VFP floating-point instruction set has been added to
  88   the ARM assembler.
  89
  90 * New psuedo op: .incbin to include a set of binary data at a given point
  91   in the assembly.  Contributed by Anders Norlander.
  92
  93 * The MIPS assembler now accepts -march/-mtune. -mcpu has been deprecated
  94   but still works for compatability.
  95
  96 * The MIPS assembler no longer issues a warning by default when it
  97   generates a nop instruction from a macro. The new command line option
  98   -n will turn on the warning.
  99
 100 Changes in 2.11:
 101
 102 * Support for PDP-11 and 2.11BSD a.out format, by Lars Brinkhoff.
 103
 104 * x86 gas now supports the full Pentium4 instruction set.
 105
 106 * Support for AMD x86-64 architecture, by Jan Hubicka, SuSE Labs.
 107
 108 * Support for Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12.
 109
 110 * Support for Texas Instruments TMS320C54x (tic54x).
 111
 112 * Support for IA-64.
 113
 114 * Support for i860, by Jason Eckhardt.
 115
 116 * Support for CRIS (Axis Communications ETRAX series).
 117
 118 * x86 gas has a new .arch pseudo op to specify the target CPU architecture.
 119
 120 * x86 gas -q command line option quietens warnings about register size changes
 121   due to suffix, indirect jmp/call without `*', stand-alone prefixes, and
 122   translating various deprecated floating point instructions.
 123
 124 Changes in 2.10:
 125
 126 * Support for the ARM msr instruction was changed to only allow an immediate
 127   operand when altering the flags field.
 128
 129 * Support for ATMEL AVR.
 130
 131 * Support for IBM 370 ELF.  Somewhat experimental.
 132
 133 * Support for numbers with suffixes.
 134
 135 * Added support for breaking to the end of repeat loops.
 136
 137 * Added support for parallel instruction syntax (DOUBLEBAR_PARALLEL).
 138
 139 * New .elseif pseudo-op added.
 140
 141 * New --fatal-warnings option.
 142
 143 * picoJava architecture support added.
 144
 145 * Motorola MCore 210 processor support added.
 146
 147 * A new pseudo-op .intel_syntax has been implemented to allow gas to parse i386
 148   assembly programs with intel syntax.
 149
 150 * New pseudo-ops .func,.endfunc to aid in debugging user-written assembler code.
 151
 152 * Added -gdwarf2 option to generate DWARF 2 debugging information.
 153
 154 * Full 16-bit mode support for i386.
 155
 156 * Greatly improved instruction operand checking for i386.  This change will
 157   produce errors or warnings on incorrect assembly code that previous versions
 158   of gas accepted.  If you get unexpected messages from code that worked with
 159   older versions of gas, please double check the code before reporting a bug.
 160
 161 * Weak symbol support added for COFF targets.
 162
 163 * Mitsubishi D30V support added.
 164
 165 * Texas Instruments c80 (tms320c80) support added.
 166
 167 * i960 ELF support added.
 168
 169 * ARM ELF support added.
 170
 171 Changes in 2.9:
 172
 173 * Texas Instruments c30 (tms320c30) support added.
 174
 175 * The assembler now optimizes the exception frame information generated by egcs
 176   and gcc 2.8.  The new --traditional-format option disables this optimization.
 177
 178 * Added --gstabs option to generate stabs debugging information.
 179
 180 * The -a option takes a new suboption, m (e.g., -alm) to expand macros in a
 181   listing.
 182
 183 * Added -MD option to print dependencies.
 184
 185 Changes in 2.8:
 186
 187 * BeOS support added.
 188
 189 * MIPS16 support added.
 190
 191 * Motorola ColdFire 5200 support added (configure for m68k and use -m5200).
 192
 193 * Alpha/VMS support added.
 194
 195 * m68k options --base-size-default-16, --base-size-default-32,
 196   --disp-size-default-16, and --disp-size-default-32 added.
 197
 198 * The alignment directives now take an optional third argument, which is the
 199   maximum number of bytes to skip.  If doing the alignment would require
 200   skipping more than the given number of bytes, the alignment is not done at
 201   all.
 202
 203 * The ELF assembler has a new pseudo-op, .symver, used for symbol versioning.
 204
 205 * The -a option takes a new suboption, c (e.g., -alc), to skip false
 206   conditionals in listings.
 207
 208 * Added new pseudo-op, .equiv; it's like .equ, except that it is an error if
 209   the symbol is already defined.
 210
 211 Changes in 2.7:
 212
 213 * The PowerPC assembler now allows the use of symbolic register names (r0,
 214   etc.) if -mregnames is used.  Symbolic names preceded by a '%' (%r0, etc.)
 215   can be used any time.  PowerPC 860 move to/from SPR instructions have been
 216   added.
 217
 218 * Alpha Linux (ELF) support added.
 219
 220 * PowerPC ELF support added.
 221
 222 * m68k Linux (ELF) support added.
 223
 224 * i960 Hx/Jx support added.
 225
 226 * i386/PowerPC gnu-win32 support added.
 227
 228 * SCO ELF support added.  For OpenServer 5 targets (i386-unknown-sco3.2v5) the
 229   default is to build COFF-only support.  To get a set of tools that generate
 230   ELF (they'll understand both COFF and ELF), you must configure with
 231   target=i386-unknown-sco3.2v5elf.
 232
 233 * m88k-motorola-sysv3* support added.
 234
 235 Changes in 2.6:
 236
 237 * Gas now directly supports macros, without requiring GASP.
 238
 239 * Gas now has an MRI assembler compatibility mode.  Use -M or --mri to select
 240   MRI mode.  The pseudo-op ``.mri 1'' will switch into the MRI mode until the
 241   ``.mri 0'' is seen; this can be convenient for inline assembler code.
 242
 243 * Added --defsym SYM=VALUE option.
 244
 245 * Added -mips4 support to MIPS assembler.
 246
 247 * Added PIC support to Solaris and SPARC SunOS 4 assembler.
 248
 249 Changes in 2.4:
 250
 251 * Converted this directory to use an autoconf-generated configure script.
 252
 253 * ARM support, from Richard Earnshaw.
 254
 255 * Updated VMS support, from Pat Rankin, including considerably improved
 256   debugging support.
 257
 258 * Support for the control registers in the 68060.
 259
 260 * Handles (ignores) a new directive ".this_GCC_requires_the_GNU_assembler", to
 261   provide for possible future gcc changes, for targets where gas provides some
 262   features not available in the native assembler.  If the native assembler is
 263   used, it should become obvious pretty quickly what the problem is.
 264
 265 * Usage message is available with "--help".
 266
 267 * The GNU Assembler Preprocessor (gasp) is included.  (Actually, it was in 2.3
 268   also, but didn't get into the NEWS file.)
 269
 270 * Weak symbol support for a.out.
 271
 272 * A bug in the listing code which could cause an infinite loop has been fixed.
 273   Bugs in listings when generating a COFF object file have also been fixed.
 274
 275 * Initial i386-svr4 PIC implementation from Eric Youngdale, based on code by
 276   Paul Kranenburg.
 277
 278 * Improved Alpha support.  Immediate constants can have a much larger range
 279   now. Support for the 21164 has been contributed by Digital.
 280
 281 * Updated ns32k (pc532-mach, netbsd532) support from Ian Dall.
 282
 283 Changes in 2.3:
 284
 285 * Mach i386 support, by David Mackenzie and Ken Raeburn.
 286
 287 * RS/6000 and PowerPC support by Ian Taylor.
 288
 289 * VMS command scripts (make-gas.com, config-gas.com) have been worked on a bit,
 290   based on mail received from various people.  The `-h#' option should work
 291   again too.
 292
 293 * HP-PA work, by Jeff Law.  Note, for the PA, gas-2.3 has been designed to work
 294   with gdb-4.12 and gcc-2.6.  As gcc-2.6 has not been released yet, a special
 295   version of gcc-2.5.8 has been patched to work with gas-2.3.  You can retrieve
 296   this special version of gcc-2.5.8 via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu
 297   in the "dist" directory.
 298
 299 * Vax support in gas fixed for BSD, so it builds and seems to run a couple
 300   simple tests okay.  I haven't put it through extensive testing.  (GNU make is
 301   currently required for BSD 4.3 builds.)
 302
 303 * Support for the DEC Alpha, running OSF/1 (ECOFF format).  The gas support is
 304   based on code donated by CMU, which used an a.out-based format.  I'm afraid
 305   the alpha-a.out support is pretty badly mangled, and much of it removed;
 306   making it work will require rewriting it as BFD support for the format anyways.
 307
 308 * Irix 5 support.
 309
 310 * The test suites have been fixed up a bit, so that they should work with a
 311   couple different versions of expect and dejagnu.
 312
 313 * Symbols' values are now handled internally as expressions, permitting more
 314   flexibility in evaluating them in some cases.  Some details of relocation
 315   handling have also changed, and simple constant pool management has been
 316   added, to make the Alpha port easier.
 317
 318 * New option "--statistics" for printing out program run times.  This is
 319   intended to be used with the gcc "-Q" option, which prints out times spent in
 320   various phases of compilation.  (You should be able to get all of them
 321   printed out with "gcc -Q -Wa,--statistics", I think.)
 322
 323 Changes in 2.2:
 324
 325 * RS/6000 AIX and MIPS SGI Irix 5 support has been added.
 326
 327 * Configurations that are still in development (and therefore are convenient to
 328   have listed in configure.in) still get rejected without a minor change to
 329   gas/Makefile.in, so people not doing development work shouldn't get the
 330   impression that support for such configurations is actually believed to be
 331   reliable.
 332
 333 * The program name (usually "as") is printed when a fatal error message is
 334   displayed.  This should prevent some confusion about the source of occasional
 335   messages about "internal errors".
 336
 337 * ELF support is falling into place.  Support for the 386 should be working.
 338   Support for SPARC Solaris is in.  HPPA support from Utah is being integrated.
 339
 340 * Symbol values are maintained as expressions instead of being immediately
 341   boiled down to add-symbol, sub-symbol, and constant.  This permits slightly
 342   more complex calculations involving symbols whose values are not alreadey
 343   known.
 344
 345 * DBX-style debugging info ("stabs") is now supported for COFF formats.
 346   If any stabs directives are seen in the source, GAS will create two new
 347   sections: a ".stab" and a ".stabstr" section.  The format of the .stab
 348   section is nearly identical to the a.out symbol format, and .stabstr is
 349   its string table.  For this to be useful, you must have configured GCC
 350   to generate stabs (by defining DBX_DEBUGGING_INFO), and must have a GDB
 351   that can use the stab sections (4.11 or later).
 352
 353 * LynxOS, on i386 and m68k platforms, is now supported.  SPARC LynxOS
 354   support is in progress.
 355
 356 Changes in 2.1:
 357
 358 * Several small fixes for i386-aix (PS/2) support from Minh Tran-Le have been
 359   incorporated, but not well tested yet.
 360
 361 * Altered the opcode table split for m68k; it should require less VM to compile
 362   with gcc now.
 363
 364 * Some minor adjustments to add (Convergent Technologies') Miniframe support,
 365   suggested by Ronald Cole.
 366
 367 * HPPA support (running OSF only, not HPUX) has been contributed by Utah.  This
 368   includes improved ELF support, which I've started adapting for SPARC Solaris
 369   2.x.  Integration isn't completely, so it probably won't work.
 370
 371 * HP9000/300 support, donated by HP, has been merged in.
 372
 373 * Ian Taylor has finished the MIPS ECOFF (Ultrix, Irix) support.
 374
 375 * Better error messages for unsupported configurations (e.g., hppa-hpux).
 376
 377 * Test suite framework is starting to become reasonable.
 378
 379 Changes in 2.0:
 380
 381 * Mostly bug fixes.
 382
 383 * Some more merging of BFD and ELF code, but ELF still doesn't work.
 384
 385 Changes in 1.94:
 386
 387 * BFD merge is partly done.  Adventurous souls may try giving configure the
 388   "--with-bfd-assembler" option.  Currently, ELF format requires it, a.out
 389   format accepts it; SPARC CPU accepts it.  It's the default only for OS "elf"
 390   or "solaris".  (ELF isn't really supported yet.  It needs work.  I've got
 391   some code from Utah for HP-PA ELF, and from DG for m88k ELF, but they're not
 392   fully merged yet.)
 393
 394 * The 68K opcode table has been split in half.  It should now compile under gcc
 395   without consuming ridiculous amounts of memory.
 396
 397 * A couple data structures have been reduced in size.  This should result in
 398   saving a little bit of space at runtime.
 399
 400 * Support for MIPS, from OSF and Ralph Campbell, has been merged in.  The OSF
 401   code provided ROSE format support, which I haven't merged in yet.  (I can
 402   make it available, if anyone wants to try it out.)  Ralph's code, for BSD
 403   4.4, supports a.out format.  We don't have ECOFF support in just yet; it's
 404   coming.
 405
 406 * Support for the Hitachi H8/500 has been added.
 407
 408 * VMS host and target support should be working now, thanks chiefly to Eric
 409   Youngdale.
 410
 411 Changes in 1.93.01:
 412
 413 * For m68k, support for more processors has been added: 68040, CPU32, 68851.
 414
 415 * For i386, .align is now power-of-two; was number-of-bytes.
 416
 417 * For m68k, "%" is now accepted before register names.  For COFF format, which
 418   doesn't use underscore prefixes for C labels, it is required, so variable "a0"
 419   can be distinguished from the register.
 420
 421 * Last public release was 1.38.  Lots of configuration changes since then, lots
 422   of new CPUs and formats, lots of bugs fixed.
 423
 424 \f
 425 Local variables:
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 427 End: