]> git.ipfire.org Git - thirdparty/binutils-gdb.git/blame - gdb/NEWS
Highlight source code using GNU Source Highlight
[thirdparty/binutils-gdb.git] / gdb / NEWS
CommitLineData
c906108c
SS
1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
3
4e5b2f89
JB
4*** Changes since GDB 8.2
5
8d619c01
EBM
6* GDB and GDBserver now support access to additional registers on
7 PowerPC GNU/Linux targets: PPR, DSCR, TAR, EBB/PMU registers, and
8 HTM registers.
9
078a0207
KS
10* GDB now has experimental support for the compilation and injection of
11 C++ source code into the inferior. This beta release does not include
12 support for several language features, such as templates, constructors,
13 and operators.
14
15 This feature requires GCC 7.1 or higher built with libcp1.so
16 (the C++ plug-in).
17
c7ab0aef
SDJ
18* GDB and GDBserver now support IPv6 connections. IPv6 addresses
19 can be passed using the '[ADDRESS]:PORT' notation, or the regular
20 'ADDRESS:PORT' method.
21
7d11235d
SM
22* DWARF index cache: GDB can now automatically save indices of DWARF
23 symbols on disk to speed up further loading of the same binaries.
24
e8bf1ce4
JB
25* Ada task switching is now supported on aarch64-elf targets when
26 debugging a program using the Ravenscar Profile. For more information,
27 see the "Tasking Support when using the Ravenscar Profile" section
28 in the GDB user manual.
29
b0f492b9
GB
30* GDB in batch mode now exits with status 1 if the last command to be
31 executed failed.
32
f67ffa6a
AB
33* Changes to the "frame", "select-frame", and "info frame" CLI
34 commands. These commands all now take a frame specification which
35 is either a frame level, or one of the keywords 'level', 'address',
36 'function', or 'view' followed by a parameter. Selecting a frame by
37 address, or viewing a frame outside the current backtrace now
38 requires the use of a keyword. Selecting a frame by level is
39 unchanged. The MI comment "-stack-select-frame" is unchanged.
40
b5ffee31
AB
41* The RISC-V target now supports target descriptions.
42
e9076973
JB
43* System call catchpoints now support system call aliases on FreeBSD.
44 When the ABI of a system call changes in FreeBSD, this is
45 implemented by leaving a compatibility system call using the old ABI
46 at the existing number and allocating a new system call number for
47 the new ABI. For example, FreeBSD 12 altered the layout of 'struct
48 kevent' used by the 'kevent' system call. As a result, FreeBSD 12
49 kernels ship with both 'kevent' and 'freebsd11_kevent' system calls.
50 The 'freebsd11_kevent' system call is assigned an alias of 'kevent'
51 so that a system call catchpoint for the 'kevent' system call will
52 catch invocations of both the 'kevent' and 'freebsd11_kevent'
53 binaries. This ensures that 'kevent' system calls are caught for
54 binaries using either the old or new ABIs.
55
51d21d60
JD
56* New targets
57
58 NXP S12Z s12z-*-elf
66ac1ae9 59 GNU/Linux/OpenRISC or1k*-*-linux*
51d21d60 60
a14c4daa
PW
61* New commands
62
078a0207
KS
63set debug compile-cplus-types
64show debug compile-cplus-types
65 Control the display of debug output about type conversion in the
66 C++ compile feature. Commands have no effect while compiliong
67 for other languages.
68
3e68067f
SM
69set debug skip
70show debug skip
71 Control whether debug output about files/functions skipping is
72 displayed.
73
a14c4daa
PW
74frame apply [all | COUNT | -COUNT | level LEVEL...] [FLAG]... COMMAND
75 Apply a command to some frames.
76 FLAG arguments allow to control what output to produce and how to handle
77 errors raised when applying COMMAND to a frame.
78
79taas COMMAND
80 Apply a command to all threads (ignoring errors and empty output).
81 Shortcut for 'thread apply all -s COMMAND'.
82
83faas COMMAND
84 Apply a command to all frames (ignoring errors and empty output).
85 Shortcut for 'frame apply all -s COMMAND'.
86
87tfaas COMMAND
88 Apply a command to all frames of all threads (ignoring errors and empty
89 output).
90 Shortcut for 'thread apply all -s frame apply all -s COMMAND'.
91
3c3bb058
AB
92maint set dwarf unwinders (on|off)
93maint show dwarf unwinders
94 Control whether DWARF unwinders can be used.
95
8b113111
JB
96info proc files
97 Display a list of open files for a process.
98
a14c4daa
PW
99* Changed commands
100
c1168a2f
JD
101target remote FILENAME
102target extended-remote FILENAME
103 If FILENAME is a Unix domain socket, GDB will attempt to connect
104 to this socket instead of opening FILENAME as a character device.
105
e0a7911f
PW
106info args [-q] [-t TYPEREGEXP] [NAMEREGEXP]
107info functions [-q] [-t TYPEREGEXP] [NAMEREGEXP]
108info locals [-q] [-t TYPEREGEXP] [NAMEREGEXP]
109info variables [-q] [-t TYPEREGEXP] [NAMEREGEXP]
110 These commands can now print only the searched entities
111 matching the provided regexp(s), giving a condition
112 on the entity names or entity types. The flag -q disables
113 printing headers or informations messages.
114
604c4ca9
PW
115info functions
116info types
117info variables
118rbreak
119 These commands now determine the syntax for the shown entities
120 according to the language chosen by `set language'. In particular,
121 `set language auto' means to automatically choose the language of
122 the shown entities.
123
a14c4daa
PW
124thread apply [all | COUNT | -COUNT] [FLAG]... COMMAND
125 The 'thread apply' command accepts new FLAG arguments.
126 FLAG arguments allow to control what output to produce and how to handle
127 errors raised when applying COMMAND to a thread.
128
7806cea7
TT
129set tui tab-width NCHARS
130show tui tab-width NCHARS
131 "set tui tab-width" replaces the "tabset" command, which has been deprecated.
132
26fb3983
JV
133* MI changes
134
135 ** The '-data-disassemble' MI command now accepts an '-a' option to
136 disassemble the whole function surrounding the given program
137 counter value or function name. Support for this feature can be
138 verified by using the "-list-features" command, which should
139 contain "data-disassemble-a-option".
140
6d52907e
JV
141 ** Command responses and notifications that include a frame now include
142 the frame's architecture in a new "arch" attribute.
143
52a187f8
JW
144* New native configurations
145
146GNU/Linux/RISC-V riscv*-*-linux*
74792ff7 147FreeBSD/riscv riscv*-*-freebsd*
52a187f8
JW
148
149* New targets
150
151GNU/Linux/RISC-V riscv*-*-linux*
416a69af
HAQ
152CSKY ELF csky*-*-elf
153CSKY GNU/LINUX csky*-*-linux
ed65e20b 154FreeBSD/riscv riscv*-*-freebsd*
52a187f8 155
a40bf0c2
SM
156* Python API
157
158 ** The gdb.Inferior type has a new 'progspace' property, which is the program
159 space associated to that inferior.
160
0ae1a321
SM
161 ** The gdb.Progspace type has a new 'objfiles' method, which returns the list
162 of objfiles associated to that program space.
163
51e78fc5
TT
164 ** gdb.SYMBOL_LOC_COMMON_BLOCK, gdb.SYMBOL_MODULE_DOMAIN, and
165 gdb.SYMBOL_COMMON_BLOCK_DOMAIN were added to reflect changes to
166 the gdb core.
167
168 ** gdb.SYMBOL_VARIABLES_DOMAIN, gdb.SYMBOL_FUNCTIONS_DOMAIN, and
169 gdb.SYMBOL_TYPES_DOMAIN are now deprecated. These were never
170 correct and did not work properly.
171
f35d5ade
TT
172* Configure changes
173
174--enable-ubsan
175
eff98030
TT
176 Enable or disable the undefined behavior sanitizer. This is
177 disabled by default, but passing --enable-ubsan=yes or
178 --enable-ubsan=auto to configure will enable it. Enabling this can
179 cause a performance penalty. The undefined behavior sanitizer was
180 first introduced in GCC 4.9.
f35d5ade 181
4e5b2f89 182*** Changes in GDB 8.2
cd385f94 183
471b9d15
MR
184* The 'set disassembler-options' command now supports specifying options
185 for the MIPS target.
186
d4d429d5
PT
187* The 'symbol-file' command now accepts an '-o' option to add a relative
188 offset to all sections.
189
291f9a96
PT
190* Similarly, the 'add-symbol-file' command also accepts an '-o' option to add
191 a relative offset to all sections, but it allows to override the load
192 address of individual sections using '-s'.
193
ed6dfe51
PT
194* The 'add-symbol-file' command no longer requires the second argument
195 (address of the text section).
196
4b2dfa9d
MR
197* The endianness used with the 'set endian auto' mode in the absence of
198 an executable selected for debugging is now the last endianness chosen
199 either by one of the 'set endian big' and 'set endian little' commands
200 or by inferring from the last executable used, rather than the startup
201 default.
202
eb6af809
TT
203* The pager now allows a "c" response, meaning to disable the pager
204 for the rest of the current command.
205
b744723f
AA
206* The commands 'info variables/functions/types' now show the source line
207 numbers of symbol definitions when available.
208
2d97a5d9
JB
209* 'info proc' now works on running processes on FreeBSD systems and core
210 files created on FreeBSD systems.
211
007e1530
TT
212* C expressions can now use _Alignof, and C++ expressions can now use
213 alignof.
214
1461bdac
AH
215* Support for SVE on AArch64 Linux. Note that GDB does not detect changes to
216 the vector length while the process is running.
217
386a8676
JB
218* New commands
219
220set debug fbsd-nat
221show debug fbsd-nat
222 Control display of debugging info regarding the FreeBSD native target.
223
3fcded8f
JB
224set|show varsize-limit
225 This new setting allows the user to control the maximum size of Ada
226 objects being printed when those objects have a variable type,
227 instead of that maximum size being hardcoded to 65536 bytes.
228
4a4495d6
MM
229set|show record btrace cpu
230 Controls the processor to be used for enabling errata workarounds for
231 branch trace decode.
232
5045b3d7
GB
233maint check libthread-db
234 Run integrity checks on the current inferior's thread debugging
235 library
236
237maint set check-libthread-db (on|off)
238maint show check-libthread-db
239 Control whether to run integrity checks on inferior specific thread
240 debugging libraries as they are loaded. The default is not to
241 perform such checks.
242
6d7bb824
TT
243* Python API
244
245 ** Type alignment is now exposed via the "align" attribute of a gdb.Type.
246
a913fffb
TT
247 ** The commands attached to a breakpoint can be set by assigning to
248 the breakpoint's "commands" field.
249
56bcdbea
TT
250 ** gdb.execute can now execute multi-line gdb commands.
251
7729052b
TT
252 ** The new functions gdb.convenience_variable and
253 gdb.set_convenience_variable can be used to get and set the value
254 of convenience variables.
255
984ee559
TT
256 ** A gdb.Parameter will no longer print the "set" help text on an
257 ordinary "set"; instead by default a "set" will be silent unless
258 the get_set_string method returns a non-empty string.
259
dbbb1059
AB
260* New targets
261
262RiscV ELF riscv*-*-elf
263
a2a79012
PA
264* Removed targets and native configurations
265
266m88k running OpenBSD m88*-*-openbsd*
8a3de5e1
PA
267SH-5/SH64 ELF sh64-*-elf*, SH-5/SH64 support in sh*
268SH-5/SH64 running GNU/Linux SH-5/SH64 support in sh*-*-linux*
269SH-5/SH64 running OpenBSD SH-5/SH64 support in sh*-*-openbsd*
a2a79012 270
a3b60e45
JK
271* Aarch64/Linux hardware watchpoints improvements
272
273 Hardware watchpoints on unaligned addresses are now properly
274 supported when running Linux kernel 4.10 or higher: read and access
275 watchpoints are no longer spuriously missed, and all watchpoints
276 lengths between 1 and 8 bytes are supported. On older kernels,
277 watchpoints set on unaligned addresses are no longer missed, with
278 the tradeoff that there is a possibility of false hits being
279 reported.
280
056dec39 281* Configure changes
44cee4fd
TT
282
283--enable-codesign=CERT
284 This can be used to invoke "codesign -s CERT" after building gdb.
285 This option is useful on macOS, where code signing is required for
286 gdb to work properly.
287
056dec39
TT
288--disable-gdbcli has been removed
289 This is now silently accepted, but does nothing.
290
cd385f94 291*** Changes in GDB 8.1
305d16a9 292
cef0f868
SH
293* GDB now supports dynamically creating arbitrary register groups specified
294 in XML target descriptions. This allows for finer grain grouping of
295 registers on systems with a large amount of registers.
296
7c161838
SDJ
297* The 'ptype' command now accepts a '/o' flag, which prints the
298 offsets and sizes of fields in a struct, like the pahole(1) tool.
299
97cbe998
SDJ
300* New "--readnever" command line option instructs GDB to not read each
301 symbol file's symbolic debug information. This makes startup faster
302 but at the expense of not being able to perform symbolic debugging.
303 This option is intended for use cases where symbolic debugging will
304 not be used, e.g., when you only need to dump the debuggee's core.
305
2400729e
UW
306* GDB now uses the GNU MPFR library, if available, to emulate target
307 floating-point arithmetic during expression evaluation when the target
308 uses different floating-point formats than the host. At least version
309 3.1 of GNU MPFR is required.
310
289e23aa
AA
311* GDB now supports access to the guarded-storage-control registers and the
312 software-based guarded-storage broadcast control registers on IBM z14.
313
0a2dde4a
SDJ
314* On Unix systems, GDB now supports transmitting environment variables
315 that are to be set or unset to GDBserver. These variables will
316 affect the environment to be passed to the remote inferior.
317
318 To inform GDB of environment variables that are to be transmitted to
319 GDBserver, use the "set environment" command. Only user set
320 environment variables are sent to GDBserver.
321
322 To inform GDB of environment variables that are to be unset before
323 the remote inferior is started by the GDBserver, use the "unset
324 environment" command.
325
d044bac8
PA
326* Completion improvements
327
328 ** GDB can now complete function parameters in linespecs and
329 explicit locations without quoting. When setting breakpoints,
330 quoting around functions names to help with TAB-completion is
331 generally no longer necessary. For example, this now completes
332 correctly:
333
334 (gdb) b function(in[TAB]
335 (gdb) b function(int)
336
337 Related, GDB is no longer confused with completing functions in
338 C++ anonymous namespaces:
339
340 (gdb) b (anon[TAB]
341 (gdb) b (anonymous namespace)::[TAB][TAB]
342 (anonymous namespace)::a_function()
343 (anonymous namespace)::b_function()
344
345 ** GDB now has much improved linespec and explicit locations TAB
346 completion support, that better understands what you're
347 completing and offers better suggestions. For example, GDB no
348 longer offers data symbols as possible completions when you're
349 setting a breakpoint.
350
351 ** GDB now TAB-completes label symbol names.
352
353 ** The "complete" command now mimics TAB completion accurately.
354
c179febe
SL
355* New command line options (gcore)
356
357-a
358 Dump all memory mappings.
359
a20714ff
PA
360* Breakpoints on C++ functions are now set on all scopes by default
361
362 By default, breakpoints on functions/methods are now interpreted as
363 specifying all functions with the given name ignoring missing
364 leading scopes (namespaces and classes).
365
366 For example, assuming a C++ program with symbols named:
367
368 A::B::func()
369 B::func()
370
371 both commands "break func()" and "break B::func()" set a breakpoint
372 on both symbols.
373
374 You can use the new flag "-qualified" to override this. This makes
375 GDB interpret the specified function name as a complete
376 fully-qualified name instead. For example, using the same C++
377 program, the "break -q B::func" command sets a breakpoint on
b89641ba
SM
378 "B::func", only. A parameter has been added to the Python
379 gdb.Breakpoint constructor to achieve the same result when creating
380 a breakpoint from Python.
a20714ff 381
bd69330d
PA
382* Breakpoints on functions marked with C++ ABI tags
383
384 GDB can now set breakpoints on functions marked with C++ ABI tags
385 (e.g., [abi:cxx11]). See here for a description of ABI tags:
386 https://developers.redhat.com/blog/2015/02/05/gcc5-and-the-c11-abi/
387
388 Functions with a C++11 abi tag are demangled/displayed like this:
389
390 function[abi:cxx11](int)
391 ^^^^^^^^^^^
392
393 You can now set a breakpoint on such functions simply as if they had
394 no tag, like:
395
396 (gdb) b function(int)
397
398 Or if you need to disambiguate between tags, like:
399
400 (gdb) b function[abi:other_tag](int)
401
402 Tab completion was adjusted accordingly as well.
403
7c96f8c1
TT
404* Python Scripting
405
406 ** New events gdb.new_inferior, gdb.inferior_deleted, and
407 gdb.new_thread are emitted. See the manual for further
408 description of these.
409
4e725347
JB
410 ** A new function, "gdb.rbreak" has been added to the Python API.
411 This function allows the setting of a large number of breakpoints
412 via a regex pattern in Python. See the manual for further details.
d8ae99a7 413
824cc835
PM
414 ** Python breakpoints can now accept explicit locations. See the
415 manual for a further description of this feature.
416
417
6d580b63
YQ
418* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
419
bc3b087d
SDJ
420 ** GDBserver is now able to start inferior processes with a
421 specified initial working directory.
422
423 The user can set the desired working directory to be used from
424 GDB using the new "set cwd" command.
425
6d580b63
YQ
426 ** New "--selftest" command line option runs some GDBserver self
427 tests. These self tests are disabled in releases.
428
429 ** On Unix systems, GDBserver now does globbing expansion and variable
430 substitution in inferior command line arguments.
431
432 This is done by starting inferiors using a shell, like GDB does.
433 See "set startup-with-shell" in the user manual for how to disable
434 this from GDB when using "target extended-remote". When using
435 "target remote", you can disable the startup with shell by using the
436 new "--no-startup-with-shell" GDBserver command line option.
aefd8b33 437
0a2dde4a
SDJ
438 ** On Unix systems, GDBserver now supports receiving environment
439 variables that are to be set or unset from GDB. These variables
440 will affect the environment to be passed to the inferior.
441
e547c119
JB
442* When catching an Ada exception raised with a message, GDB now prints
443 the message in the catchpoint hit notification. In GDB/MI mode, that
444 information is provided as an extra field named "exception-message"
445 in the *stopped notification.
446
7403715e
TT
447* Trait objects can now be inspected When debugging Rust code. This
448 requires compiler support which will appear in Rust 1.24.
449
aefd8b33
SDJ
450* New remote packets
451
0a2dde4a
SDJ
452QEnvironmentHexEncoded
453 Inform GDBserver of an environment variable that is to be passed to
454 the inferior when starting it.
455
456QEnvironmentUnset
457 Inform GDBserver of an environment variable that is to be unset
458 before starting the remote inferior.
459
460QEnvironmentReset
461 Inform GDBserver that the environment should be reset (i.e.,
462 user-set environment variables should be unset).
463
aefd8b33
SDJ
464QStartupWithShell
465 Indicates whether the inferior must be started with a shell or not.
466
bc3b087d
SDJ
467QSetWorkingDir
468 Tell GDBserver that the inferior to be started should use a specific
469 working directory.
470
8e2141c6
YQ
471* The "maintenance print c-tdesc" command now takes an optional
472 argument which is the file name of XML target description.
473
1526853e
SM
474* The "maintenance selftest" command now takes an optional argument to
475 filter the tests to be run.
476
d0fe4701
XR
477* The "enable", and "disable" commands now accept a range of
478 breakpoint locations, e.g. "enable 1.3-5".
479
c4dcb155
SM
480* New commands
481
d092c5a2
SDJ
482set|show cwd
483 Set and show the current working directory for the inferior.
484
6e41ddec
JK
485set|show compile-gcc
486 Set and show compilation command used for compiling and injecting code
487 with the 'compile' commands.
488
c4dcb155
SM
489set debug separate-debug-file
490show debug separate-debug-file
491 Control the display of debug output about separate debug file search.
492
1e52e849
SL
493set dump-excluded-mappings
494show dump-excluded-mappings
495 Control whether mappings marked with the VM_DONTDUMP flag should be
496 dumped when generating a core file.
497
1526853e
SM
498maint info selftests
499 List the registered selftests.
500
4e5a4f58
JB
501starti
502 Start the debugged program stopping at the first instruction.
503
b282f0f2
SH
504set|show debug or1k
505 Control display of debugging messages related to OpenRISC targets.
506
883fd55a
KS
507set|show print type nested-type-limit
508 Set and show the limit of nesting level for nested types that the
509 type printer will show.
510
44d0fb3a
RK
511* TUI Single-Key mode now supports two new shortcut keys: `i' for stepi and
512 `o' for nexti.
513
d69cf9b2
PA
514* Safer/improved support for debugging with no debug info
515
516 GDB no longer assumes functions with no debug information return
517 'int'.
518
519 This means that GDB now refuses to call such functions unless you
520 tell it the function's type, by either casting the call to the
521 declared return type, or by casting the function to a function
522 pointer of the right type, and calling that:
523
524 (gdb) p getenv ("PATH")
525 'getenv' has unknown return type; cast the call to its declared return type
526 (gdb) p (char *) getenv ("PATH")
527 $1 = 0x7fffffffe "/usr/local/bin:/"...
528 (gdb) p ((char * (*) (const char *)) getenv) ("PATH")
529 $2 = 0x7fffffffe "/usr/local/bin:/"...
530
531 Similarly, GDB no longer assumes that global variables with no debug
532 info have type 'int', and refuses to print the variable's value
533 unless you tell it the variable's type:
534
535 (gdb) p var
536 'var' has unknown type; cast it to its declared type
537 (gdb) p (float) var
538 $3 = 3.14
539
351787dd
JB
540* New native configurations
541
542FreeBSD/aarch64 aarch64*-*-freebsd*
4f9d9906 543FreeBSD/arm arm*-*-freebsd*
351787dd 544
c0f84956
JB
545* New targets
546
547FreeBSD/aarch64 aarch64*-*-freebsd*
7176dfd2 548FreeBSD/arm arm*-*-freebsd*
b282f0f2 549OpenRISC ELF or1k*-*-elf
c0f84956 550
281c4447
RO
551* Removed targets and native configurations
552
553Solaris 2.0-9 i?86-*-solaris2.[0-9], sparc*-*-solaris2.[0-9]
554
305d16a9 555*** Changes in GDB 8.0
51547df6
MS
556
557* GDB now supports access to the PKU register on GNU/Linux. The register is
558 added by the Memory Protection Keys for Userspace feature which will be
559 available in future Intel CPUs.
751b375e 560
c0f55cc6
AV
561* GDB now supports C++11 rvalue references.
562
0a0faf9f
TW
563* Python Scripting
564
565 ** New functions to start, stop and access a running btrace recording.
c0f55cc6 566 ** Rvalue references are now supported in gdb.Type.
0a0faf9f 567
20b477a7
LM
568* GDB now supports recording and replaying rdrand and rdseed Intel 64
569 instructions.
570
e6485aaf 571* Building GDB and GDBserver now requires a C++11 compiler.
d2946923
PA
572
573 For example, GCC 4.8 or later.
cf6de44d
PA
574
575 It is no longer possible to build GDB or GDBserver with a C
576 compiler. The --disable-build-with-cxx configure option has been
577 removed.
578
f2ff9acd
SM
579* Building GDB and GDBserver now requires GNU make >= 3.81.
580
581 It is no longer supported to build GDB or GDBserver with another
582 implementation of the make program or an earlier version of GNU make.
583
8ba42bc5
EZ
584* Native debugging on MS-Windows supports command-line redirection
585
586 Command-line arguments used for starting programs on MS-Windows can
587 now include redirection symbols supported by native Windows shells,
588 such as '<', '>', '>>', '2>&1', etc. This affects GDB commands such
589 as "run", "start", and "set args", as well as the corresponding MI
590 features.
591
24cdb46e
РИ
592* Support for thread names on MS-Windows.
593
594 GDB now catches and handles the special exception that programs
595 running on MS-Windows use to assign names to threads in the
596 debugger.
597
9c37b5ae
TT
598* Support for Java programs compiled with gcj has been removed.
599
df3ee9ca
PA
600* User commands now accept an unlimited number of arguments.
601 Previously, only up to 10 was accepted.
602
01770bbd
PA
603* The "eval" command now expands user-defined command arguments.
604
605 This makes it easier to process a variable number of arguments:
606
607 define mycommand
608 set $i = 0
609 while $i < $argc
610 eval "print $arg%d", $i
611 set $i = $i + 1
612 end
613 end
614
3f7b46f2
IR
615* Target descriptions can now describe registers for sparc32 and sparc64.
616
0ae60b63
JK
617* GDB now supports DWARF version 5 (debug information format).
618 Its .debug_names index is not yet supported.
619
b268007c
JB
620* New native configurations
621
622FreeBSD/mips mips*-*-freebsd
623
ad0a504f
AK
624* New targets
625
626Synopsys ARC arc*-*-elf32
387360da 627FreeBSD/mips mips*-*-freebsd
ad0a504f 628
db6be0d5
SM
629* Removed targets and native configurations
630
631Alpha running FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
632Alpha running GNU/kFreeBSD alpha*-*-kfreebsd*-gnu
633
78cbbba8
LM
634* New commands
635
636flash-erase
637 Erases all the flash memory regions reported by the target.
638
db6be0d5
SM
639maint print arc arc-instruction address
640 Print internal disassembler information about instruction at a given address.
51457a05 641
db6be0d5 642* New options
65b48a81
PB
643
644set disassembler-options
645show disassembler-options
646 Controls the passing of target specific information to the disassembler.
647 If it is necessary to specify more than one disassembler option then
648 multiple options can be placed together into a comma separated list.
649 The default value is the empty string. Currently, the only supported
650 targets are ARM, PowerPC and S/390.
651
db6be0d5 652* New MI commands
eea78757 653
db6be0d5
SM
654-target-flash-erase
655 Erases all the flash memory regions reported by the target. This is
656 equivalent to the CLI command flash-erase.
1e1a8bef 657
db6be0d5
SM
658-file-list-shared-libraries
659 List the shared libraries in the program. This is
660 equivalent to the CLI command "info shared".
1e1a8bef 661
bea298f9
XR
662-catch-handlers
663 Catchpoints stopping the program when Ada exceptions are
664 handled. This is equivalent to the CLI command "catch handlers".
665
751b375e 666*** Changes in GDB 7.12
1233c0ba 667
69ffd7f2
PA
668* GDB and GDBserver now build with a C++ compiler by default.
669
670 The --enable-build-with-cxx configure option is now enabled by
671 default. One must now explicitly configure with
672 --disable-build-with-cxx in order to build with a C compiler. This
673 option will be removed in a future release.
674
c0272db5
TW
675* GDBserver now supports recording btrace without maintaining an active
676 GDB connection.
677
bb556f1f
TK
678* GDB now supports a negative repeat count in the 'x' command to examine
679 memory backward from the given address. For example:
680
681 (gdb) bt
682 #0 Func1 (n=42, p=0x40061c "hogehoge") at main.cpp:4
683 #1 0x400580 in main (argc=1, argv=0x7fffffffe5c8) at main.cpp:8
684 (gdb) x/-5i 0x0000000000400580
685 0x40056a <main(int, char**)+8>: mov %edi,-0x4(%rbp)
686 0x40056d <main(int, char**)+11>: mov %rsi,-0x10(%rbp)
687 0x400571 <main(int, char**)+15>: mov $0x40061c,%esi
688 0x400576 <main(int, char**)+20>: mov $0x2a,%edi
689 0x40057b <main(int, char**)+25>:
690 callq 0x400536 <Func1(int, char const*)>
691
9920b434
BH
692* Fortran: Support structures with fields of dynamic types and
693 arrays of dynamic types.
694
34c41c68
DE
695* The symbol dumping maintenance commands have new syntax.
696maint print symbols [-pc address] [--] [filename]
697maint print symbols [-objfile objfile] [-source source] [--] [filename]
698maint print psymbols [-objfile objfile] [-pc address] [--] [filename]
699maint print psymbols [-objfile objfile] [-source source] [--] [filename]
700maint print msymbols [-objfile objfile] [--] [filename]
701
81516450
DE
702* GDB now supports multibit bitfields and enums in target register
703 descriptions.
704
f2f3ccb9
SM
705* New Python-based convenience function $_as_string(val), which returns
706 the textual representation of a value. This function is especially
707 useful to obtain the text label of an enum value.
708
012b3a21
WT
709* Intel MPX bound violation handling.
710
711 Segmentation faults caused by a Intel MPX boundary violation
712 now display the kind of violation (upper or lower), the memory
713 address accessed and the memory bounds, along with the usual
714 signal received and code location.
715
716 For example:
717
718 Program received signal SIGSEGV, Segmentation fault
719 Upper bound violation while accessing address 0x7fffffffc3b3
720 Bounds: [lower = 0x7fffffffc390, upper = 0x7fffffffc3a3]
721 0x0000000000400d7c in upper () at i386-mpx-sigsegv.c:68
722
0bdfa368
TT
723* Rust language support.
724 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the Rust programming
725 language. See https://www.rust-lang.org/ for more information about
726 Rust.
727
86f78169
PA
728* Support for running interpreters on specified input/output devices
729
730 GDB now supports a new mechanism that allows frontends to provide
731 fully featured GDB console views, as a better alternative to
732 building such views on top of the "-interpreter-exec console"
733 command. See the new "new-ui" command below. With that command,
734 frontends can now start GDB in the traditional command-line mode
735 running in an embedded terminal emulator widget, and create a
736 separate MI interpreter running on a specified i/o device. In this
737 way, GDB handles line editing, history, tab completion, etc. in the
738 console all by itself, and the GUI uses the separate MI interpreter
739 for its own control and synchronization, invisible to the command
740 line.
741
e3487908
GKB
742* The "catch syscall" command catches groups of related syscalls.
743
744 The "catch syscall" command now supports catching a group of related
745 syscalls using the 'group:' or 'g:' prefix.
746
d2dffb8d
DE
747* New commands
748
749skip -file file
750skip -gfile file-glob-pattern
751skip -function function
752skip -rfunction regular-expression
753 A generalized form of the skip command, with new support for
754 glob-style file names and regular expressions for function names.
755 Additionally, a file spec and a function spec may now be combined.
756
f2403c39
AB
757maint info line-table REGEXP
758 Display the contents of GDB's internal line table data struture.
759
dcd1f979
TT
760maint selftest
761 Run any GDB unit tests that were compiled in.
762
86f78169
PA
763new-ui INTERP TTY
764 Start a new user interface instance running INTERP as interpreter,
765 using the TTY file for input/output.
766
93daf339
TT
767* Python Scripting
768
769 ** gdb.Breakpoint objects have a new attribute "pending", which
770 indicates whether the breakpoint is pending.
8d2a0a14
TT
771 ** Three new breakpoint-related events have been added:
772 gdb.breakpoint_created, gdb.breakpoint_modified, and
773 gdb.breakpoint_deleted.
93daf339 774
463888ab
РИ
775signal-event EVENTID
776 Signal ("set") the given MS-Windows event object. This is used in
777 conjunction with the Windows JIT debugging (AeDebug) support, where
778 the OS suspends a crashing process until a debugger can attach to
779 it. Resuming the crashing process, in order to debug it, is done by
780 signalling an event.
781
c37c0ba6
MK
782* Support for tracepoints and fast tracepoints on s390-linux and s390x-linux
783 was added in GDBserver, including JIT compiling fast tracepoint's
784 conditional expression bytecode into native code.
785
f7c38292
PA
786* Support for various remote target protocols and ROM monitors has
787 been removed:
788
789 target m32rsdi Remote M32R debugging over SDI
790 target mips MIPS remote debugging protocol
791 target pmon PMON ROM monitor
792 target ddb NEC's DDB variant of PMON for Vr4300
793 target rockhopper NEC RockHopper variant of PMON
794 target lsi LSI variant of PMO
795
22084c42
MK
796* Support for tracepoints and fast tracepoints on powerpc-linux,
797 powerpc64-linux, and powerpc64le-linux was added in GDBserver,
798 including JIT compiling fast tracepoint's conditional expression
799 bytecode into native code.
800
38b022b4
SM
801* MI async record =record-started now includes the method and format used for
802 recording. For example:
803
804 =record-started,thread-group="i1",method="btrace",format="bts"
805
4034d0ff
AT
806* MI async record =thread-selected now includes the frame field. For example:
807
808 =thread-selected,id="3",frame={level="0",addr="0x00000000004007c0"}
809
a28d8e50
YTL
810* New targets
811
812Andes NDS32 nds32*-*-elf
813
1233c0ba 814*** Changes in GDB 7.11
7c79d316 815
6e9567fe
JB
816* GDB now supports debugging kernel-based threads on FreeBSD.
817
5d5658a1
PA
818* Per-inferior thread numbers
819
820 Thread numbers are now per inferior instead of global. If you're
821 debugging multiple inferiors, GDB displays thread IDs using a
822 qualified INF_NUM.THR_NUM form. For example:
823
824 (gdb) info threads
825 Id Target Id Frame
826 1.1 Thread 0x7ffff7fc2740 (LWP 8155) (running)
827 1.2 Thread 0x7ffff7fc1700 (LWP 8168) (running)
828 * 2.1 Thread 0x7ffff7fc2740 (LWP 8157) (running)
829 2.2 Thread 0x7ffff7fc1700 (LWP 8190) (running)
830
831 As consequence, thread numbers as visible in the $_thread
832 convenience variable and in Python's InferiorThread.num attribute
833 are no longer unique between inferiors.
834
835 GDB now maintains a second thread ID per thread, referred to as the
836 global thread ID, which is the new equivalent of thread numbers in
663f6d42 837 previous releases. See also $_gthread below.
5d5658a1
PA
838
839 For backwards compatibility, MI's thread IDs always refer to global
840 IDs.
841
842* Commands that accept thread IDs now accept the qualified
843 INF_NUM.THR_NUM form as well. For example:
844
845 (gdb) thread 2.1
846 [Switching to thread 2.1 (Thread 0x7ffff7fc2740 (LWP 8157))] (running)
847 (gdb)
848
71ef29a8
PA
849* In commands that accept a list of thread IDs, you can now refer to
850 all threads of an inferior using a star wildcard. GDB accepts
851 "INF_NUM.*", to refer to all threads of inferior INF_NUM, and "*" to
852 refer to all threads of the current inferior. For example, "info
853 threads 2.*".
854
c84f6bbf
PA
855* You can use "info threads -gid" to display the global thread ID of
856 all threads.
857
663f6d42
PA
858* The new convenience variable $_gthread holds the global number of
859 the current thread.
860
e3940304
PA
861* The new convenience variable $_inferior holds the number of the
862 current inferior.
863
f303dbd6
PA
864* GDB now displays the ID and name of the thread that hit a breakpoint
865 or received a signal, if your program is multi-threaded. For
866 example:
867
868 Thread 3 "bar" hit Breakpoint 1 at 0x40087a: file program.c, line 20.
869 Thread 1 "main" received signal SIGINT, Interrupt.
870
cbb55fa7
MM
871* Record btrace now supports non-stop mode.
872
58d2eda5
PL
873* Support for tracepoints on aarch64-linux was added in GDBserver.
874
da8c46d2 875* The 'record instruction-history' command now indicates speculative execution
bc504a31 876 when using the Intel Processor Trace recording format.
da8c46d2 877
629500fa
KS
878* GDB now allows users to specify explicit locations, bypassing
879 the linespec parser. This feature is also available to GDB/MI
880 clients.
881
02f024f9
YQ
882* Multi-architecture debugging is supported on AArch64 GNU/Linux.
883 GDB now is able to debug both AArch64 applications and ARM applications
884 at the same time.
885
4d9d419e
PL
886* Support for fast tracepoints on aarch64-linux was added in GDBserver,
887 including JIT compiling fast tracepoint's conditional expression bytecode
888 into native code.
889
eda14cf2
YQ
890* GDB now supports displaced stepping on AArch64 GNU/Linux.
891
be81798b
PA
892* "info threads", "info inferiors", "info display", "info checkpoints"
893 and "maint info program-spaces" now list the corresponding items in
894 ascending ID order, for consistency with all other "info" commands.
895
3685b09f
PMR
896* In Ada, the overloads selection menu has been enhanced to display the
897 parameter types and the return types for the matching overloaded subprograms.
898
fbea99ea
PA
899* New commands
900
901maint set target-non-stop (on|off|auto)
902maint show target-non-stop
903 Control whether GDB targets always operate in non-stop mode even if
904 "set non-stop" is "off". The default is "auto", meaning non-stop
905 mode is enabled if supported by the target.
906
18989b3c
AB
907maint set bfd-sharing
908maint show bfd-sharing
909 Control the reuse of bfd objects.
910
566f5e3b
AB
911set debug bfd-cache
912show debug bfd-cache
913 Control display of debugging info regarding bfd caching.
914
6e9567fe
JB
915set debug fbsd-lwp
916show debug fbsd-lwp
917 Control display of debugging info regarding FreeBSD threads.
918
73b8c1fd
PA
919set remote multiprocess-extensions-packet
920show remote multiprocess-extensions-packet
921 Set/show the use of the remote protocol multiprocess extensions.
922
65706a29
PA
923set remote thread-events
924show remote thread-events
925 Set/show the use of thread create/exit events.
926
3685b09f
PMR
927set ada print-signatures on|off
928show ada print-signatures"
929 Control whether parameter types and return types are displayed in overloads
930 selection menus. It is activaled (@code{on}) by default.
931
5fdf6324
AB
932set max-value-size
933show max-value-size
934 Controls the maximum size of memory, in bytes, that GDB will
935 allocate for value contents. Prevents incorrect programs from
936 causing GDB to allocate overly large buffers. Default is 64k.
937
6ff0ba5f
DE
938* The "disassemble" command accepts a new modifier: /s.
939 It prints mixed source+disassembly like /m with two differences:
940 - disassembled instructions are now printed in program order, and
941 - and source for all relevant files is now printed.
942 The "/m" option is now considered deprecated: its "source-centric"
943 output hasn't proved useful in practice.
944
0c532a29
MM
945* The "record instruction-history" command accepts a new modifier: /s.
946 It behaves exactly like /m and prints mixed source+disassembly.
947
f2665db5
MM
948* The "set scheduler-locking" command supports a new mode "replay".
949 It behaves like "off" in record mode and like "on" in replay mode.
950
40e0b271
PA
951* Support for various ROM monitors has been removed:
952
953 target dbug dBUG ROM monitor for Motorola ColdFire
954 target picobug Motorola picobug monitor
955 target dink32 DINK32 ROM monitor for PowerPC
956 target m32r Renesas M32R/D ROM monitor
957 target mon2000 mon2000 ROM monitor
958 target ppcbug PPCBUG ROM monitor for PowerPC
959
fd2ae5d6 960* Support for reading/writing memory and extracting values on architectures
d63dd61e 961 whose memory is addressable in units of any integral multiple of 8 bits.
fd2ae5d6 962
9f757bf7
XR
963catch handlers
964 Allows to break when an Ada exception is handled.
965
b459a59b
DB
966* New remote packets
967
968exec stop reason
969 Indicates that an exec system call was executed.
970
971exec-events feature in qSupported
972 The qSupported packet allows GDB to request support for exec
973 events using the new 'gdbfeature' exec-event, and the qSupported
974 response can contain the corresponding 'stubfeature'. Set and
975 show commands can be used to display whether these features are enabled.
976
de979965
PA
977vCtrlC
978 Equivalent to interrupting with the ^C character, but works in
979 non-stop mode.
980
65706a29
PA
981thread created stop reason (T05 create:...)
982 Indicates that the thread was just created and is stopped at entry.
983
984thread exit stop reply (w exitcode;tid)
985 Indicates that the thread has terminated.
986
987QThreadEvents
988 Enables/disables thread create and exit event reporting. For
989 example, this is used in non-stop mode when GDB stops a set of
990 threads and synchronously waits for the their corresponding stop
991 replies. Without exit events, if one of the threads exits, GDB
992 would hang forever not knowing that it should no longer expect a
993 stop for that same thread.
994
f2faf941 995N stop reply
f2faf941
PA
996 Indicates that there are no resumed threads left in the target (all
997 threads are stopped). The remote stub reports support for this stop
998 reply to GDB's qSupported query.
999
aab3c527
JK
1000QCatchSyscalls
1001 Enables/disables catching syscalls from the inferior process.
1002 The remote stub reports support for this packet to GDB's qSupported query.
82075af2
JS
1003
1004syscall_entry stop reason
1005 Indicates that a syscall was just called.
1006
1007syscall_return stop reason
1008 Indicates that a syscall just returned.
1009
b459a59b
DB
1010* Extended-remote exec events
1011
1012 ** GDB now has support for exec events on extended-remote Linux targets.
1013 For such targets with Linux kernels 2.5.46 and later, this enables
1014 follow-exec-mode and exec catchpoints.
1015
1016set remote exec-event-feature-packet
1017show remote exec-event-feature-packet
1018 Set/show the use of the remote exec event feature.
1019
79efa585
SM
1020 * Thread names in remote protocol
1021
1022 The reply to qXfer:threads:read may now include a name attribute for each
1023 thread.
1024
19d9d4ef
DB
1025* Target remote mode fork and exec events
1026
1027 ** GDB now has support for fork and exec events on target remote mode
1028 Linux targets. For such targets with Linux kernels 2.5.46 and later,
1029 this enables follow-fork-mode, detach-on-fork, follow-exec-mode, and
1030 fork and exec catchpoints.
1031
82075af2
JS
1032* Remote syscall events
1033
1034 ** GDB now has support for catch syscall on remote Linux targets,
1035 currently enabled on x86/x86_64 architectures.
1036
1037set remote catch-syscall-packet
1038show remote catch-syscall-packet
1039 Set/show the use of the remote catch syscall feature.
1040
1c35a88f
LM
1041* MI changes
1042
1043 ** The -var-set-format command now accepts the zero-hexadecimal
1044 format. It outputs data in hexadecimal format with zero-padding on the
1045 left.
1046
84654457
PA
1047* Python Scripting
1048
22a02324
PA
1049 ** gdb.InferiorThread objects have a new attribute "global_num",
1050 which refers to the thread's global thread ID. The existing
1051 "num" attribute now refers to the thread's per-inferior number.
1052 See "Per-inferior thread numbers" above.
84654457
PA
1053 ** gdb.InferiorThread objects have a new attribute "inferior", which
1054 is the Inferior object the thread belongs to.
1055
7c79d316 1056*** Changes in GDB 7.10
df8411da 1057
c16a3f52
OJ
1058* Support for process record-replay and reverse debugging on aarch64*-linux*
1059 targets has been added. GDB now supports recording of A64 instruction set
1060 including advance SIMD instructions.
1061
18a94d75
DE
1062* Support for Sun's version of the "stabs" debug file format has been removed.
1063
df8411da
SDJ
1064* GDB now honors the content of the file /proc/PID/coredump_filter
1065 (PID is the process ID) on GNU/Linux systems. This file can be used
1066 to specify the types of memory mappings that will be included in a
1067 corefile. For more information, please refer to the manual page of
1068 "core(5)". GDB also has a new command: "set use-coredump-filter
1069 on|off". It allows to set whether GDB will read the content of the
1070 /proc/PID/coredump_filter file when generating a corefile.
3b2f13ff 1071
d33279b3
AT
1072* The "info os" command on GNU/Linux can now display information on
1073 cpu information :
1074 "info os cpus" Listing of all cpus/cores on the system
1075
236af5e3
YG
1076* GDB has two new commands: "set serial parity odd|even|none" and
1077 "show serial parity". These allows to set or show parity for the
1078 remote serial I/O.
1079
b6577aab
DE
1080* The "info source" command now displays the producer string if it was
1081 present in the debug info. This typically includes the compiler version
1082 and may include things like its command line arguments.
1083
b30a0bc3
JB
1084* The "info dll", an alias of the "info sharedlibrary" command,
1085 is now available on all platforms.
1086
599bd15c
GB
1087* Directory names supplied to the "set sysroot" commands may be
1088 prefixed with "target:" to tell GDB to access shared libraries from
1089 the target system, be it local or remote. This replaces the prefix
1090 "remote:". The default sysroot has been changed from "" to
1091 "target:". "remote:" is automatically converted to "target:" for
1092 backward compatibility.
1093
a9a5a3d1
GB
1094* The system root specified by "set sysroot" will be prepended to the
1095 filename of the main executable (if reported to GDB as absolute by
1096 the operating system) when starting processes remotely, and when
1097 attaching to already-running local or remote processes.
1098
1b6e6f5c
GB
1099* GDB now supports automatic location and retrieval of executable
1100 files from remote targets. Remote debugging can now be initiated
1101 using only a "target remote" or "target extended-remote" command
1102 (no "set sysroot" or "file" commands are required). See "New remote
1103 packets" below.
1104
cf75d6c3
AB
1105* The "dump" command now supports verilog hex format.
1106
417c80f9
AA
1107* GDB now supports the vector ABI on S/390 GNU/Linux targets.
1108
51aad7cc
GB
1109* On GNU/Linux, GDB and gdbserver are now able to access executable
1110 and shared library files without a "set sysroot" command when
1111 attaching to processes running in different mount namespaces from
1112 the debugger. This makes it possible to attach to processes in
1113 containers as simply as "gdb -p PID" or "gdbserver --attach PID".
1114 See "New remote packets" below.
1115
51f0e40d
AB
1116* The "tui reg" command now provides completion for all of the
1117 available register groups, including target specific groups.
1118
b58c513b
PP
1119* The HISTSIZE environment variable is no longer read when determining
1120 the size of GDB's command history. GDB now instead reads the dedicated
bc460514
PP
1121 GDBHISTSIZE environment variable. Setting GDBHISTSIZE to "-1" or to "" now
1122 disables truncation of command history. Non-numeric values of GDBHISTSIZE
1123 are ignored.
b58c513b 1124
37442ce1
DE
1125* Guile Scripting
1126
1127 ** Memory ports can now be unbuffered.
1128
3a8b707a
DE
1129* Python Scripting
1130
1131 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "username",
1132 which is the name of the objfile as specified by the user,
1133 without, for example, resolving symlinks.
d11916aa 1134 ** You can now write frame unwinders in Python.
59fb7612
SS
1135 ** gdb.Type objects have a new method "optimized_out",
1136 returning optimized out gdb.Value instance of this type.
4c082a81
SC
1137 ** gdb.Value objects have new methods "reference_value" and
1138 "const_value" which return a reference to the value and a
1139 "const" version of the value respectively.
3a8b707a 1140
f57d2163
DE
1141* New commands
1142
1143maint print symbol-cache
1144 Print the contents of the symbol cache.
1145
1146maint print symbol-cache-statistics
1147 Print statistics of symbol cache usage.
1148
1149maint flush-symbol-cache
1150 Flush the contents of the symbol cache.
1151
f4abbc16
MM
1152record btrace bts
1153record bts
1154 Start branch trace recording using Branch Trace Store (BTS) format.
1155
36de76f9
JK
1156compile print
1157 Evaluate expression by using the compiler and print result.
1158
a4ea0946
AB
1159tui enable
1160tui disable
1161 Explicit commands for enabling and disabling tui mode.
1162
29c1c244
WT
1163show mpx bound
1164set mpx bound on i386 and amd64
bc504a31 1165 Support for bound table investigation on Intel MPX enabled applications.
29c1c244 1166
b20a6524
MM
1167record btrace pt
1168record pt
bc504a31 1169 Start branch trace recording using Intel Processor Trace format.
b20a6524 1170
b0627500
MM
1171maint info btrace
1172 Print information about branch tracing internals.
1173
1174maint btrace packet-history
1175 Print the raw branch tracing data.
1176
1177maint btrace clear-packet-history
1178 Discard the stored raw branch tracing data.
1179
1180maint btrace clear
1181 Discard all branch tracing data. It will be fetched and processed
1182 anew by the next "record" command.
1183
253828f1
JK
1184* New options
1185
b4f54984
DE
1186set debug dwarf-die
1187 Renamed from "set debug dwarf2-die".
1188show debug dwarf-die
1189 Renamed from "show debug dwarf2-die".
1190
1191set debug dwarf-read
1192 Renamed from "set debug dwarf2-read".
1193show debug dwarf-read
1194 Renamed from "show debug dwarf2-read".
1195
1196maint set dwarf always-disassemble
1197 Renamed from "maint set dwarf2 always-disassemble".
1198maint show dwarf always-disassemble
1199 Renamed from "maint show dwarf2 always-disassemble".
1200
1201maint set dwarf max-cache-age
1202 Renamed from "maint set dwarf2 max-cache-age".
1203maint show dwarf max-cache-age
1204 Renamed from "maint show dwarf2 max-cache-age".
1205
27e0867f
DE
1206set debug dwarf-line
1207show debug dwarf-line
1208 Control display of debugging info regarding DWARF line processing.
1209
ef0b411a
GB
1210set max-completions
1211show max-completions
1212 Set the maximum number of candidates to be considered during
1213 completion. The default value is 200. This limit allows GDB
1214 to avoid generating large completion lists, the computation of
1215 which can cause the debugger to become temporarily unresponsive.
1216
fc637f04
PP
1217set history remove-duplicates
1218show history remove-duplicates
1219 Control the removal of duplicate history entries.
1220
f57d2163
DE
1221maint set symbol-cache-size
1222maint show symbol-cache-size
1223 Control the size of the symbol cache.
1224
d33501a5
MM
1225set|show record btrace bts buffer-size
1226 Set and show the size of the ring buffer used for branch tracing in
1227 BTS format.
1228 The obtained size may differ from the requested size. Use "info
1229 record" to see the obtained buffer size.
1230
7a6a1731
GB
1231set debug linux-namespaces
1232show debug linux-namespaces
1233 Control display of debugging info regarding Linux namespaces.
1234
b20a6524
MM
1235set|show record btrace pt buffer-size
1236 Set and show the size of the ring buffer used for branch tracing in
bc504a31 1237 Intel Processor Trace format.
b20a6524
MM
1238 The obtained size may differ from the requested size. Use "info
1239 record" to see the obtained buffer size.
1240
b0627500
MM
1241maint set|show btrace pt skip-pad
1242 Set and show whether PAD packets are skipped when computing the
1243 packet history.
1244
253828f1
JK
1245* The command 'thread apply all' can now support new option '-ascending'
1246 to call its specified command for all threads in ascending order.
1247
9f050062
DE
1248* Python/Guile scripting
1249
1250 ** GDB now supports auto-loading of Python/Guile scripts contained in the
1251 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts'.
1252
f4abbc16
MM
1253* New remote packets
1254
1255qXfer:btrace-conf:read
1256 Return the branch trace configuration for the current thread.
1257
d33501a5
MM
1258Qbtrace-conf:bts:size
1259 Set the requested ring buffer size for branch tracing in BTS format.
1260
b20a6524 1261Qbtrace:pt
bc504a31 1262 Enable Intel Procesor Trace-based branch tracing for the current
b20a6524
MM
1263 process. The remote stub reports support for this packet to GDB's
1264 qSupported query.
1265
1266Qbtrace-conf:pt:size
bc504a31 1267 Set the requested ring buffer size for branch tracing in Intel Processor
b20a6524
MM
1268 Trace format.
1269
f7e6eed5
PA
1270swbreak stop reason
1271 Indicates a memory breakpoint instruction was executed, irrespective
1272 of whether it was GDB that planted the breakpoint or the breakpoint
1273 is hardcoded in the program. This is required for correct non-stop
1274 mode operation.
1275
1276hwbreak stop reason
1277 Indicates the target stopped for a hardware breakpoint. This is
1278 required for correct non-stop mode operation.
1279
0a93529c
GB
1280vFile:fstat:
1281 Return information about files on the remote system.
1282
c78fa86a
GB
1283qXfer:exec-file:read
1284 Return the full absolute name of the file that was executed to
1285 create a process running on the remote system.
1286
15a201c8
GB
1287vFile:setfs:
1288 Select the filesystem on which vFile: operations with filename
1289 arguments will operate. This is required for GDB to be able to
1290 access files on remote targets where the remote stub does not
1291 share a common filesystem with the inferior(s).
1292
0d71eef5
DB
1293fork stop reason
1294 Indicates that a fork system call was executed.
1295
1296vfork stop reason
1297 Indicates that a vfork system call was executed.
1298
1299vforkdone stop reason
1300 Indicates that a vfork child of the specified process has executed
1301 an exec or exit, allowing the vfork parent to resume execution.
1302
1303fork-events and vfork-events features in qSupported
1304 The qSupported packet allows GDB to request support for fork and
1305 vfork events using new 'gdbfeatures' fork-events and vfork-events,
1306 and the qSupported response can contain the corresponding
1307 'stubfeatures'. Set and show commands can be used to display
1308 whether these features are enabled.
1309
1310* Extended-remote fork events
1311
1312 ** GDB now has support for fork events on extended-remote Linux
1313 targets. For targets with Linux kernels 2.5.60 and later, this
1314 enables follow-fork-mode and detach-on-fork for both fork and
1315 vfork, as well as fork and vfork catchpoints.
1316
d33501a5
MM
1317* The info record command now shows the recording format and the
1318 branch tracing configuration for the current thread when using
1319 the btrace record target.
1320 For the BTS format, it shows the ring buffer size.
1321
b05e3b0d
JM
1322* GDB now has support for DTrace USDT (Userland Static Defined
1323 Tracing) probes. The supported targets are x86_64-*-linux-gnu.
1324
550bdf96
AA
1325* GDB now supports access to vector registers on S/390 GNU/Linux
1326 targets.
1327
4f45d445
JK
1328* Removed command line options
1329
1330-xdb HP-UX XDB compatibility mode.
1331
0800b440
JK
1332* Removed targets and native configurations
1333
1334HP/PA running HP-UX hppa*-*-hpux*
1335Itanium running HP-UX ia64-*-hpux*
1336
58bfce93
MM
1337* New configure options
1338
1339--with-intel-pt
1340 This configure option allows the user to build GDB with support for
bc504a31 1341 Intel Processor Trace (default: auto). This requires libipt.
58bfce93
MM
1342
1343--with-libipt-prefix=PATH
1344 Specify the path to the version of libipt that GDB should use.
1345 $PATH/include should contain the intel-pt.h header and
1346 $PATH/lib should contain the libipt.so library.
1347
f5f85ab9
JB
1348*** Changes in GDB 7.9.1
1349
1350* Python Scripting
1351
1352 ** Xmethods can now specify a result type.
1353
3b2f13ff 1354*** Changes in GDB 7.9
919b9a93 1355
05db5edd
ST
1356* GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on x86 GNU Hurd.
1357
5f3b99cf 1358* Python Scripting
2b4fd423
DE
1359
1360 ** You can now access frame registers from Python scripts.
1361 ** New attribute 'producer' for gdb.Symtab objects.
d096d8c1
DE
1362 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "progspace",
1363 which is the gdb.Progspace object of the containing program space.
a0be3e44 1364 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "owner".
7c50a931
DE
1365 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new attribute "build_id",
1366 which is the build ID generated when the file was built.
86e4ed39 1367 ** gdb.Objfile objects have a new method "add_separate_debug_file".
4ffbba72
DE
1368 ** A new event "gdb.clear_objfiles" has been added, triggered when
1369 selecting a new file to debug.
02be9a71 1370 ** You can now add attributes to gdb.Objfile and gdb.Progspace objects.
6dddd6a5 1371 ** New function gdb.lookup_objfile.
5f3b99cf 1372
8fda9068
YQ
1373 New events which are triggered when GDB modifies the state of the
1374 inferior.
1375
1376 ** gdb.events.inferior_call_pre: Function call is about to be made.
1377 ** gdb.events.inferior_call_post: Function call has just been made.
1378 ** gdb.events.memory_changed: A memory location has been altered.
1379 ** gdb.events.register_changed: A register has been altered.
1380
faa42425
DE
1381* New Python-based convenience functions:
1382
1383 ** $_caller_is(name [, number_of_frames])
1384 ** $_caller_matches(regexp [, number_of_frames])
1385 ** $_any_caller_is(name [, number_of_frames])
1386 ** $_any_caller_matches(regexp [, number_of_frames])
1387
bb2ec1b3
TT
1388* GDB now supports the compilation and injection of source code into
1389 the inferior. GDB will use GCC 5.0 or higher built with libcc1.so
1390 to compile the source code to object code, and if successful, inject
1391 and execute that code within the current context of the inferior.
1392 Currently the C language is supported. The commands used to
1393 interface with this new feature are:
1394
1395 compile code [-raw|-r] [--] [source code]
1396 compile file [-raw|-r] filename
1397
81219e53
DE
1398* New commands
1399
439250fb
DE
1400demangle [-l language] [--] name
1401 Demangle "name" in the specified language, or the current language
1402 if elided. This command is renamed from the "maint demangle" command.
1403 The latter is kept as a no-op to avoid "maint demangle" being interpreted
1404 as "maint demangler-warning".
1405
81219e53
DE
1406queue-signal signal-name-or-number
1407 Queue a signal to be delivered to the thread when it is resumed.
1408
f10c5b19
JK
1409add-auto-load-scripts-directory directory
1410 Add entries to the list of directories from which to load auto-loaded
1411 scripts.
1412
f5b95c01
AA
1413maint print user-registers
1414 List all currently available "user" registers.
1415
bb2ec1b3
TT
1416compile code [-r|-raw] [--] [source code]
1417 Compile, inject, and execute in the inferior the executable object
1418 code produced by compiling the provided source code.
1419
1420compile file [-r|-raw] filename
1421 Compile and inject into the inferior the executable object code
1422 produced by compiling the source code stored in the filename
1423 provided.
1424
70509625
PA
1425* On resume, GDB now always passes the signal the program had stopped
1426 for to the thread the signal was sent to, even if the user changed
1427 threads before resuming. Previously GDB would often (but not
1428 always) deliver the signal to the thread that happens to be current
1429 at resume time.
1430
1431* Conversely, the "signal" command now consistently delivers the
1432 requested signal to the current thread. GDB now asks for
1433 confirmation if the program had stopped for a signal and the user
1434 switched threads meanwhile.
1435
a25a5a45
PA
1436* "breakpoint always-inserted" modes "off" and "auto" merged.
1437
1438 Now, when 'breakpoint always-inserted mode' is set to "off", GDB
1439 won't remove breakpoints from the target until all threads stop,
1440 even in non-stop mode. The "auto" mode has been removed, and "off"
1441 is now the default mode.
1442
cc485e62
DE
1443* New options
1444
1445set debug symbol-lookup
1446show debug symbol-lookup
1447 Control display of debugging info regarding symbol lookup.
1448
2ddf4301
SM
1449* MI changes
1450
1451 ** The -list-thread-groups command outputs an exit-code field for
1452 inferiors that have exited.
1453
bb7e3f4d
YQ
1454* New targets
1455
1456MIPS SDE mips*-sde*-elf*
1457
3831839c
PA
1458* Removed targets
1459
1460Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
1461
5ab806de
PA
1462Alpha running OSF/1 (or Tru64) alpha*-*-osf*
1463SGI Irix-5.x mips-*-irix5*
1464SGI Irix-6.x mips-*-irix6*
09dd9a69
PA
1465VAX running (4.2 - 4.3 Reno) BSD vax-*-bsd*
1466VAX running Ultrix vax-*-ultrix*
3831839c 1467
6bf6fd09
JB
1468* The "dll-symbols" command, and its two aliases ("add-shared-symbol-files"
1469 and "assf"), have been removed. Use the "sharedlibrary" command, or
1470 its alias "share", instead.
1471
919b9a93 1472*** Changes in GDB 7.8
e9475ead 1473
8d551b02
DE
1474* New command line options
1475
1476-D data-directory
1477 This is an alias for the --data-directory option.
1478
e9475ead
SA
1479* GDB supports printing and modifying of variable length automatic arrays
1480 as specified in ISO C99.
1481
a75fef0e
NC
1482* The ARM simulator now supports instruction level tracing
1483 with or without disassembly.
b7bba001 1484
ed3ef339
DE
1485* Guile scripting
1486
1487 GDB now has support for scripting using Guile. Whether this is
1488 available is determined at configure time.
1489 Guile version 2.0 or greater is required.
1490 Guile version 2.0.9 is well tested, earlier 2.0 versions are not.
1491
1492* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
1493
1494guile [code]
1495gu [code]
1496 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Guile interpreter.
1497
1498guile-repl
1499gr
1500 Start a Guile interactive prompt (or "repl" for "read-eval-print loop").
1501
1502info auto-load guile-scripts [regexp]
1503 Print the list of automatically loaded Guile scripts.
1504
1505* The source command is now capable of sourcing Guile scripts.
1506 This feature is dependent on the debugger being built with Guile support.
1507
c6044dd1
JB
1508* New options
1509
770e7fc7
DE
1510set print symbol-loading (off|brief|full)
1511show print symbol-loading
1512 Control whether to print informational messages when loading symbol
1513 information for a file. The default is "full", but when debugging
1514 programs with large numbers of shared libraries the amount of output
1515 becomes less useful.
1516
ed3ef339
DE
1517set guile print-stack (none|message|full)
1518show guile print-stack
1519 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Guile script.
1520
1521set auto-load guile-scripts (on|off)
1522show auto-load guile-scripts
1523 Control auto-loading of Guile script files.
1524
c6044dd1
JB
1525maint ada set ignore-descriptive-types (on|off)
1526maint ada show ignore-descriptive-types
1527 Control whether the debugger should ignore descriptive types in Ada
1528 programs. The default is not to ignore the descriptive types. See
1529 the user manual for more details on descriptive types and the intended
1530 usage of this option.
1531
6a3cb8e8
PA
1532set auto-connect-native-target
1533
1534 Control whether GDB is allowed to automatically connect to the
1535 native target for the run, attach, etc. commands when not connected
1536 to any target yet. See also "target native" below.
1537
67b5c0c1
MM
1538set record btrace replay-memory-access (read-only|read-write)
1539show record btrace replay-memory-access
1540 Control what memory accesses are allowed during replay.
1541
329ea579
PA
1542maint set target-async (on|off)
1543maint show target-async
5784b3ca
JK
1544 This controls whether GDB targets operate in synchronous or
1545 asynchronous mode. Normally the default is asynchronous, if it is
329ea579 1546 available; but this can be changed to more easily debug problems
5784b3ca 1547 occurring only in synchronous mode.
329ea579
PA
1548
1549set mi-async (on|off)
1550show mi-async
1551 Control whether MI asynchronous mode is preferred. This supersedes
1552 "set target-async" of previous GDB versions.
1553
1554* "set target-async" is deprecated as a CLI option and is now an alias
1555 for "set mi-async" (only puts MI into async mode).
1556
1557* Background execution commands (e.g., "c&", "s&", etc.) are now
1558 possible ``out of the box'' if the target supports them. Previously
1559 the user would need to explicitly enable the possibility with the
1560 "set target-async on" command.
1561
87ce2a04
DE
1562* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
1563
1564 ** New option --debug-format=option1[,option2,...] allows one to add
1565 additional text to each output. At present only timestamps
1566 are supported: --debug-format=timestamps.
1567 Timestamps can also be turned on with the
1568 "monitor set debug-format timestamps" command from GDB.
1569
5de9129b
MM
1570* The 'record instruction-history' command now starts counting instructions
1571 at one. This also affects the instruction ranges reported by the
1572 'record function-call-history' command when given the /i modifier.
1573
8710b709
MM
1574* The command 'record function-call-history' supports a new modifier '/c' to
1575 indent the function names based on their call stack depth.
1576 The fields for the '/i' and '/l' modifier have been reordered.
1577 The source line range is now prefixed with 'at'.
1578 The instruction range is now prefixed with 'inst'.
1579 Both ranges are now printed as '<from>, <to>' to allow copy&paste to the
1580 "record instruction-history" and "list" commands.
1581
0688d04e
MM
1582* The ranges given as arguments to the 'record function-call-history' and
1583 'record instruction-history' commands are now inclusive.
1584
066ce621 1585* The btrace record target now supports the 'record goto' command.
0b722aec
MM
1586 For locations inside the execution trace, the back trace is computed
1587 based on the information stored in the execution trace.
066ce621 1588
52834460
MM
1589* The btrace record target supports limited reverse execution and replay.
1590 The target does not record data and therefore does not allow reading
1591 memory or registers.
1592
237b092b
AA
1593* The "catch syscall" command now works on s390*-linux* targets.
1594
936d2992
PA
1595* The "compare-sections" command is no longer specific to target
1596 remote. It now works with all targets.
1597
930ee1b1
PA
1598* All native targets are now consistently called "native".
1599 Consequently, the "target child", "target GNU", "target djgpp",
1600 "target procfs" (Solaris/Irix/OSF/AIX) and "target darwin-child"
1601 commands have been replaced with "target native". The QNX/NTO port
1602 leaves the "procfs" target in place and adds a "native" target for
1603 consistency with other ports. The impact on users should be minimal
1604 as these commands previously either throwed an error, or were
1605 no-ops. The target's name is visible in the output of the following
1606 commands: "help target", "info target", "info files", "maint print
1607 target-stack".
1608
6a3cb8e8
PA
1609* The "target native" command now connects to the native target. This
1610 can be used to launch native programs even when "set
1611 auto-connect-native-target" is set to off.
1612
bc504a31 1613* GDB now supports access to Intel MPX registers on GNU/Linux.
dc304a94 1614
bc504a31
PA
1615* Support for Intel AVX-512 registers on GNU/Linux.
1616 Support displaying and modifying Intel AVX-512 registers
dc304a94
JK
1617 $zmm0 - $zmm31 and $k0 - $k7 on GNU/Linux.
1618
969c39fb
MM
1619* New remote packets
1620
1621qXfer:btrace:read's annex
1622 The qXfer:btrace:read packet supports a new annex 'delta' to read
1623 branch trace incrementally.
1624
f7bd0f78
SC
1625* Python Scripting
1626
1627 ** Valid Python operations on gdb.Value objects representing
1628 structs/classes invoke the corresponding overloaded operators if
1629 available.
0c6e92a5
SC
1630 ** New `Xmethods' feature in the Python API. Xmethods are
1631 additional methods or replacements for existing methods of a C++
1632 class. This feature is useful for those cases where a method
1633 defined in C++ source code could be inlined or optimized out by
1634 the compiler, making it unavailable to GDB.
f7bd0f78 1635
36c24d95
UW
1636* New targets
1637PowerPC64 GNU/Linux little-endian powerpc64le-*-linux*
1638
95060284
JB
1639* The "dll-symbols" command, and its two aliases ("add-shared-symbol-files"
1640 and "assf"), have been deprecated. Use the "sharedlibrary" command, or
1641 its alias "share", instead.
1642
7f3c0343
JB
1643* The commands "set remotebaud" and "show remotebaud" are no longer
1644 supported. Use "set serial baud" and "show serial baud" (respectively)
1645 instead.
1646
329ea579
PA
1647* MI changes
1648
1649 ** A new option "-gdb-set mi-async" replaces "-gdb-set
1650 target-async". The latter is left as a deprecated alias of the
1651 former for backward compatibility. If the target supports it,
1652 CLI background execution commands are now always possible by
1653 default, independently of whether the frontend stated a
1654 preference for asynchronous execution with "-gdb-set mi-async".
1655 Previously "-gdb-set target-async off" affected both MI execution
1656 commands and CLI execution commands.
1657
b7bba001 1658*** Changes in GDB 7.7
2d450646 1659
33a97bbe
OJ
1660* Improved support for process record-replay and reverse debugging on
1661 arm*-linux* targets. Support for thumb32 and syscall instruction
1662 recording has been added.
1663
08248ca9
SDJ
1664* GDB now supports SystemTap SDT probes on AArch64 GNU/Linux.
1665
73869dc2
DE
1666* GDB now supports Fission DWP file format version 2.
1667 http://gcc.gnu.org/wiki/DebugFission
1668
a280dbd1
SDJ
1669* New convenience function "$_isvoid", to check whether an expression
1670 is void. A void expression is an expression where the type of the
1671 result is "void". For example, some convenience variables may be
1672 "void" when evaluated (e.g., "$_exitcode" before the execution of
1673 the program being debugged; or an undefined convenience variable).
1674 Another example, when calling a function whose return type is
1675 "void".
1676
52e260a3
DE
1677* The "maintenance print objfiles" command now takes an optional regexp.
1678
9f948660
SDJ
1679* The "catch syscall" command now works on arm*-linux* targets.
1680
901461f8
PA
1681* GDB now consistently shows "<not saved>" when printing values of
1682 registers the debug info indicates have not been saved in the frame
1683 and there's nowhere to retrieve them from
1684 (callee-saved/call-clobbered registers):
1685
1686 (gdb) p $rax
1687 $1 = <not saved>
1688
1689 (gdb) info registers rax
1690 rax <not saved>
1691
1692 Before, the former would print "<optimized out>", and the latter
1693 "*value not available*".
1694
caf26be9
SB
1695* New script contrib/gdb-add-index.sh for adding .gdb_index sections
1696 to binaries.
1697
1e611234
PM
1698* Python scripting
1699
1700 ** Frame filters and frame decorators have been added.
f76c27b5 1701 ** Temporary breakpoints are now supported.
bc79de95 1702 ** Line tables representation has been added.
a16b0e22
SC
1703 ** New attribute 'parent_type' for gdb.Field objects.
1704 ** gdb.Field objects can be used as subscripts on gdb.Value objects.
c0d48811 1705 ** New attribute 'name' for gdb.Type objects.
1e611234 1706
a1217d97
SL
1707* New targets
1708
1709Nios II ELF nios2*-*-elf
1710Nios II GNU/Linux nios2*-*-linux
42059f0e 1711Texas Instruments MSP430 msp430*-*-elf
a1217d97 1712
2659903b
JK
1713* Removed native configurations
1714
1715Support for these a.out NetBSD and OpenBSD obsolete configurations has
1716been removed. ELF variants of these configurations are kept supported.
1717
1718arm*-*-netbsd* but arm*-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
1719i[34567]86-*-netbsd* but i[34567]86-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
1720i[34567]86-*-openbsd[0-2].* but i[34567]86-*-openbsd* is kept supported.
1721i[34567]86-*-openbsd3.[0-3]
1722m68*-*-netbsd* but m68*-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
1723sparc-*-netbsd* but sparc-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
1724vax-*-netbsd* but vax-*-netbsdelf* is kept supported.
1725
bd712aed 1726* New commands:
b340913d
TT
1727catch rethrow
1728 Like "catch throw", but catches a re-thrown exception.
7d0c9981
DE
1729maint check-psymtabs
1730 Renamed from old "maint check-symtabs".
1731maint check-symtabs
1732 Perform consistency checks on symtabs.
1733maint expand-symtabs
1734 Expand symtabs matching an optional regexp.
b340913d 1735
dccca75d
EZ
1736show configuration
1737 Display the details of GDB configure-time options.
1738
bd712aed
DE
1739maint set|show per-command
1740maint set|show per-command space
1741maint set|show per-command time
1742maint set|show per-command symtab
1743 Enable display of per-command gdb resource usage.
1744
98297bf6
NB
1745remove-symbol-file FILENAME
1746remove-symbol-file -a ADDRESS
1747 Remove a symbol file added via add-symbol-file. The file to remove
1748 can be identified by its filename or by an address that lies within
1749 the boundaries of this symbol file in memory.
1750
58d06528
JB
1751info exceptions
1752info exceptions REGEXP
1753 Display the list of Ada exceptions defined in the program being
1754 debugged. If provided, only the exceptions whose names match REGEXP
1755 are listed.
1756
bd3eecc3
PA
1757* New options
1758
8fb8eb5c
DE
1759set debug symfile off|on
1760show debug symfile
1761 Control display of debugging info regarding reading symbol files and
1762 symbol tables within those files
1763
e7045703
DE
1764set print raw frame-arguments
1765show print raw frame-arguments
1766 Set/show whether to print frame arguments in raw mode,
1767 disregarding any defined pretty-printers.
1768
bd3eecc3
PA
1769set remote trace-status-packet
1770show remote trace-status-packet
1771 Set/show the use of remote protocol qTStatus packet.
1772
a1217d97
SL
1773set debug nios2
1774show debug nios2
1775 Control display of debugging messages related to Nios II targets.
1776
c1e36e3e
PA
1777set range-stepping
1778show range-stepping
1779 Control whether target-assisted range stepping is enabled.
1780
98882a26
PA
1781set startup-with-shell
1782show startup-with-shell
1783 Specifies whether Unix child processes are started via a shell or
1784 directly.
1785
29453a14
YQ
1786set code-cache
1787show code-cache
1788 Use the target memory cache for accesses to the code segment. This
1789 improves performance of remote debugging (particularly disassembly).
1790
1c2e4450
PA
1791* You can now use a literal value 'unlimited' for options that
1792 interpret 0 or -1 as meaning "unlimited". E.g., "set
1793 trace-buffer-size unlimited" is now an alias for "set
1794 trace-buffer-size -1" and "set height unlimited" is now an alias for
1795 "set height 0".
1796
db0fec5c
DE
1797* The "set debug symtab-create" debugging option of GDB has been changed to
1798 accept a verbosity level. 0 means "off", 1 provides basic debugging
1799 output, and values of 2 or greater provides more verbose output.
1800
dccca75d
EZ
1801* New command-line options
1802--configuration
1803 Display the details of GDB configure-time options.
1804
d0353e76
YQ
1805* The command 'tsave' can now support new option '-ctf' to save trace
1806 buffer in Common Trace Format.
1807
b292c783
JK
1808* Newly installed $prefix/bin/gcore acts as a shell interface for the
1809 GDB command gcore.
1810
6e72ca20
TT
1811* GDB now implements the the C++ 'typeid' operator.
1812
b340913d
TT
1813* The new convenience variable $_exception holds the exception being
1814 thrown or caught at an exception-related catchpoint.
1815
1816* The exception-related catchpoints, like "catch throw", now accept a
1817 regular expression which can be used to filter exceptions by type.
1818
0c557179
SDJ
1819* The new convenience variable $_exitsignal is automatically set to
1820 the terminating signal number when the program being debugged dies
1821 due to an uncaught signal.
1822
d0353e76
YQ
1823* MI changes
1824
403cb6b1 1825 ** All MI commands now accept an optional "--language" option.
4e35e808
JB
1826 Support for this feature can be verified by using the "-list-features"
1827 command, which should contain "language-option".
403cb6b1 1828
6b7cbff1
JB
1829 ** The new command -info-gdb-mi-command allows the user to determine
1830 whether a GDB/MI command is supported or not.
1831
2ea126fa
JB
1832 ** The "^error" result record returned when trying to execute an undefined
1833 GDB/MI command now provides a variable named "code" whose content is the
1834 "undefined-command" error code. Support for this feature can be verified
1835 by using the "-list-features" command, which should contain
1836 "undefined-command-error-code".
1837
d0353e76
YQ
1838 ** The -trace-save MI command can optionally save trace buffer in Common
1839 Trace Format now.
1840
c5867ab6
HZ
1841 ** The new command -dprintf-insert sets a dynamic printf breakpoint.
1842
c898adb7
YQ
1843 ** The command -data-list-register-values now accepts an optional
1844 "--skip-unavailable" option. When used, only the available registers
1845 are displayed.
1846
dc673c81
YQ
1847 ** The new command -trace-frame-collected dumps collected variables,
1848 computed expressions, tvars, memory and registers in a traceframe.
1849
6211c335
YQ
1850 ** The commands -stack-list-locals, -stack-list-arguments and
1851 -stack-list-variables now accept an option "--skip-unavailable".
1852 When used, only the available locals or arguments are displayed.
1853
5713b9b5
JB
1854 ** The -exec-run command now accepts an optional "--start" option.
1855 When used, the command follows the same semantics as the "start"
1856 command, stopping the program's execution at the start of its
72bfa06c
JB
1857 main subprogram. Support for this feature can be verified using
1858 the "-list-features" command, which should contain
1859 "exec-run-start-option".
5713b9b5 1860
40555925
JB
1861 ** The new commands -catch-assert and -catch-exceptions insert
1862 catchpoints stopping the program when Ada exceptions are raised.
1863
58d06528
JB
1864 ** The new command -info-ada-exceptions provides the equivalent of
1865 the new "info exceptions" command.
1866
0201faac
JB
1867* New system-wide configuration scripts
1868 A GDB installation now provides scripts suitable for use as system-wide
1869 configuration scripts for the following systems:
1870 ** ElinOS
1871 ** Wind River Linux
1872
c1e36e3e
PA
1873* GDB now supports target-assigned range stepping with remote targets.
1874 This improves the performance of stepping source lines by reducing
1875 the number of control packets from/to GDB. See "New remote packets"
1876 below.
1877
28a93511
YQ
1878* GDB now understands the element 'tvar' in the XML traceframe info.
1879 It has the id of the collected trace state variables.
1880
4ac33720
UW
1881* On S/390 targets that provide the transactional-execution feature,
1882 the program interruption transaction diagnostic block (TDB) is now
1883 represented as a number of additional "registers" in GDB.
1884
c1e36e3e
PA
1885* New remote packets
1886
1887vCont;r
1888
1889 The vCont packet supports a new 'r' action, that tells the remote
1890 stub to step through an address range itself, without GDB
1891 involvemement at each single-step.
1892
7f91dbec
GB
1893qXfer:libraries-svr4:read's annex
1894 The previously unused annex of the qXfer:libraries-svr4:read packet
1895 is now used to support passing an argument list. The remote stub
1896 reports support for this argument list to GDB's qSupported query.
1897 The defined arguments are "start" and "prev", used to reduce work
1898 necessary for library list updating, resulting in significant
1899 speedup.
1900
c2d6af84
PA
1901* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
1902
1903 ** GDBserver now supports target-assisted range stepping. Currently
1904 enabled on x86/x86_64 GNU/Linux targets.
1905
28a93511
YQ
1906 ** GDBserver now adds element 'tvar' in the XML in the reply to
1907 'qXfer:traceframe-info:read'. It has the id of the collected
1908 trace state variables.
1909
7a60ad40
YQ
1910 ** GDBserver now supports hardware watchpoints on the MIPS GNU/Linux
1911 target.
1912
6fbe845e
AB
1913* New 'z' formatter for printing and examining memory, this displays the
1914 value as hexadecimal zero padded on the left to the size of the type.
1915
9058cc3a
TG
1916* GDB can now use Windows x64 unwinding data.
1917
0d12017b
JB
1918* The "set remotebaud" command has been replaced by "set serial baud".
1919 Similarly, "show remotebaud" has been replaced by "show serial baud".
1920 The "set remotebaud" and "show remotebaud" commands are still available
1921 to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
1922
2d450646 1923*** Changes in GDB 7.6
80c8d323 1924
59ea5688
MM
1925* Target record has been renamed to record-full.
1926 Record/replay is now enabled with the "record full" command.
1927 This also affects settings that are associated with full record/replay
1928 that have been moved from "set/show record" to "set/show record full":
1929
1930set|show record full insn-number-max
1931set|show record full stop-at-limit
1932set|show record full memory-query
1933
1934* A new record target "record-btrace" has been added. The new target
1935 uses hardware support to record the control-flow of a process. It
1936 does not support replaying the execution, but it implements the
1937 below new commands for investigating the recorded execution log.
1938 This new recording method can be enabled using:
1939
1940record btrace
1941
1942 The "record-btrace" target is only available on Intel Atom processors
1943 and requires a Linux kernel 2.6.32 or later.
1944
1945* Two new commands have been added for record/replay to give information
1946 about the recorded execution without having to replay the execution.
1947 The commands are only supported by "record btrace".
1948
1949record instruction-history prints the execution history at
1950 instruction granularity
1951
1952record function-call-history prints the execution history at
1953 function granularity
1954
543bf33d
AT
1955* New native configurations
1956
51d66578 1957ARM AArch64 GNU/Linux aarch64*-*-linux-gnu
543bf33d 1958FreeBSD/powerpc powerpc*-*-freebsd
4f4352f7 1959x86_64/Cygwin x86_64-*-cygwin*
ea5f3910 1960Tilera TILE-Gx GNU/Linux tilegx*-*-linux-gnu
543bf33d 1961
249729c4
JB
1962* New targets
1963
51d66578
MS
1964ARM AArch64 aarch64*-*-elf
1965ARM AArch64 GNU/Linux aarch64*-*-linux
249729c4 1966Lynx 178 PowerPC powerpc-*-lynx*178
3c095f49 1967x86_64/Cygwin x86_64-*-cygwin*
ea5f3910 1968Tilera TILE-Gx GNU/Linux tilegx*-*-linux
249729c4 1969
e64e0392
DE
1970* If the configured location of system.gdbinit file (as given by the
1971 --with-system-gdbinit option at configure time) is in the
1972 data-directory (as specified by --with-gdb-datadir at configure
1973 time) or in one of its subdirectories, then GDB will look for the
1974 system-wide init file in the directory specified by the
1975 --data-directory command-line option.
1976
07540c15
DE
1977* New command line options:
1978
1979-nh Disables auto-loading of ~/.gdbinit, but still executes all the
1980 other initialization files, unlike -nx which disables all of them.
1981
e93a8774
TT
1982* Removed command line options
1983
1984-epoch This was used by the gdb mode in Epoch, an ancient fork of
1985 Emacs.
1986
53342f27
TT
1987* The 'ptype' and 'whatis' commands now accept an argument to control
1988 type formatting.
1989
451b7c33
TT
1990* 'info proc' now works on some core files.
1991
a72c3253
DE
1992* Python scripting
1993
1994 ** Vectors can be created with gdb.Type.vector.
1995
d7de8e3c
TT
1996 ** Python's atexit.register now works in GDB.
1997
18a9fc12
TT
1998 ** Types can be pretty-printed via a Python API.
1999
9a27f2c6
PK
2000 ** Python 3 is now supported (in addition to Python 2.4 or later)
2001
bea883fd
SCR
2002 ** New class gdb.Architecture exposes GDB's internal representation
2003 of architecture in the Python API.
2004
2005 ** New method Frame.architecture returns the gdb.Architecture object
2006 corresponding to the frame's architecture.
2007
a72c3253
DE
2008* New Python-based convenience functions:
2009
2010 ** $_memeq(buf1, buf2, length)
2011 ** $_streq(str1, str2)
2012 ** $_strlen(str)
2013 ** $_regex(str, regex)
2014
f3c8a52a
JK
2015* The 'cd' command now defaults to using '~' (the home directory) if not
2016 given an argument.
2017
1605ef26
TT
2018* The C++ ABI now defaults to the GNU v3 ABI. This has been the
2019 default for GCC since November 2000.
2020
504b36fd
YQ
2021* The command 'forward-search' can now be abbreviated as 'fo'.
2022
f2a8bc8a
YQ
2023* The command 'info tracepoints' can now display 'installed on target'
2024 or 'not installed on target' for each non-pending location of tracepoint.
2025
23a80689
JB
2026* New configure options
2027
2028--enable-libmcheck/--disable-libmcheck
2029 By default, development versions are built with -lmcheck on hosts
2030 that support it, in order to help track memory corruption issues.
2031 Release versions, on the other hand, are built without -lmcheck
2032 by default. The --enable-libmcheck/--disable-libmcheck configure
2033 options allow the user to override that default.
393fd4c3
YQ
2034--with-babeltrace/--with-babeltrace-include/--with-babeltrace-lib
2035 This configure option allows the user to build GDB with
2036 libbabeltrace using which GDB can read Common Trace Format data.
23a80689 2037
d6b28940
TT
2038* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
2039
ab04a2af
TT
2040catch signal
2041 Catch signals. This is similar to "handle", but allows commands and
2042 conditions to be attached.
2043
d6b28940
TT
2044maint info bfds
2045 List the BFDs known to GDB.
2046
8315665e
YPK
2047python-interactive [command]
2048pi [command]
2049 Start a Python interactive prompt, or evaluate the optional command
2050 and print the result of expressions.
2051
2052py [command]
2053 "py" is a new alias for "python".
2054
18a9fc12
TT
2055enable type-printer [name]...
2056disable type-printer [name]...
2057 Enable or disable type printers.
2058
aa9259cc
TS
2059* Removed commands
2060
2061 ** For the Renesas Super-H architecture, the "regs" command has been removed
2062 (has been deprecated in GDB 7.5), and "info all-registers" should be used
2063 instead.
2064
53342f27
TT
2065* New options
2066
2067set print type methods (on|off)
2068show print type methods
2069 Control whether method declarations are displayed by "ptype".
2070 The default is to show them.
2071
2072set print type typedefs (on|off)
2073show print type typedefs
2074 Control whether typedef definitions are displayed by "ptype".
2075 The default is to show them.
2076
1b56eb55
JK
2077set filename-display basename|relative|absolute
2078show filename-display
2079 Control the way in which filenames is displayed.
2080 The default is "relative", which preserves previous behavior.
2081
e9f1758d
PA
2082set trace-buffer-size
2083show trace-buffer-size
2084 Request target to change the size of trace buffer.
2085
a46c1e42
PA
2086set remote trace-buffer-size-packet auto|on|off
2087show remote trace-buffer-size-packet
2088 Control the use of the remote protocol `QTBuffer:size' packet.
2089
be9a8770
PA
2090set debug aarch64
2091show debug aarch64
2092 Control display of debugging messages related to ARM AArch64.
2093 The default is off.
2094
2095set debug coff-pe-read
2096show debug coff-pe-read
2097 Control display of debugging messages related to reading of COFF/PE
2098 exported symbols.
2099
2100set debug mach-o
2101show debug mach-o
2102 Control display of debugging messages related to Mach-O symbols
2103 processing.
2104
2105set debug notification
2106show debug notification
2107 Control display of debugging info for async remote notification.
2108
5b9afe8a
YQ
2109* MI changes
2110
2111 ** Command parameter changes are now notified using new async record
2112 "=cmd-param-changed".
201b4506
YQ
2113 ** Trace frame changes caused by command "tfind" are now notified using
2114 new async record "=traceframe-changed".
134a2066
YQ
2115 ** The creation, deletion and modification of trace state variables
2116 are now notified using new async records "=tsv-created",
2117 "=tsv-deleted" and "=tsv-modified".
82a90ccf
YQ
2118 ** The start and stop of process record are now notified using new
2119 async record "=record-started" and "=record-stopped".
8de0566d
YQ
2120 ** Memory changes are now notified using new async record
2121 "=memory-changed".
ed8a1c2d 2122 ** The data-disassemble command response will include a "fullname" field
ec83d211 2123 containing the absolute file name when source has been requested.
62747a60
TT
2124 ** New optional parameter COUNT added to the "-data-write-memory-bytes"
2125 command, to allow pattern filling of memory areas.
3fa7bf06
MG
2126 ** New commands "-catch-load"/"-catch-unload" added for intercepting
2127 library load/unload events.
f2a8bc8a
YQ
2128 ** The response to breakpoint commands and breakpoint async records
2129 includes an "installed" field containing a boolean state about each
2130 non-pending tracepoint location is whether installed on target or not.
f5911ea1
HAQ
2131 ** Output of the "-trace-status" command includes a "trace-file" field
2132 containing the name of the trace file being examined. This field is
2133 optional, and only present when examining a trace file.
ec83d211
JK
2134 ** The "fullname" field is now always present along with the "file" field,
2135 even if the file cannot be found by GDB.
5b9afe8a 2136
608e2dbb
TT
2137* GDB now supports the "mini debuginfo" section, .gnu_debugdata.
2138 You must have the LZMA library available when configuring GDB for this
2139 feature to be enabled. For more information, see:
2140 http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Features/MiniDebugInfo
2141
f6f899bf
HAQ
2142* New remote packets
2143
2144QTBuffer:size
2145 Set the size of trace buffer. The remote stub reports support for this
2146 packet to gdb's qSupported query.
2147
10782d74
MM
2148Qbtrace:bts
2149 Enable Branch Trace Store (BTS)-based branch tracing for the current
2150 thread. The remote stub reports support for this packet to gdb's
2151 qSupported query.
2152
2153Qbtrace:off
2154 Disable branch tracing for the current thread. The remote stub reports
2155 support for this packet to gdb's qSupported query.
2156
2157qXfer:btrace:read
2158 Read the traced branches for the current thread. The remote stub
2159 reports support for this packet to gdb's qSupported query.
2160
80c8d323 2161*** Changes in GDB 7.5
d6e00af6 2162
1b3371b1
L
2163* GDB now supports x32 ABI. Visit <http://sites.google.com/site/x32abi/>
2164 for more x32 ABI info.
2165
d0e64392
MR
2166* GDB now supports access to MIPS DSP registers on Linux targets.
2167
4cc0665f
MR
2168* GDB now supports debugging microMIPS binaries.
2169
85d4a676
SS
2170* The "info os" command on GNU/Linux can now display information on
2171 several new classes of objects managed by the operating system:
2172 "info os procgroups" lists process groups
2173 "info os files" lists file descriptors
2174 "info os sockets" lists internet-domain sockets
2175 "info os shm" lists shared-memory regions
2176 "info os semaphores" lists semaphores
2177 "info os msg" lists message queues
2178 "info os modules" lists loaded kernel modules
2179
55aa24fb
SDJ
2180* GDB now has support for SDT (Static Defined Tracing) probes. Currently,
2181 the only implemented backend is for SystemTap probes (<sys/sdt.h>). You
2182 can set a breakpoint using the new "-probe, "-pstap" or "-probe-stap"
2183 options and inspect the probe arguments using the new $_probe_arg family
2184 of convenience variables. You can obtain more information about SystemTap
2185 in <http://sourceware.org/systemtap/>.
2186
72508ac0
PO
2187* GDB now supports reversible debugging on ARM, it allows you to
2188 debug basic ARM and THUMB instructions, and provides
2189 record/replay support.
2190
16899756
DE
2191* The option "symbol-reloading" has been deleted as it is no longer used.
2192
4795f398
DE
2193* Python scripting
2194
7d74f244
DE
2195 ** GDB commands implemented in Python can now be put in command class
2196 "gdb.COMMAND_USER".
2197
4795f398
DE
2198 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" is now deleted.
2199
50897289
TT
2200 ** A new class, gdb.printing.FlagEnumerationPrinter, can be used to
2201 apply "flag enum"-style pretty-printing to any enum.
2202
64e7d9dd
TT
2203 ** gdb.lookup_symbol can now work when there is no current frame.
2204
2205 ** gdb.Symbol now has a 'line' attribute, holding the line number in
2206 the source at which the symbol was defined.
2207
f0823d2c
TT
2208 ** gdb.Symbol now has the new attribute 'needs_frame' and the new
2209 method 'value'. The former indicates whether the symbol needs a
2210 frame in order to compute its value, and the latter computes the
2211 symbol's value.
2212
7b282c5a
SCR
2213 ** A new method 'referenced_value' on gdb.Value objects which can
2214 dereference pointer as well as C++ reference values.
2215
a20ee7a4
SCR
2216 ** New methods 'global_block' and 'static_block' on gdb.Symtab objects
2217 which return the global and static blocks (as gdb.Block objects),
2218 of the underlying symbol table, respectively.
2219
7efc75aa
SCR
2220 ** New function gdb.find_pc_line which returns the gdb.Symtab_and_line
2221 object associated with a PC value.
2222
ee0bf529
SCR
2223 ** gdb.Symtab_and_line has new attribute 'last' which holds the end
2224 of the address range occupied by code for the current source line.
2225
a766d390
DE
2226* Go language support.
2227 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the Go programming
2228 language.
2229
e0f9f062
DE
2230* GDBserver now supports stdio connections.
2231 E.g. (gdb) target remote | ssh myhost gdbserver - hello
2232
217bff3e
JK
2233* The binary "gdbtui" can no longer be built or installed.
2234 Use "gdb -tui" instead.
2235
cafec441
TT
2236* GDB will now print "flag" enums specially. A flag enum is one where
2237 all the enumerator values have no bits in common when pairwise
2238 "and"ed. When printing a value whose type is a flag enum, GDB will
2239 show all the constants, e.g., for enum E { ONE = 1, TWO = 2}:
2240 (gdb) print (enum E) 3
2241 $1 = (ONE | TWO)
2242
4aac40c8
TT
2243* The filename part of a linespec will now match trailing components
2244 of a source file name. For example, "break gcc/expr.c:1000" will
2245 now set a breakpoint in build/gcc/expr.c, but not
2246 build/libcpp/expr.c.
2247
d99bd577
UW
2248* The "info proc" and "generate-core-file" commands will now also
2249 work on remote targets connected to GDBserver on Linux.
2250
53fe1783
GB
2251* The command "info catch" has been removed. It has been disabled
2252 since December 2007.
2253
e41eec66
JB
2254* The "catch exception" and "catch assert" commands now accept
2255 a condition at the end of the command, much like the "break"
2256 command does. For instance:
2257
2258 (gdb) catch exception Constraint_Error if Barrier = True
2259
2260 Previously, it was possible to add a condition to such catchpoints,
2261 but it had to be done as a second step, after the catchpoint had been
2262 created, using the "condition" command.
2263
5808517f
YQ
2264* The "info static-tracepoint-marker" command will now also work on
2265 native Linux targets with in-process agent.
2266
481860b3
GB
2267* GDB can now set breakpoints on inlined functions.
2268
2269* The .gdb_index section has been updated to include symbols for
2270 inlined functions. GDB will ignore older .gdb_index sections by
2271 default, which could cause symbol files to be loaded more slowly
e615022a
DE
2272 until their .gdb_index sections can be recreated. The new command
2273 "set use-deprecated-index-sections on" will cause GDB to use any older
2274 .gdb_index sections it finds. This will restore performance, but the
2275 ability to set breakpoints on inlined functions will be lost in symbol
2276 files with older .gdb_index sections.
481860b3 2277
156942c7
DE
2278 The .gdb_index section has also been updated to record more information
2279 about each symbol. This speeds up the "info variables", "info functions"
2280 and "info types" commands when used with programs having the .gdb_index
2281 section, as well as speeding up debugging with shared libraries using
2282 the .gdb_index section.
2283
927fbba6
JB
2284* Ada support for GDB/MI Variable Objects has been added.
2285
20388dd6
YQ
2286* GDB can now support 'breakpoint always-inserted mode' in 'record'
2287 target.
2288
f3e0e960
SS
2289* MI changes
2290
2291 ** New command -info-os is the MI equivalent of "info os".
2292
37ce89eb
SS
2293 ** Output logs ("set logging" and related) now include MI output.
2294
edcc5120
TT
2295* New commands
2296
e615022a
DE
2297 ** "set use-deprecated-index-sections on|off"
2298 "show use-deprecated-index-sections on|off"
2299 Controls the use of deprecated .gdb_index sections.
2300
edcc5120
TT
2301 ** "catch load" and "catch unload" can be used to stop when a shared
2302 library is loaded or unloaded, respectively.
2303
816338b5
SS
2304 ** "enable count" can be used to auto-disable a breakpoint after
2305 several hits.
2306
57651221 2307 ** "info vtbl" can be used to show the virtual method tables for
c4aeac85
TT
2308 C++ and Java objects.
2309
06fc020f 2310 ** "explore" and its sub commands "explore value" and "explore type"
6ea71545 2311 can be used to recursively explore values and types of
06fc020f
SCR
2312 expressions. These commands are available only if GDB is
2313 configured with '--with-python'.
2314
bf88dd68
JK
2315 ** "info auto-load" shows status of all kinds of auto-loaded files,
2316 "info auto-load gdb-scripts" shows status of auto-loading GDB canned
2317 sequences of commands files, "info auto-load python-scripts"
2318 shows status of auto-loading Python script files,
2319 "info auto-load local-gdbinit" shows status of loading init file
2320 (.gdbinit) from current directory and "info auto-load libthread-db" shows
2321 status of inferior specific thread debugging shared library loading.
2322
2323 ** "info auto-load-scripts", "set auto-load-scripts on|off"
2324 and "show auto-load-scripts" commands have been deprecated, use their
2325 "info auto-load python-scripts", "set auto-load python-scripts on|off"
2326 and "show auto-load python-scripts" counterparts instead.
2327
e7e0cddf
SS
2328 ** "dprintf location,format,args..." creates a dynamic printf, which
2329 is basically a breakpoint that does a printf and immediately
2330 resumes your program's execution, so it is like a printf that you
2331 can insert dynamically at runtime instead of at compiletime.
2332
9cb709b6
TT
2333 ** "set print symbol"
2334 "show print symbol"
2335 Controls whether GDB attempts to display the symbol, if any,
2336 corresponding to addresses it prints. This defaults to "on", but
2337 you can set it to "off" to restore GDB's previous behavior.
2338
2d4c29c5
TS
2339* Deprecated commands
2340
2341 ** For the Renesas Super-H architecture, the "regs" command has been
2342 deprecated, and "info all-registers" should be used instead.
2343
a58b110a
KB
2344* New targets
2345
2346Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
60c9a3c0 2347HP OpenVMS ia64 ia64-hp-openvms*
a58b110a 2348
72895ff6
LM
2349* GDBserver supports evaluation of breakpoint conditions. When
2350 support is advertised by GDBserver, GDB may be told to send the
2351 breakpoint conditions in bytecode form to GDBserver. GDBserver
2352 will only report the breakpoint trigger to GDB when its condition
2353 evaluates to true.
2354
2355* New options
2356
4cc0665f
MR
2357set mips compression
2358show mips compression
2359 Select the compressed ISA encoding used in functions that have no symbol
2360 information available. The encoding can be set to either of:
2361 mips16
2362 micromips
2363 and is updated automatically from ELF file flags if available.
2364
72895ff6
LM
2365set breakpoint condition-evaluation
2366show breakpoint condition-evaluation
cf65ecd3 2367 Control whether breakpoint conditions are evaluated by GDB ("host") or by
5b43fab2
JK
2368 GDBserver ("target"). Default option "auto" chooses the most efficient
2369 available mode.
72895ff6
LM
2370 This option can improve debugger efficiency depending on the speed of the
2371 target.
2372
bf88dd68
JK
2373set auto-load off
2374 Disable auto-loading globally.
2375
2376show auto-load
2377 Show auto-loading setting of all kinds of auto-loaded files.
2378
2379set auto-load gdb-scripts on|off
2380show auto-load gdb-scripts
2381 Control auto-loading of GDB canned sequences of commands files.
2382
2383set auto-load python-scripts on|off
2384show auto-load python-scripts
2385 Control auto-loading of Python script files.
2386
2387set auto-load local-gdbinit on|off
2388show auto-load local-gdbinit
2389 Control loading of init file (.gdbinit) from current directory.
2390
2391set auto-load libthread-db on|off
2392show auto-load libthread-db
2393 Control auto-loading of inferior specific thread debugging shared library.
2394
7349ff92 2395set auto-load scripts-directory <dir1>[:<dir2>...]
9cc815f5 2396show auto-load scripts-directory
7349ff92
JK
2397 Set a list of directories from which to load auto-loaded scripts.
2398 Automatically loaded Python scripts and GDB scripts are located in one
2399 of the directories listed by this option.
2400 The delimiter (':' above) may differ according to the host platform.
2401
bccbefd2
JK
2402set auto-load safe-path <dir1>[:<dir2>...]
2403show auto-load safe-path
2404 Set a list of directories from which it is safe to auto-load files.
2405 The delimiter (':' above) may differ according to the host platform.
2406
4dc84fd1
JK
2407set debug auto-load on|off
2408show debug auto-load
2409 Control display of debugging info for auto-loading the files above.
2410
d3ce09f5 2411set dprintf-style gdb|call|agent
e7e0cddf 2412show dprintf-style
d3ce09f5
SS
2413 Control the way in which a dynamic printf is performed; "gdb"
2414 requests a GDB printf command, while "call" causes dprintf to call a
2415 function in the inferior. "agent" requests that the target agent
2416 (such as GDBserver) do the printing.
e7e0cddf
SS
2417
2418set dprintf-function <expr>
2419show dprintf-function
2420set dprintf-channel <expr>
2421show dprintf-channel
2422 Set the function and optional first argument to the call when using
2423 the "call" style of dynamic printf.
2424
d3ce09f5
SS
2425set disconnected-dprintf on|off
2426show disconnected-dprintf
2427 Control whether agent-style dynamic printfs continue to be in effect
2428 after GDB disconnects.
2429
6dea1fbd
JK
2430* New configure options
2431
7349ff92
JK
2432--with-auto-load-dir
2433 Configure default value for the 'set auto-load scripts-directory'
1564a261
JK
2434 setting above. It defaults to '$debugdir:$datadir/auto-load',
2435 $debugdir representing global debugging info directories (available
2436 via 'show debug-file-directory') and $datadir representing GDB's data
2437 directory (available via 'show data-directory').
7349ff92 2438
6dea1fbd
JK
2439--with-auto-load-safe-path
2440 Configure default value for the 'set auto-load safe-path' setting
7349ff92 2441 above. It defaults to the --with-auto-load-dir setting.
6dea1fbd
JK
2442
2443--without-auto-load-safe-path
2444 Set 'set auto-load safe-path' to '/', effectively disabling this
2445 security feature.
2446
72895ff6
LM
2447* New remote packets
2448
74c48cbb
PA
2449z0/z1 conditional breakpoints extension
2450
72895ff6
LM
2451 The z0/z1 breakpoint insertion packets have been extended to carry
2452 a list of conditional expressions over to the remote stub depending on the
2453 condition evaluation mode. The use of this extension can be controlled
2454 via the "set remote conditional-breakpoints-packet" command.
2455
9b224c5e
PA
2456QProgramSignals:
2457
2458 Specify the signals which the remote stub may pass to the debugged
2459 program without GDB involvement.
2460
8320cc4f
JK
2461* New command line options
2462
2463--init-command=FILE, -ix Like --command, -x but execute it
2464 before loading inferior.
2465--init-eval-command=COMMAND, -iex Like --eval-command=COMMAND, -ex but
2466 execute it before loading inferior.
2467
8837a20f
JB
2468*** Changes in GDB 7.4
2469
f8eba3c6
TT
2470* GDB now handles ambiguous linespecs more consistently; the existing
2471 FILE:LINE support has been expanded to other types of linespecs. A
2472 breakpoint will now be set on all matching locations in all
2473 inferiors, and locations will be added or removed according to
2474 inferior changes.
2475
1bfeeb0f
JL
2476* GDB now allows you to skip uninteresting functions and files when
2477 stepping with the "skip function" and "skip file" commands.
2478
480a3f21
PW
2479* GDB has two new commands: "set remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit"
2480 and "show remote hardware-watchpoint-length-limit". These allows to
2481 set or show the maximum length limit (in bytes) of a remote
2482 target hardware watchpoint.
2483
2484 This allows e.g. to use "unlimited" hardware watchpoints with the
2485 gdbserver integrated in Valgrind version >= 3.7.0. Such Valgrind
2486 watchpoints are slower than real hardware watchpoints but are
2487 significantly faster than gdb software watchpoints.
2488
3a7bf607
PM
2489* Python scripting
2490
32d1c362 2491 ** The register_pretty_printer function in module gdb.printing now takes
7d0aff21 2492 an optional `replace' argument. If True, the new printer replaces any
32d1c362
DE
2493 existing one.
2494
3a7bf607 2495 ** The "maint set python print-stack on|off" command has been
4795f398
DE
2496 deprecated and will be deleted in GDB 7.5.
2497 A new command: "set python print-stack none|full|message" has
2498 replaced it. Additionally, the default for "print-stack" is
2499 now "message", which just prints the error message without
2500 the stack trace.
3a7bf607 2501
baacfb07 2502 ** A prompt substitution hook (prompt_hook) is now available to the
3a7bf607 2503 Python API.
713389e0 2504
fa3a4f15
PM
2505 ** A new Python module, gdb.prompt has been added to the GDB Python
2506 modules library. This module provides functionality for
baacfb07 2507 escape sequences in prompts (used by set/show
fa3a4f15
PM
2508 extended-prompt). These escape sequences are replaced by their
2509 corresponding value.
2510
5e239b84
PM
2511 ** Python commands and convenience-functions located in
2512 'data-directory'/python/gdb/command and
2513 'data-directory'/python/gdb/function are now automatically loaded
2514 on GDB start-up.
2515
9df2fbc4
PM
2516 ** Blocks now provide four new attributes. global_block and
2517 static_block will return the global and static blocks
2518 respectively. is_static and is_global are boolean attributes
2519 that indicate if the block is one of those two types.
2520
457e09f0
DE
2521 ** Symbols now provide the "type" attribute, the type of the symbol.
2522
6839b47f
KP
2523 ** The "gdb.breakpoint" function has been deprecated in favor of
2524 "gdb.breakpoints".
2525
cc72b2a2
KP
2526 ** A new class "gdb.FinishBreakpoint" is provided to catch the return
2527 of a function. This class is based on the "finish" command
2528 available in the CLI.
2529
84ad80e6
PK
2530 ** Type objects for struct and union types now allow access to
2531 the fields using standard Python dictionary (mapping) methods.
2532 For example, "some_type['myfield']" now works, as does
2533 "some_type.items()".
2534
20c168b5
KP
2535 ** A new event "gdb.new_objfile" has been added, triggered by loading a
2536 new object file.
2537
03c3051a
PK
2538 ** A new function, "deep_items" has been added to the gdb.types
2539 module in the GDB Python modules library. This function returns
2540 an iterator over the fields of a struct or union type. Unlike
2541 the standard Python "iteritems" method, it will recursively traverse
2542 any anonymous fields.
2543
7376e450
TT
2544* MI changes
2545
2546 ** "*stopped" events can report several new "reason"s, such as
2547 "solib-event".
2548
2549 ** Breakpoint changes are now notified using new async records, like
2550 "=breakpoint-modified".
2551
2552 ** New command -ada-task-info.
2553
98a5dd13
DE
2554* libthread-db-search-path now supports two special values: $sdir and $pdir.
2555 $sdir specifies the default system locations of shared libraries.
2556 $pdir specifies the directory where the libpthread used by the application
2557 lives.
2558
2559 GDB no longer looks in $sdir and $pdir after it has searched the directories
2560 mentioned in libthread-db-search-path. If you want to search those
2561 directories, they must be specified in libthread-db-search-path.
2562 The default value of libthread-db-search-path on GNU/Linux and Solaris
2563 systems is now "$sdir:$pdir".
2564
2565 $pdir is not supported by gdbserver, it is currently ignored.
2566 $sdir is supported by gdbserver.
2567
478aac75
DE
2568* New configure option --with-iconv-bin.
2569 When using the internationalization support like the one in the GNU C
2570 library, GDB will invoke the "iconv" program to get a list of supported
2571 character sets. If this program lives in a non-standard location, one can
2572 use this option to specify where to find it.
2573
9c06b0b4
TJB
2574* When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
2575 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports masked hardware
2576 watchpoints, which specify a mask in addition to an address to watch.
2577 The mask specifies that some bits of an address (the bits which are
2578 reset in the mask) should be ignored when matching the address accessed
2579 by the inferior against the watchpoint address. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
2580 section in the user manual for more details.
2581
03f2bd59
JK
2582* The new option --once causes GDBserver to stop listening for connections once
2583 the first connection is made. The listening port used by GDBserver will
2584 become available after that.
2585
71eba9c2 2586* New commands "info macros" and "alias" have been added.
edc84990 2587
2bda9cc5
JK
2588* New function parameters suffix @entry specifies value of function parameter
2589 at the time the function got called. Entry values are available only since
2590 gcc version 4.7.
2591
ed59ded5
DE
2592* New commands
2593
2594!SHELL COMMAND
2595 "!" is now an alias of the "shell" command.
2596 Note that no space is needed between "!" and SHELL COMMAND.
2597
9c06b0b4
TJB
2598* Changed commands
2599
2600watch EXPRESSION mask MASK_VALUE
2601 The watch command now supports the mask argument which allows creation
2602 of masked watchpoints, if the current architecture supports this feature.
2603
dbaefcf7
DE
2604info auto-load-scripts [REGEXP]
2605 This command was formerly named "maintenance print section-scripts".
2606 It is now generally useful and is no longer a maintenance-only command.
2607
71eba9c2 2608info macro [-all] [--] MACRO
2609 The info macro command has new options `-all' and `--'. The first for
2610 printing all definitions of a macro. The second for explicitly specifying
2611 the end of arguments and the beginning of the macro name in case the macro
2612 name starts with a hyphen.
2613
3065dfb6
SS
2614collect[/s] EXPRESSIONS
2615 The tracepoint collect command now takes an optional modifier "/s"
2616 that directs it to dereference pointer-to-character types and
2617 collect the bytes of memory up to a zero byte. The behavior is
2618 similar to what you see when you use the regular print command on a
2619 string. An optional integer following the "/s" sets a bound on the
2620 number of bytes that will be collected.
2621
f196051f
SS
2622tstart [NOTES]
2623 The trace start command now interprets any supplied arguments as a
2624 note to be recorded with the trace run, with an effect similar to
2625 setting the variable trace-notes.
2626
2627tstop [NOTES]
2628 The trace stop command now interprets any arguments as a note to be
2629 mentioned along with the tstatus report that the trace was stopped
2630 with a command. The effect is similar to setting the variable
2631 trace-stop-notes.
2632
d248b706
KY
2633* Tracepoints can now be enabled and disabled at any time after a trace
2634 experiment has been started using the standard "enable" and "disable"
2635 commands. It is now possible to start a trace experiment with no enabled
2636 tracepoints; GDB will display a warning, but will allow the experiment to
2637 begin, assuming that tracepoints will be enabled as needed while the trace
2638 is running.
2639
405f8e94
SS
2640* Fast tracepoints on 32-bit x86-architectures can now be placed at
2641 locations with 4-byte instructions, when they were previously
2642 limited to locations with instructions of 5 bytes or longer.
2643
2bda9cc5
JK
2644* New options
2645
45cfd468
DE
2646set debug dwarf2-read
2647show debug dwarf2-read
2648 Turns on or off display of debugging messages related to reading
2649 DWARF debug info. The default is off.
2650
2651set debug symtab-create
2652show debug symtab-create
2653 Turns on or off display of debugging messages related to symbol table
2654 creation. The default is off.
2655
baacfb07
PM
2656set extended-prompt
2657show extended-prompt
2658 Set the GDB prompt, and allow escape sequences to be inserted to
2659 display miscellaneous information (see 'help set extended-prompt'
2660 for the list of sequences). This prompt (and any information
2661 accessed through the escape sequences) is updated every time the
2662 prompt is displayed.
2663
2bda9cc5
JK
2664set print entry-values (both|compact|default|if-needed|no|only|preferred)
2665show print entry-values
2666 Set printing of frame argument values at function entry. In some cases
2667 GDB can determine the value of function argument which was passed by the
2668 function caller, even if the value was modified inside the called function.
2669
2670set debug entry-values
2671show debug entry-values
2672 Control display of debugging info for determining frame argument values at
2673 function entry and virtual tail call frames.
2674
c011a4f4
DE
2675set basenames-may-differ
2676show basenames-may-differ
2677 Set whether a source file may have multiple base names.
2678 (A "base name" is the name of a file with the directory part removed.
2679 Example: The base name of "/home/user/hello.c" is "hello.c".)
2680 If set, GDB will canonicalize file names (e.g., expand symlinks)
2681 before comparing them. Canonicalization is an expensive operation,
2682 but it allows the same file be known by more than one base name.
2683 If not set (the default), all source files are assumed to have just
2684 one base name, and gdb will do file name comparisons more efficiently.
2685
f196051f
SS
2686set trace-user
2687show trace-user
2688set trace-notes
2689show trace-notes
2690 Set a user name and notes for the current and any future trace runs.
2691 This is useful for long-running and/or disconnected traces, to
2692 inform others (or yourself) as to who is running the trace, supply
2693 contact information, or otherwise explain what is going on.
2694
2695set trace-stop-notes
2696show trace-stop-notes
2697 Set a note attached to the trace run, that is displayed when the
2698 trace has been stopped by a tstop command. This is useful for
2699 instance as an explanation, if you are stopping a trace run that was
2700 started by someone else.
2701
d248b706
KY
2702* New remote packets
2703
2704QTEnable
2705
2706 Dynamically enable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
2707
2708QTDisable
2709
2710 Dynamically disable a tracepoint in a started trace experiment.
2711
f196051f
SS
2712QTNotes
2713
2714 Set the user and notes of the trace run.
2715
2716qTP
2717
2718 Query the current status of a tracepoint.
2719
405f8e94
SS
2720qTMinFTPILen
2721
2722 Query the minimum length of instruction at which a fast tracepoint may
2723 be placed.
2724
1a532630
PP
2725* Dcache size (number of lines) and line-size are now runtime-configurable
2726 via "set dcache line" and "set dcache line-size" commands.
2727
11315641
YQ
2728* New targets
2729
2730Texas Instruments TMS320C6x tic6x-*-*
2731
87326c78
DD
2732* New Simulators
2733
2734Renesas RL78 rl78-*-elf
2735
e8d56f18
JB
2736*** Changes in GDB 7.3.1
2737
2738* The build failure for NetBSD and OpenBSD targets have now been fixed.
2739
d6e00af6 2740*** Changes in GDB 7.3
797054e6 2741
60f98dde
MS
2742* GDB has a new command: "thread find [REGEXP]".
2743 It finds the thread id whose name, target id, or thread extra info
2744 matches the given regular expression.
2745
eee5b35e
DD
2746* The "catch syscall" command now works on mips*-linux* targets.
2747
b716877b
AB
2748* The -data-disassemble MI command now supports modes 2 and 3 for
2749 dumping the instruction opcodes.
2750
aae1c79a
DE
2751* New command line options
2752
2753-data-directory DIR Specify DIR as the "data-directory".
2754 This is mostly for testing purposes.
2755
a86caf66
DE
2756* The "maint set python auto-load on|off" command has been renamed to
2757 "set auto-load-scripts on|off".
2758
99e7ae30
DE
2759* GDB has a new command: "set directories".
2760 It is like the "dir" command except that it replaces the
2761 source path list instead of augmenting it.
2762
4694da01
TT
2763* GDB now understands thread names.
2764
2765 On GNU/Linux, "info threads" will display the thread name as set by
2766 prctl or pthread_setname_np.
2767
2768 There is also a new command, "thread name", which can be used to
2769 assign a name internally for GDB to display.
2770
f4b8a18d
KW
2771* OpenCL C
2772 Initial support for the OpenCL C language (http://www.khronos.org/opencl)
2773 has been integrated into GDB.
2774
585d1eb8
PM
2775* Python scripting
2776
da5d4055
PM
2777 ** The function gdb.Write now accepts an optional keyword 'stream'.
2778 This keyword, when provided, will direct the output to either
2779 stdout, stderr, or GDB's logging output.
2780
9a6f1302
PM
2781 ** Parameters can now be be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
2782 you may implement the get_set_doc and get_show_doc functions.
2783 This improves how Parameter set/show documentation is processed
2784 and allows for more dynamic content.
2785
29703da4
PM
2786 ** Symbols, Symbol Table, Symbol Table and Line, Object Files,
2787 Inferior, Inferior Thread, Blocks, and Block Iterator APIs now
2788 have an is_valid method.
2789
350c6c65
PM
2790 ** Breakpoints can now be sub-classed in Python, and in particular
2791 you may implement a 'stop' function that is executed each time
2792 the inferior reaches that breakpoint.
2793
6e6fbe60
DE
2794 ** New function gdb.lookup_global_symbol looks up a global symbol.
2795
585d1eb8
PM
2796 ** GDB values in Python are now callable if the value represents a
2797 function. For example, if 'some_value' represents a function that
2798 takes two integer parameters and returns a value, you can call
2799 that function like so:
2800
2801 result = some_value (10,20)
2802
0e3509db
DE
2803 ** Module gdb.types has been added.
2804 It contains a collection of utilities for working with gdb.Types objects:
2805 get_basic_type, has_field, make_enum_dict.
2806
7b51bc51
DE
2807 ** Module gdb.printing has been added.
2808 It contains utilities for writing and registering pretty-printers.
2809 New classes: PrettyPrinter, SubPrettyPrinter,
2810 RegexpCollectionPrettyPrinter.
2811 New function: register_pretty_printer.
2812
2813 ** New commands "info pretty-printers", "enable pretty-printer" and
2814 "disable pretty-printer" have been added.
2815
99e7ae30
DE
2816 ** gdb.parameter("directories") is now available.
2817
d8e22779
TT
2818 ** New function gdb.newest_frame returns the newest frame in the
2819 selected thread.
2820
4694da01
TT
2821 ** The gdb.InferiorThread class has a new "name" attribute. This
2822 holds the thread's name.
2823
505500db
SW
2824 ** Python Support for Inferior events.
2825 Python scripts can add observers to be notified of events
824446ad 2826 occurring in the process being debugged.
c17a9e46
HZ
2827 The following events are currently supported:
2828 - gdb.events.cont Continue event.
2829 - gdb.events.exited Inferior exited event.
2830 - gdb.events.stop Signal received, and Breakpoint hit events.
2831
def98928
TT
2832* C++ Improvements:
2833
2834 ** GDB now puts template parameters in scope when debugging in an
2835 instantiation. For example, if you have:
2836
2837 template<int X> int func (void) { return X; }
2838
2839 then if you step into func<5>, "print X" will show "5". This
2840 feature requires proper debuginfo support from the compiler; it
2841 was added to GCC 4.5.
2842
66cb8159
TT
2843 ** The motion commands "next", "finish", "until", and "advance" now
2844 work better when exceptions are thrown. In particular, GDB will
2845 no longer lose control of the inferior; instead, the GDB will
2846 stop the inferior at the point at which the exception is caught.
2847 This functionality requires a change in the exception handling
2848 code that was introduced in GCC 4.5.
2849
4aac0db7
UW
2850* GDB now follows GCC's rules on accessing volatile objects when
2851 reading or writing target state during expression evaluation.
2852 One notable difference to prior behavior is that "print x = 0"
2853 no longer generates a read of x; the value of the assignment is
2854 now always taken directly from the value being assigned.
2855
283e6a52
TT
2856* GDB now has some support for using labels in the program's source in
2857 linespecs. For instance, you can use "advance label" to continue
2858 execution to a label.
2859
2860* GDB now has support for reading and writing a new .gdb_index
2861 section. This section holds a fast index of DWARF debugging
2862 information and can be used to greatly speed up GDB startup and
2863 operation. See the documentation for `save gdb-index' for details.
2864
b56df873 2865* The "watch" command now accepts an optional "-location" argument.
14c0d4e1 2866 When used, this causes GDB to watch the memory referred to by the
b56df873
TT
2867 expression. Such a watchpoint is never deleted due to it going out
2868 of scope.
2869
ae53ffa4
PA
2870* GDB now supports thread debugging of core dumps on GNU/Linux.
2871
2872 GDB now activates thread debugging using the libthread_db library
2873 when debugging GNU/Linux core dumps, similarly to when debugging
2874 live processes. As a result, when debugging a core dump file, GDB
2875 is now able to display pthread_t ids of threads. For example, "info
2876 threads" shows the same output as when debugging the process when it
2877 was live. In earlier releases, you'd see something like this:
2878
2879 (gdb) info threads
2880 * 1 LWP 6780 main () at main.c:10
2881
2882 While now you see this:
2883
2884 (gdb) info threads
2885 * 1 Thread 0x7f0f5712a700 (LWP 6780) main () at main.c:10
2886
2887 It is also now possible to inspect TLS variables when debugging core
2888 dumps.
2889
2890 When debugging a core dump generated on a machine other than the one
2891 used to run GDB, you may need to point GDB at the correct
2892 libthread_db library with the "set libthread-db-search-path"
2893 command. See the user manual for more details on this command.
2894
f1310107
TJB
2895* When natively debugging programs on PowerPC BookE processors running
2896 a Linux kernel version 2.6.34 or later, GDB supports ranged breakpoints,
2897 which stop execution of the inferior whenever it executes an instruction
2898 at any address within the specified range. See the "PowerPC Embedded"
2899 section in the user manual for more details.
2900
248c9dbc
JB
2901* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
2902
1aee7009
JB
2903 ** GDBserver is now supported on PowerPC LynxOS (versions 4.x and 5.x),
2904 and i686 LynxOS (version 5.x).
248c9dbc 2905
eb826dc6
MF
2906 ** GDBserver is now supported on Blackfin Linux.
2907
44603653
JB
2908* New native configurations
2909
2910ia64 HP-UX ia64-*-hpux*
2911
91021223
MF
2912* New targets:
2913
2914Analog Devices, Inc. Blackfin Processor bfin-*
2915
6e1bb179
JB
2916* Ada task switching is now supported on sparc-elf targets when
2917 debugging a program using the Ravenscar Profile. For more information,
2918 see the "Tasking Support when using the Ravenscar Profile" section
2919 in the GDB user manual.
2920
50c97f38
TT
2921* Guile support was removed.
2922
448a92bf
MF
2923* New features in the GNU simulator
2924
2925 ** The --map-info flag lists all known core mappings.
2926
66ee2731
MF
2927 ** CFI flashes may be simulated via the "cfi" device.
2928
76b8507d 2929*** Changes in GDB 7.2
bfbf3774 2930
ba25b921
PA
2931* Shared library support for remote targets by default
2932
2933 When GDB is configured for a generic, non-OS specific target, like
2934 for example, --target=arm-eabi or one of the many *-*-elf targets,
2935 GDB now queries remote stubs for loaded shared libraries using the
2936 `qXfer:libraries:read' packet. Previously, shared library support
2937 was always disabled for such configurations.
2938
4656f5c6
SW
2939* C++ Improvements:
2940
2941 ** Argument Dependent Lookup (ADL)
2942
2943 In C++ ADL lookup directs function search to the namespaces of its
2944 arguments even if the namespace has not been imported.
2945 For example:
2946 namespace A
2947 {
2948 class B { };
2949 void foo (B) { }
2950 }
2951 ...
2952 A::B b
2953 foo(b)
2954 Here the compiler will search for `foo' in the namespace of 'b'
2955 and find A::foo. GDB now supports this. This construct is commonly
2956 used in the Standard Template Library for operators.
2957
2958 ** Improved User Defined Operator Support
2959
2960 In addition to member operators, GDB now supports lookup of operators
2961 defined in a namespace and imported with a `using' directive, operators
2962 defined in the global scope, operators imported implicitly from an
2963 anonymous namespace, and the ADL operators mentioned in the previous
2964 entry.
2965 GDB now also supports proper overload resolution for all the previously
2966 mentioned flavors of operators.
2967
254e6b9e
DE
2968 ** static const class members
2969
2970 Printing of static const class members that are initialized in the
2971 class definition has been fixed.
2972
711e434b
PM
2973* Windows Thread Information Block access.
2974
2975 On Windows targets, GDB now supports displaying the Windows Thread
2976 Information Block (TIB) structure. This structure is visible either
2977 by using the new command `info w32 thread-information-block' or, by
2978 dereferencing the new convenience variable named `$_tlb', a
2979 thread-specific pointer to the TIB. This feature is also supported
2980 when remote debugging using GDBserver.
2981
0fb4aa4b
PA
2982* Static tracepoints
2983
2984 Static tracepoints are calls in the user program into a tracing
2985 library. One such library is a port of the LTTng kernel tracer to
2986 userspace --- UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer, http://lttng.org/ust).
2987 When debugging with GDBserver, GDB now supports combining the GDB
2988 tracepoint machinery with such libraries. For example: the user can
2989 use GDB to probe a static tracepoint marker (a call from the user
2990 program into the tracing library) with the new "strace" command (see
2991 "New commands" below). This creates a "static tracepoint" in the
2992 breakpoint list, that can be manipulated with the same feature set
2993 as fast and regular tracepoints. E.g., collect registers, local and
2994 global variables, collect trace state variables, and define
2995 tracepoint conditions. In addition, the user can collect extra
2996 static tracepoint marker specific data, by collecting the new
2997 $_sdata internal variable. When analyzing the trace buffer, you can
2998 inspect $_sdata like any other variable available to GDB. For more
2999 information, see the "Tracepoints" chapter in GDB user manual. New
3000 remote packets have been defined to support static tracepoints, see
3001 the "New remote packets" section below.
3002
ca11e899
SS
3003* Better reconstruction of tracepoints after disconnected tracing
3004
3005 GDB will attempt to download the original source form of tracepoint
3006 definitions when starting a trace run, and then will upload these
3007 upon reconnection to the target, resulting in a more accurate
3008 reconstruction of the tracepoints that are in use on the target.
3009
3010* Observer mode
3011
3012 You can now exercise direct control over the ways that GDB can
3013 affect your program. For instance, you can disallow the setting of
3014 breakpoints, so that the program can run continuously (assuming
3015 non-stop mode). In addition, the "observer" variable is available
3016 to switch all of the different controls; in observer mode, GDB
3017 cannot affect the target's behavior at all, which is useful for
3018 tasks like diagnosing live systems in the field.
3019
3020* The new convenience variable $_thread holds the number of the
3021 current thread.
3022
711e434b
PM
3023* New remote packets
3024
3025qGetTIBAddr
3026
3027 Return the address of the Windows Thread Information Block of a given thread.
3028
dde08ee1
PA
3029qRelocInsn
3030
3031 In response to several of the tracepoint packets, the target may now
3032 also respond with a number of intermediate `qRelocInsn' request
3033 packets before the final result packet, to have GDB handle
3034 relocating an instruction to execute at a different address. This
3035 is particularly useful for stubs that support fast tracepoints. GDB
3036 reports support for this feature in the qSupported packet.
3037
0fb4aa4b
PA
3038qTfSTM, qTsSTM
3039
3040 List static tracepoint markers in the target program.
3041
3042qTSTMat
3043
3044 List static tracepoint markers at a given address in the target
3045 program.
3046
3047qXfer:statictrace:read
3048
3049 Read the static trace data collected (by a `collect $_sdata'
3050 tracepoint action). The remote stub reports support for this packet
3051 to gdb's qSupported query.
3052
ca11e899
SS
3053QAllow
3054
3055 Send the current settings of GDB's permission flags.
3056
3057QTDPsrc
3058
3059 Send part of the source (textual) form of a tracepoint definition,
3060 which includes location, conditional, and action list.
3061
3f7b2faa
DE
3062* The source command now accepts a -s option to force searching for the
3063 script in the source search path even if the script name specifies
3064 a directory.
3065
d337e9f0
PA
3066* New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
3067
0fb4aa4b
PA
3068 - GDBserver now support tracepoints (including fast tracepoints, and
3069 static tracepoints). The feature is currently supported by the
3070 i386-linux and amd64-linux builds. See the "Tracepoints support
3071 in gdbserver" section in the manual for more information.
3072
3073 GDBserver JIT compiles the tracepoint's conditional agent
3074 expression bytecode into native code whenever possible for low
3075 overhead dynamic tracepoints conditionals. For such tracepoints,
3076 an expression that examines program state is evaluated when the
3077 tracepoint is reached, in order to determine whether to capture
3078 trace data. If the condition is simple and false, processing the
3079 tracepoint finishes very quickly and no data is gathered.
3080
3081 GDBserver interfaces with the UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer) library
3082 for static tracepoints support.
d337e9f0 3083
c24d0242
PM
3084 - GDBserver now supports x86_64 Windows 64-bit debugging.
3085
c8d5aac9
L
3086* GDB now sends xmlRegisters= in qSupported packet to indicate that
3087 it understands register description.
3088
7c953934
TT
3089* The --batch flag now disables pagination and queries.
3090
8685c86f
L
3091* X86 general purpose registers
3092
3093 GDB now supports reading/writing byte, word and double-word x86
3094 general purpose registers directly. This means you can use, say,
3095 $ah or $ax to refer, respectively, to the byte register AH and
3096 16-bit word register AX that are actually portions of the 32-bit
3097 register EAX or 64-bit register RAX.
3098
95a42b64 3099* The `commands' command now accepts a range of breakpoints to modify.
86b17b60
PA
3100 A plain `commands' following a command that creates multiple
3101 breakpoints affects all the breakpoints set by that command. This
3102 applies to breakpoints set by `rbreak', and also applies when a
3103 single `break' command creates multiple breakpoints (e.g.,
3104 breakpoints on overloaded c++ functions).
95a42b64 3105
8bd10a10
CM
3106* The `rbreak' command now accepts a filename specification as part of
3107 its argument, limiting the functions selected by the regex to those
3108 in the specified file.
3109
ab38a727
PA
3110* Support for remote debugging Windows and SymbianOS shared libraries
3111 from Unix hosts has been improved. Non Windows GDB builds now can
3112 understand target reported file names that follow MS-DOS based file
3113 system semantics, such as file names that include drive letters and
3114 use the backslash character as directory separator. This makes it
3115 possible to transparently use the "set sysroot" and "set
3116 solib-search-path" on Unix hosts to point as host copies of the
3117 target's shared libraries. See the new command "set
3118 target-file-system-kind" described below, and the "Commands to
3119 specify files" section in the user manual for more information.
3120
6149aea9
PA
3121* New commands
3122
f1421989
HZ
3123eval template, expressions...
3124 Convert the values of one or more expressions under the control
3125 of the string template to a command line, and call it.
3126
ab38a727
PA
3127set target-file-system-kind unix|dos-based|auto
3128show target-file-system-kind
3129 Set or show the assumed file system kind for target reported file
3130 names.
3131
6149aea9
PA
3132save breakpoints <filename>
3133 Save all current breakpoint definitions to a file suitable for use
3134 in a later debugging session. To read the saved breakpoint
3135 definitions, use the `source' command.
3136
3137`save tracepoints' is a new alias for `save-tracepoints'. The latter
3138is now deprecated.
3139
0fb4aa4b
PA
3140info static-tracepoint-markers
3141 Display information about static tracepoint markers in the target.
3142
3143strace FN | FILE:LINE | *ADDR | -m MARKER_ID
3144 Define a static tracepoint by probing a marker at the given
3145 function, line, address, or marker ID.
3146
ca11e899
SS
3147set observer on|off
3148show observer
3149 Enable and disable observer mode.
3150
3151set may-write-registers on|off
3152set may-write-memory on|off
3153set may-insert-breakpoints on|off
3154set may-insert-tracepoints on|off
3155set may-insert-fast-tracepoints on|off
3156set may-interrupt on|off
3157 Set individual permissions for GDB effects on the target. Note that
3158 some of these settings can have undesirable or surprising
3159 consequences, particularly when changed in the middle of a session.
3160 For instance, disabling the writing of memory can prevent
3161 breakpoints from being inserted, cause single-stepping to fail, or
3162 even crash your program, if you disable after breakpoints have been
3163 inserted. However, GDB should not crash.
3164
3165set record memory-query on|off
3166show record memory-query
3167 Control whether to stop the inferior if memory changes caused
3168 by an instruction cannot be recorded.
3169
53a71c06
CR
3170* Changed commands
3171
3172disassemble
3173 The disassemble command now supports "start,+length" form of two arguments.
3174
f3e9a817
PM
3175* Python scripting
3176
9279c692
JB
3177** GDB now provides a new directory location, called the python directory,
3178 where Python scripts written for GDB can be installed. The location
3179 of that directory is <data-directory>/python, where <data-directory>
3180 is the GDB data directory. For more details, see section `Scripting
3181 GDB using Python' in the manual.
3182
adc36818 3183** The GDB Python API now has access to breakpoints, symbols, symbol
595939de
PM
3184 tables, program spaces, inferiors, threads and frame's code blocks.
3185 Additionally, GDB Parameters can now be created from the API, and
3186 manipulated via set/show in the CLI.
f870a310 3187
fa33c3cd 3188** New functions gdb.target_charset, gdb.target_wide_charset,
07ca107c
DE
3189 gdb.progspaces, gdb.current_progspace, and gdb.string_to_argv.
3190
3191** New exception gdb.GdbError.
fa33c3cd
DE
3192
3193** Pretty-printers are now also looked up in the current program space.
f3e9a817 3194
967cf477
DE
3195** Pretty-printers can now be individually enabled and disabled.
3196
8a1ea21f
DE
3197** GDB now looks for names of Python scripts to auto-load in a
3198 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts', in addition to looking
3199 for a OBJFILE-gdb.py script when OBJFILE is read by the debugger.
3200
a7bdde9e
VP
3201* Tracepoint actions were unified with breakpoint commands. In particular,
3202there are no longer differences in "info break" output for breakpoints and
3203tracepoints and the "commands" command can be used for both tracepoints and
3204regular breakpoints.
3205
05071a4d
PA
3206* New targets
3207
3208ARM Symbian arm*-*-symbianelf*
3209
6aecb9c2
JB
3210* D language support.
3211 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the D programming
3212 language.
3213
431e49aa
TJB
3214* GDB now supports the extended ptrace interface for PowerPC which is
3215 available since Linux kernel version 2.6.34. This automatically enables
3216 any hardware breakpoints and additional hardware watchpoints available in
3217 the processor. The old ptrace interface exposes just one hardware
3218 watchpoint and no hardware breakpoints.
3219
3220* GDB is now able to use the Data Value Compare (DVC) register available on
3221 embedded PowerPC processors to implement in hardware simple watchpoint
3222 conditions of the form:
3223
3224 watch ADDRESS|VARIABLE if ADDRESS|VARIABLE == CONSTANT EXPRESSION
3225
3226 This works in native GDB running on Linux kernels with the extended ptrace
3227 interface mentioned above.
3228
bfbf3774 3229*** Changes in GDB 7.1
abc7453d 3230
4eef138c
TT
3231* C++ Improvements
3232
3233 ** Namespace Support
71dee663
SW
3234
3235 GDB now supports importing of namespaces in C++. This enables the
3236 user to inspect variables from imported namespaces. Support for
3237 namepace aliasing has also been added. So, if a namespace is
3238 aliased in the current scope (e.g. namepace C=A; ) the user can
3239 print variables using the alias (e.g. (gdb) print C::x).
3240
4eef138c
TT
3241 ** Bug Fixes
3242
3243 All known bugs relating to the printing of virtual base class were
3244 fixed. It is now possible to call overloaded static methods using a
3245 qualified name.
3246
3247 ** Cast Operators
3248
3249 The C++ cast operators static_cast<>, dynamic_cast<>, const_cast<>,
3250 and reinterpret_cast<> are now handled by the C++ expression parser.
3251
2d1c1221
ME
3252* New targets
3253
3254Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze-*-*
34207b9e 3255Renesas RX rx-*-elf
2d1c1221
ME
3256
3257* New Simulators
3258
3259Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze
34207b9e 3260Renesas RX rx
2d1c1221 3261
6c95b8df
PA
3262* Multi-program debugging.
3263
3264 GDB now has support for multi-program (a.k.a. multi-executable or
3265 multi-exec) debugging. This allows for debugging multiple inferiors
3266 simultaneously each running a different program under the same GDB
3267 session. See "Debugging Multiple Inferiors and Programs" in the
3268 manual for more information. This implied some user visible changes
3269 in the multi-inferior support. For example, "info inferiors" now
3270 lists inferiors that are not running yet or that have exited
3271 already. See also "New commands" and "New options" below.
3272
d5551862
SS
3273* New tracing features
3274
3275 GDB's tracepoint facility now includes several new features:
3276
3277 ** Trace state variables
f61e138d
SS
3278
3279 GDB tracepoints now include support for trace state variables, which
3280 are variables managed by the target agent during a tracing
3281 experiment. They are useful for tracepoints that trigger each
3282 other, so for instance one tracepoint can count hits in a variable,
3283 and then a second tracepoint has a condition that is true when the
3284 count reaches a particular value. Trace state variables share the
3285 $-syntax of GDB convenience variables, and can appear in both
3286 tracepoint actions and condition expressions. Use the "tvariable"
3287 command to create, and "info tvariables" to view; see "Trace State
3288 Variables" in the manual for more detail.
7a697b8d 3289
d5551862 3290 ** Fast tracepoints
7a697b8d
SS
3291
3292 GDB now includes an option for defining fast tracepoints, which
3293 targets may implement more efficiently, such as by installing a jump
3294 into the target agent rather than a trap instruction. The resulting
3295 speedup can be by two orders of magnitude or more, although the
3296 tradeoff is that some program locations on some target architectures
3297 might not allow fast tracepoint installation, for instance if the
3298 instruction to be replaced is shorter than the jump. To request a
3299 fast tracepoint, use the "ftrace" command, with syntax identical to
3300 the regular trace command.
3301
d5551862
SS
3302 ** Disconnected tracing
3303
3304 It is now possible to detach GDB from the target while it is running
3305 a trace experiment, then reconnect later to see how the experiment
3306 is going. In addition, a new variable disconnected-tracing lets you
3307 tell the target agent whether to continue running a trace if the
3308 connection is lost unexpectedly.
3309
00bf0b85
SS
3310 ** Trace files
3311
3312 GDB now has the ability to save the trace buffer into a file, and
3313 then use that file as a target, similarly to you can do with
3314 corefiles. You can select trace frames, print data that was
3315 collected in them, and use tstatus to display the state of the
3316 tracing run at the moment that it was saved. To create a trace
3317 file, use "tsave <filename>", and to use it, do "target tfile
3318 <name>".
4daf5ac0
SS
3319
3320 ** Circular trace buffer
3321
3322 You can ask the target agent to handle the trace buffer as a
3323 circular buffer, discarding the oldest trace frames to make room for
3324 newer ones, by setting circular-trace-buffer to on. This feature may
3325 not be available for all target agents.
3326
21a0512e
PP
3327* Changed commands
3328
3329disassemble
3330 The disassemble command, when invoked with two arguments, now requires
3331 the arguments to be comma-separated.
3332
0fe7935b
DJ
3333info variables
3334 The info variables command now displays variable definitions. Files
3335 which only declare a variable are not shown.
3336
fb2e7cb4
JB
3337source
3338 The source command is now capable of sourcing Python scripts.
3339 This feature is dependent on the debugger being build with Python
3340 support.
3341
3342 Related to this enhancement is also the introduction of a new command
3343 "set script-extension" (see below).
3344
6c95b8df
PA
3345* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
3346
399cd161
MS
3347record save [<FILENAME>]
3348 Save a file (in core file format) containing the process record
3349 execution log for replay debugging at a later time.
3350
3351record restore <FILENAME>
3352 Restore the process record execution log that was saved at an
3353 earlier time, for replay debugging.
3354
6c95b8df
PA
3355add-inferior [-copies <N>] [-exec <FILENAME>]
3356 Add a new inferior.
3357
3358clone-inferior [-copies <N>] [ID]
3359 Make a new inferior ready to execute the same program another
3360 inferior has loaded.
3361
3362remove-inferior ID
3363 Remove an inferior.
3364
3365maint info program-spaces
3366 List the program spaces loaded into GDB.
3367
9a7071a8
JB
3368set remote interrupt-sequence [Ctrl-C | BREAK | BREAK-g]
3369show remote interrupt-sequence
3370 Allow the user to select one of ^C, a BREAK signal or BREAK-g
3371 as the sequence to the remote target in order to interrupt the execution.
3372 Ctrl-C is a default. Some system prefers BREAK which is high level of
3373 serial line for some certain time. Linux kernel prefers BREAK-g, a.k.a
3374 Magic SysRq g. It is BREAK signal and character 'g'.
3375
3376set remote interrupt-on-connect [on | off]
3377show remote interrupt-on-connect
3378 When interrupt-on-connect is ON, gdb sends interrupt-sequence to
3379 remote target when gdb connects to it. This is needed when you debug
3380 Linux kernel.
3381
3382set remotebreak [on | off]
3383show remotebreak
3384Deprecated. Use "set/show remote interrupt-sequence" instead.
3385
f61e138d
SS
3386tvariable $NAME [ = EXP ]
3387 Create or modify a trace state variable.
3388
3389info tvariables
3390 List trace state variables and their values.
3391
3392delete tvariable $NAME ...
3393 Delete one or more trace state variables.
3394
6da95a67
SS
3395teval EXPR, ...
3396 Evaluate the given expressions without collecting anything into the
3397 trace buffer. (Valid in tracepoint actions only.)
3398
7a697b8d
SS
3399ftrace FN / FILE:LINE / *ADDR
3400 Define a fast tracepoint at the given function, line, or address.
3401
b0f02ee9
JK
3402* New expression syntax
3403
3404 GDB now parses the 0b prefix of binary numbers the same way as GCC does.
3405 GDB now parses 0b101010 identically with 42.
3406
6c95b8df
PA
3407* New options
3408
3409set follow-exec-mode new|same
3410show follow-exec-mode
3411 Control whether GDB reuses the same inferior across an exec call or
3412 creates a new one. This is useful to be able to restart the old
3413 executable after the inferior having done an exec call.
3414
236f1d4d
SS
3415set default-collect EXPR, ...
3416show default-collect
3417 Define a list of expressions to be collected at each tracepoint.
3418 This is a useful way to ensure essential items are not overlooked,
3419 such as registers or a critical global variable.
3420
d5551862
SS
3421set disconnected-tracing
3422show disconnected-tracing
3423 If set to 1, the target is instructed to continue tracing if it
3424 loses its connection to GDB. If 0, the target is to stop tracing
3425 upon disconnection.
3426
4daf5ac0
SS
3427set circular-trace-buffer
3428show circular-trace-buffer
3429 If set to on, the target is instructed to use a circular trace buffer
3430 and discard the oldest trace frames instead of stopping the trace due
3431 to a full trace buffer. If set to off, the trace stops when the buffer
3432 fills up. Some targets may not support this.
3433
fb2e7cb4
JB
3434set script-extension off|soft|strict
3435show script-extension
3436 If set to "off", the debugger does not perform any script language
3437 recognition, and all sourced files are assumed to be GDB scripts.
3438 If set to "soft" (the default), files are sourced according to
3439 filename extension, falling back to GDB scripts if the first
3440 evaluation failed.
3441 If set to "strict", files are sourced according to filename extension.
3442
2b71fc8e
JB
3443set ada trust-PAD-over-XVS on|off
3444show ada trust-PAD-over-XVS
3445 If off, activate a workaround against a bug in the debugging information
3446 generated by the compiler for PAD types (see gcc/exp_dbug.ads in
3447 the GCC sources for more information about the GNAT encoding and
3448 PAD types in particular). It is always safe to set this option to
3449 off, but this introduces a slight performance penalty. The default
3450 is on.
3451
de2e5182
TT
3452* Python API Improvements
3453
3454 ** GDB provides the new class gdb.LazyString. This is useful in
3455 some pretty-printing cases. The new method gdb.Value.lazy_string
3456 provides a simple way to create objects of this type.
3457
3458 ** The fields returned by gdb.Type.fields now have an
3459 `is_base_class' attribute.
3460
3461 ** The new method gdb.Type.range returns the range of an array type.
3462
3463 ** The new method gdb.parse_and_eval can be used to parse and
3464 evaluate an expression.
3465
f61e138d
SS
3466* New remote packets
3467
3468QTDV
3469 Define a trace state variable.
3470
3471qTV
3472 Get the current value of a trace state variable.
3473
d5551862
SS
3474QTDisconnected
3475 Set desired tracing behavior upon disconnection.
3476
4daf5ac0
SS
3477QTBuffer:circular
3478 Set the trace buffer to be linear or circular.
3479
d5551862
SS
3480qTfP, qTsP
3481 Get data about the tracepoints currently in use.
3482
2d483d34
MS
3483* Bug fixes
3484
3485Process record now works correctly with hardware watchpoints.
3486
6e0e5977
JB
3487Multiple bug fixes have been made to the mips-irix port, making it
3488much more reliable. In particular:
3489 - Debugging threaded applications is now possible again. Previously,
3490 GDB would hang while starting the program, or while waiting for
3491 the program to stop at a breakpoint.
3492 - Attaching to a running process no longer hangs.
3493 - An error occurring while loading a core file has been fixed.
3494 - Changing the value of the PC register now works again. This fixes
3495 problems observed when using the "jump" command, or when calling
3496 a function from GDB, or even when assigning a new value to $pc.
3497 - With the "finish" and "return" commands, the return value for functions
3498 returning a small array is now correctly printed.
3499 - It is now possible to break on shared library code which gets executed
3500 during a shared library init phase (code executed while executing
3501 their .init section). Previously, the breakpoint would have no effect.
3502 - GDB is now able to backtrace through the signal handler for
3503 non-threaded programs.
3504
93c26624
JK
3505PIE (Position Independent Executable) programs debugging is now supported.
3506This includes debugging execution of PIC (Position Independent Code) shared
3507libraries although for that, it should be possible to run such libraries as an
3508executable program.
3509
abc7453d 3510*** Changes in GDB 7.0
75feb17d 3511
4efc6507
DE
3512* GDB now has an interface for JIT compilation. Applications that
3513dynamically generate code can create symbol files in memory and register
3514them with GDB. For users, the feature should work transparently, and
3515for JIT developers, the interface is documented in the GDB manual in the
3516"JIT Compilation Interface" chapter.
3517
782b2b07
SS
3518* Tracepoints may now be conditional. The syntax is as for
3519breakpoints; either an "if" clause appended to the "trace" command,
3520or the "condition" command is available. GDB sends the condition to
3521the target for evaluation using the same bytecode format as is used
3522for tracepoint actions.
3523
53a71c06
CR
3524* The disassemble command now supports: an optional /r modifier, print the
3525raw instructions in hex as well as in symbolic form, and an optional /m
3526modifier to print mixed source+assembly.
e6158f16 3527
e7a8dbfb
HZ
3528* Process record and replay
3529
3530 In a architecture environment that supports ``process record and
3531 replay'', ``process record and replay'' target can record a log of
3532 the process execution, and replay it with both forward and reverse
3533 execute commands.
3534
64644d9b
MS
3535* Reverse debugging: GDB now has new commands reverse-continue, reverse-
3536step, reverse-next, reverse-finish, reverse-stepi, reverse-nexti, and
3537set execution-direction {forward|reverse}, for targets that support
3538reverse execution.
3539
b9412953
DD
3540* GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on MIPS/Linux systems. This
3541feature is available with a native GDB running on kernel version
35422.6.28 or later.
3543
6c7a06a3
TT
3544* GDB now has support for multi-byte and wide character sets on the
3545target. Strings whose character type is wchar_t, char16_t, or
3546char32_t are now correctly printed. GDB supports wide- and unicode-
3547literals in C, that is, L'x', L"string", u'x', u"string", U'x', and
3548U"string" syntax. And, GDB allows the "%ls" and "%lc" formats in
3549`printf'. This feature requires iconv to work properly; if your
3550system does not have a working iconv, GDB can use GNU libiconv. See
3551the installation instructions for more information.
3552
f1838a98
UW
3553* GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
3554remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
3555with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
3556the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
3557
55333a84
DE
3558* "info sharedlibrary" now takes an optional regex of libraries to show,
3559and it now reports if a shared library has no debugging information.
3560
7f6a6314
PM
3561* Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
3562now complete on file names.
3563
65d12d83
TT
3564* When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
3565completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
3566For instance, consider:
3567
3568 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
3569 # struct example variable;
3570 (gdb) p variable.
3571
3572If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
3573completions will be "f1" and "f2".
3574
edb3359d
DJ
3575* Inlined functions are now supported. They show up in backtraces, and
3576the "step", "next", and "finish" commands handle them automatically.
3577
2fae03e8
TT
3578* GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
3579operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
3580macros.
3581
47a3467a 3582* GDB now supports inspecting extra signal information, exported by
58d6951d
DJ
3583the new $_siginfo convenience variable. The feature is currently
3584implemented on linux ARM, i386 and amd64.
3585
3586* GDB can now display the VFP floating point registers and NEON vector
3587registers on ARM targets. Both ARM GNU/Linux native GDB and gdbserver
3588can provide these registers (requires Linux 2.6.30 or later). Remote
3589and simulator targets may also provide them.
47a3467a 3590
08388c79
DE
3591* New remote packets
3592
3593qSearch:memory:
3594 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
3595
a6f3e723
SL
3596QStartNoAckMode
3597 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
3598 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
3599 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
3600
d7713ae0
EZ
3601vKill
3602 Kill the process with the specified process ID. Use this in preference
3603 to `k' when multiprocess protocol extensions are supported.
3604
07e059b5
VP
3605qXfer:osdata:read
3606 Obtains additional operating system information
3607
47a3467a
PA
3608qXfer:siginfo:read
3609qXfer:siginfo:write
3610 Read or write additional signal information.
3611
060871df
PA
3612* Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
3613
3614 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
3615 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
3616 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
3617
c055b101 3618* GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
a0ef4274 3619DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
c055b101
CV
3620
3621* The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
a0ef4274
DJ
3622and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
3623`set/show sh calling-convention'.
c055b101 3624
31fffb02
CS
3625* GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
3626with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
3627
88d8a8e0
JB
3628* 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
3629
7f99b190
JB
3630* Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
3631
ccd213ac
DJ
3632* Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
3633which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
3634
1fddbabb 3635* The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
31fffb02 3636list of section offsets.
1fddbabb 3637
a0ef4274
DJ
3638* On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
3639conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
3640have also been fixed.
3641
bfb8797a 3642* GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
158c7665
PH
3643From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
3644are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
bfb8797a 3645
71c25dea
TT
3646* GDB now parses C++ symbol and type names more flexibly. For
3647example, given:
3648
3649 template<typename T> class C { };
3650 C<char const *> c;
3651
3652GDB will now correctly handle all of:
3653
3654 ptype C<char const *>
3655 ptype C<char const*>
3656 ptype C<const char *>
3657 ptype C<const char*>
3658
ccd213ac
DJ
3659* New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
3660
3661 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
3662 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
3663
7ae0e2a2
UW
3664 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
3665 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
3666 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
3667
a6f3e723
SL
3668 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
3669 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
3670
da8bd9a3
DJ
3671 - Support for the sparc64-linux-gnu target is now included in
3672 gdbserver.
3673
d70e31dd
DE
3674 - The amd64-linux build of gdbserver now supports debugging both
3675 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
3676
3677 - The i386-linux, amd64-linux, and i386-win32 builds of gdbserver
3678 now support hardware watchpoints, and will use them automatically
3679 as appropriate.
3680
d57a3c85
TJB
3681* Python scripting
3682
3683 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
3684 available is determined at configure time.
3685
d8906c6f
TJB
3686 New GDB commands can now be written in Python.
3687
aadc346a
JB
3688* Ada tasking support
3689
3690 Ada tasks can now be inspected in GDB. The following commands have
3691 been introduced:
3692
3693 info tasks
3694 Print the list of Ada tasks.
3695 info task N
3696 Print detailed information about task number N.
3697 task
3698 Print the task number of the current task.
3699 task N
3700 Switch the context of debugging to task number N.
3701
adb483fe
DJ
3702* Support for user-defined prefixed commands. The "define" command can
3703add new commands to existing prefixes, e.g. "target".
3704
2277426b
PA
3705* Multi-inferior, multi-process debugging.
3706
3707 GDB now has generalized support for multi-inferior debugging. See
3708 "Debugging Multiple Inferiors" in the manual for more information.
3709 Although availability still depends on target support, the command
3710 set is more uniform now. The GNU/Linux specific multi-forks support
3711 has been migrated to this new framework. This implied some user
3712 visible changes; see "New commands" and also "Removed commands"
3713 below.
3714
08d16641
PA
3715* Target descriptions can now describe the target OS ABI. See the
3716"Target Description Format" section in the user manual for more
3717information.
3718
e35359c5
UW
3719* Target descriptions can now describe "compatible" architectures
3720to indicate that the target can execute applications for a different
3721architecture in addition to those for the main target architecture.
3722See the "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for
3723more information.
3724
85e747d2
UW
3725* Multi-architecture debugging.
3726
3727 GDB now includes general supports for debugging applications on
3728 hybrid systems that use more than one single processor architecture
3729 at the same time. Each such hybrid architecture still requires
3730 specific support to be added. The only hybrid architecture supported
3731 in this version of GDB is the Cell Broadband Engine.
3732
3733* GDB now supports integrated debugging of Cell/B.E. applications that
3734use both the PPU and SPU architectures. To enable support for hybrid
3735Cell/B.E. debugging, you need to configure GDB to support both the
3736powerpc-linux or powerpc64-linux and the spu-elf targets, using the
3737--enable-targets configure option.
3738
11ade57a
PA
3739* Non-stop mode debugging.
3740
3741 For some targets, GDB now supports an optional mode of operation in
3742 which you can examine stopped threads while other threads continue
3743 to execute freely. This is referred to as non-stop mode, with the
3744 old mode referred to as all-stop mode. See the "Non-Stop Mode"
3745 section in the user manual for more information.
3746
3747 To be able to support remote non-stop debugging, a remote stub needs
3748 to implement the non-stop mode remote protocol extensions, as
3749 described in the "Remote Non-Stop" section of the user manual. The
3750 GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been adjusted to support these
3751 extensions on linux targets.
3752
d7713ae0 3753* New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
75feb17d 3754
a96d9b2e
SDJ
3755catch syscall [NAME(S) | NUMBER(S)]
3756 Catch system calls. Arguments, which should be names of system
3757 calls or their numbers, mean catch only those syscalls. Without
3758 arguments, every syscall will be caught. When the inferior issues
3759 any of the specified syscalls, GDB will stop and announce the system
3760 call, both when it is called and when its call returns. This
3761 feature is currently available with a native GDB running on the
3762 Linux Kernel, under the following architectures: x86, x86_64,
3763 PowerPC and PowerPC64.
3764
08388c79
DE
3765find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
3766 val1 [, val2, ...]
3767 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
3768
d57a3c85
TJB
3769maint set python print-stack
3770maint show python print-stack
3771 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
3772
3773python [CODE]
3774 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
3775
d7713ae0
EZ
3776macro define
3777macro list
3778macro undef
3779 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
3780 interactively.
3781
3782info os processes
3783 Show operating system information about processes.
3784
2277426b
PA
3785info inferiors
3786 List the inferiors currently under GDB's control.
3787
3788inferior NUM
3789 Switch focus to inferior number NUM.
3790
3791detach inferior NUM
3792 Detach from inferior number NUM.
3793
3794kill inferior NUM
3795 Kill inferior number NUM.
3796
d7713ae0
EZ
3797* New options
3798
3285f3fe
UW
3799set spu stop-on-load
3800show spu stop-on-load
3801 Control whether to stop for new SPE threads during Cell/B.E. debugging.
3802
ff1a52c6
UW
3803set spu auto-flush-cache
3804show spu auto-flush-cache
3805 Control whether to automatically flush the software-managed cache
3806 during Cell/B.E. debugging.
3807
d7713ae0
EZ
3808set sh calling-convention
3809show sh calling-convention
3810 Control the calling convention used when calling SH target functions.
3811
e0a3ce09 3812set debug timestamp
75feb17d 3813show debug timestamp
d7713ae0
EZ
3814 Control display of timestamps with GDB debugging output.
3815
3816set disassemble-next-line
3817show disassemble-next-line
3818 Control display of disassembled source lines or instructions when
3819 the debuggee stops.
3820
3821set remote noack-packet
3822show remote noack-packet
3823 Set/show the use of remote protocol QStartNoAckMode packet. See above
3824 under "New remote packets."
3825
3826set remote query-attached-packet
3827show remote query-attached-packet
3828 Control use of remote protocol `qAttached' (query-attached) packet.
3829
3830set remote read-siginfo-object
3831show remote read-siginfo-object
3832 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:read' (read-siginfo-object)
3833 packet.
3834
3835set remote write-siginfo-object
3836show remote write-siginfo-object
3837 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:write' (write-siginfo-object)
3838 packet.
3839
40ab02ce
MS
3840set remote reverse-continue
3841show remote reverse-continue
3842 Control use of remote protocol 'bc' (reverse-continue) packet.
3843
3844set remote reverse-step
3845show remote reverse-step
3846 Control use of remote protocol 'bs' (reverse-step) packet.
3847
d7713ae0
EZ
3848set displaced-stepping
3849show displaced-stepping
3850 Control displaced stepping mode. Displaced stepping is a way to
3851 single-step over breakpoints without removing them from the debuggee.
3852 Also known as "out-of-line single-stepping".
3853
3854set debug displaced
3855show debug displaced
3856 Control display of debugging info for displaced stepping.
3857
3858maint set internal-error
3859maint show internal-error
3860 Control what GDB does when an internal error is detected.
3861
3862maint set internal-warning
3863maint show internal-warning
3864 Control what GDB does when an internal warning is detected.
75feb17d 3865
ccd213ac
DJ
3866set exec-wrapper
3867show exec-wrapper
3868unset exec-wrapper
3869 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
fa4727a6 3870
aad4b048
JB
3871set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
3872show multiple-symbols
3873 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
3874 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
3875 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
3876
74960c60
VP
3877set breakpoint always-inserted
3878show breakpoint always-inserted
3879 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
3880 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
3881 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
3882
0428b8f5
DJ
3883set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
3884show arm fallback-mode
3885set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
3886show arm force-mode
3887 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
3888 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
3889 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
3890 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
3891
10568435
JK
3892set disable-randomization
3893show disable-randomization
3894 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
3895 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
3896 multiple debugging sessions.
3897
d7713ae0
EZ
3898set non-stop
3899show non-stop
3900 Control whether other threads are stopped or not when some thread hits
3901 a breakpoint.
3902
b3eb342c 3903set target-async
d7713ae0 3904show target-async
b3eb342c
VP
3905 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
3906 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
3907 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
3908 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
3909
6c7a06a3
TT
3910set target-wide-charset
3911show target-wide-charset
3912 The target-wide-charset is the name of the character set that GDB
3913 uses when printing characters whose type is wchar_t.
3914
84603566
SL
3915set tcp auto-retry (on|off)
3916show tcp auto-retry
3917set tcp connect-timeout
3918show tcp connect-timeout
3919 These commands allow GDB to retry failed TCP connections to a remote stub
3920 with a specified timeout period; this is useful if the stub is launched
3921 in parallel with GDB but may not be ready to accept connections immediately.
3922
17a37d48
PP
3923set libthread-db-search-path
3924show libthread-db-search-path
3925 Control list of directories which GDB will search for appropriate
3926 libthread_db.
3927
d4db2f36
PA
3928set schedule-multiple (on|off)
3929show schedule-multiple
3930 Allow GDB to resume all threads of all processes or only threads of
3931 the current process.
3932
4e5d721f
DE
3933set stack-cache
3934show stack-cache
3935 Use more aggressive caching for accesses to the stack. This improves
3936 performance of remote debugging (particularly backtraces) without
3937 affecting correctness.
3938
910c5da8
JB
3939set interactive-mode (on|off|auto)
3940show interactive-mode
3941 Control whether GDB runs in interactive mode (on) or not (off).
3942 When in interactive mode, GDB waits for the user to answer all
3943 queries. Otherwise, GDB does not wait and assumes the default
3944 answer. When set to auto (the default), GDB determines which
3945 mode to use based on the stdin settings.
3946
2277426b
PA
3947* Removed commands
3948
3949info forks
3950 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `info
3951 inferiors' command. To list checkpoints, you can still use the
3952 `info checkpoints' command, which was an alias for the `info forks'
3953 command.
3954
3955fork NUM
3956 Replaced by the new `inferior' command. To switch between
3957 checkpoints, you can still use the `restart' command, which was an
3958 alias for the `fork' command.
3959
3960process PID
3961 This is removed, since some targets don't have a notion of
3962 processes. To switch between processes, you can still use the
3963 `inferior' command using GDB's own inferior number.
3964
3965delete fork NUM
3966 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `kill
3967 inferior' command. To delete a checkpoint, you can still use the
3968 `delete checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `delete
3969 fork' command.
3970
3971detach fork NUM
3972 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `detach
3973 inferior' command. To detach a checkpoint, you can still use the
3974 `detach checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `detach
3975 fork' command.
3976
a80b95ba
TG
3977* New native configurations
3978
3979x86/x86_64 Darwin i[34567]86-*-darwin*
3980
b8bfd3ed
JB
3981x86_64 MinGW x86_64-*-mingw*
3982
75a2d5e7
TT
3983* New targets
3984
c28c63d8 3985Lattice Mico32 lm32-*
75a2d5e7 3986x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
4c1d2973 3987x86_64 DICOS x86_64-*-dicos*
5f814c3b 3988S+core 3 score-*-*
75a2d5e7 3989
6de3146c
PA
3990* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports x86 Windows CE
3991 (mingw32ce) debugging.
3992
d5cbbe6e
JB
3993* Removed commands
3994
3995catch load
3996catch unload
3997 These commands were actually not implemented on any target.
3998
75feb17d 3999*** Changes in GDB 6.8
f9ed52be 4000
af5ca30d
NH
4001* New native configurations
4002
4003NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
94a0e877 4004Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
af5ca30d
NH
4005
4006* New targets
4007
4008NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
94a0e877 4009Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
af5ca30d 4010
7a404eba
PA
4011* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
4012
4013 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
4014 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
4015 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
4016 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
4017
430ebac9
PA
4018* GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
4019(mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
4020
fe6fbf8b 4021* Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
8d5f9c6f 4022is resolved.
fe6fbf8b
VP
4023
4024* GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
8d5f9c6f
DJ
4025including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
4026and in inlined functions.
fe6fbf8b 4027
10665d76
JB
4028* GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
4029accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
4030more than one contiguous range of addresses.
4031
7cc46491
DJ
4032* Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
4033
d71340b8
DJ
4034* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
4035registers on PowerPC targets.
4036
523c4513
DJ
4037* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
4038targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
4039
a6b151f1
DJ
4040* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
4041commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
4042
2d717e4f
DJ
4043* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
4044extended-remote mode.
4045
24a836bd 4046* hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
d001be7a
DJ
4047The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
4048error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
4049The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
24a836bd 4050
d0c678e6
UW
4051* GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
4052building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
4053target architectures.
4054
d64a946d
TJB
4055* GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
4056Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
4057now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
4058stored in two consecutive float registers.
4059
ee163bf5
VP
4060* The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
4061breakpoints now.
4062
b93b6ca7 4063* Improved support for debugging Ada
d001be7a
DJ
4064Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
4065include:
b93b6ca7
JB
4066 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
4067 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
4068 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
4069 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
4070 of an assignment
4071 - Improved command completion in Ada
4072 - Several bug fixes
4073
d001be7a
DJ
4074* GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
4075process.
4076
a6b151f1
DJ
4077* New commands
4078
6d53d0af
JB
4079set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
4080show print frame-arguments
4081 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
4082 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
4083
a6b151f1
DJ
4084remote put
4085remote get
4086remote delete
4087 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
4088
4089* New MI commands
4090
4091-target-file-put
4092-target-file-get
4093-target-file-delete
4094 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
4095
4096* New remote packets
4097
4098vFile:open:
4099vFile:close:
4100vFile:pread:
4101vFile:pwrite:
4102vFile:unlink:
4103 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
d0c678e6 4104
2d717e4f
DJ
4105vAttach
4106 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
4107 mode.
4108
4109vRun
4110 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
4111
8d5f9c6f 4112*** Changes in GDB 6.7
6dd09645 4113
19d378fc
MS
4114* Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
4115bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
4116Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
4117
3a40aaa0
UW
4118* When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
4119symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
4120-Bsymbolic linker option.
4121
a6ec25f2
BW
4122* When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
4123recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
4124is not supported.
4125
6dd09645
JB
4126* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
4127frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
4128
c9bb8148
DJ
4129* GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
413032-bit or 64-bit register values.
4131
0d5de010
DJ
4132* Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
4133
23181151
DJ
4134* GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
4135target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
4136a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
4137
ea37ba09
DJ
4138* Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
4139automatically displayed as character or string data.
4140
4141* The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
4142arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
4143as strings.
e1f48ead 4144
123dc839
DJ
4145* Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
4146for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
8d5f9c6f 4147only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
123dc839 4148
05a4558a
DJ
4149* GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
4150iWMMXt coprocessor.
fb1e4ffc 4151
7c963485
PA
4152* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
4153ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
4154has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
4155
b18be20d
DJ
4156* GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
4157
0ca420ce
UW
4158* GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
4159
31d99776
DJ
4160* The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
4161layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
4162segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
4163
a4642986
MR
4164* The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
4165immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
4166
cfa9d6d9
DJ
4167* The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
4168"library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
4169packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
4170where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
4171Windows and SymbianOS).
255e7678
DJ
4172
4173* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
4174(DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
f5db8714
JK
4175
4176* GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
4177according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
cfa9d6d9 4178
c9bb8148
DJ
4179* New commands
4180
23776285
MR
4181set remoteflow
4182show remoteflow
4183 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
4184 when debugging using remote targets.
4185
c9bb8148
DJ
4186set mem inaccessible-by-default
4187show mem inaccessible-by-default
4188 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
4189 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
4190 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
4191 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
4192 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
4193
4194set breakpoint auto-hw
4195show breakpoint auto-hw
4196 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
4197 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
4198 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
4199 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
4200 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
4201 including "next" and "finish".
4202
0e420bd8
JB
4203catch exception
4204catch exception unhandled
4205 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
4206
4207catch assert
4208 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
4209
f822c95b
DJ
4210set sysroot
4211show sysroot
4212 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
4213 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
4214 an alias to "set sysroot".
4215
83cc5c53
UW
4216info spu
4217 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
4218 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
4219 architecture.
4220
bd372731
MK
4221* New native configurations
4222
4223OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
4224
23181151
DJ
4225set tdesc filename
4226unset tdesc filename
4227show tdesc filename
4228 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
4229 not query the target for its built-in description.
4230
c9bb8148
DJ
4231* New targets
4232
54fe9172 4233OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
c9bb8148 4234MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
c077150c 4235Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
c9bb8148 4236
6dd09645
JB
4237* New remote packets
4238
4239QPassSignals:
4240 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
4241 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
4242
23181151
DJ
4243qXfer:features:read:
4244 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
4245 features.
6dd09645 4246
83cc5c53
UW
4247qXfer:spu:read:
4248qXfer:spu:write:
4249 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
4250 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
4251
cfa9d6d9
DJ
4252qXfer:libraries:read:
4253 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
4254 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
4255 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
4256 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
4257
483367ee
DJ
4258* Removed targets
4259
4260Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
4261
d08950c4
UW
4262alpha*-*-osf1*
4263alpha*-*-osf2*
7ce59000 4264d10v-*-*
483367ee
DJ
4265hppa*-*-hiux*
4266i[34567]86-ncr-*
4267i[34567]86-*-dgux*
4268i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
4269i[34567]86-*-netware*
4270i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
4271i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
4272i[34567]86-*-sco*
4273i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
4274i[34567]86-*-sysv4*
4275i[34567]86-*-sysv5*
4276i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
4277i[34567]86-*-unixware*
4278i[34567]86-*-sysv*
4279i[34567]86-*-isc*
4280m68*-cisco*-*
4281m68*-tandem-*
ad527d2e 4282mips*-*-pe
483367ee 4283rs6000-*-lynxos*
ad527d2e 4284sh*-*-pe
483367ee 4285
7ce59000
DJ
4286* Other removed features
4287
4288target abug
4289target cpu32bug
4290target est
4291target rom68k
4292
4293 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
4294
ea35711c
DJ
4295target hms
4296target e7000
4297target sh3
4298target sh3e
4299
4300 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
4301 H8/300.
4302
4303target ocd
4304
4305 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
4306 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
4307 interfaces.
4308
7ce59000
DJ
4309DWARF 1 support
4310
4311 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
4312 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
4313
54d61198
DJ
4314Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
4315
4316 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
4317 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
4318 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
4319 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
4320
ea35711c
DJ
4321MIPS ".pdr" sections
4322
4323 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
4324 in debugging information.
4325
4326Scheme support
4327
4328 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
4329 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
4330
1a69e1e4
DJ
4331set mips stack-arg-size
4332set mips saved-gpreg-size
4333
4334 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
4335
6dd09645 4336*** Changes in GDB 6.6
e374b601 4337
ca3bf3bd
DJ
4338* New targets
4339
4340Xtensa xtensa-elf
9c309e77 4341Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
ca3bf3bd 4342
6aec2e11
DJ
4343* GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
4344(mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
4345running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
4346
4347* The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
4348Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
4349supported.
4350
17218d91
DJ
4351* The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
4352broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
4353
9ebce043
DJ
4354* The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
4355stub provides the required support.
4356
7d3d3ece
DJ
4357* Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
4358longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
4359
4f8253f3
JB
4360* New commands
4361
4362set substitute-path
4363unset substitute-path
4364show substitute-path
4365 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
4366 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
4367 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
4368 between compilation and debugging.
4369
9fa66fd7
AS
4370set trace-commands
4371show trace-commands
4372 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
4373 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
4374 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
4375
1f5befc1
DJ
4376* REMOVED features
4377
4378The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
4379
2ec3381a
DJ
4380Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
4381an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
4382
3d00d119
DJ
4383The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
4384
be2a5f71
DJ
4385* New remote packets
4386
4387qSupported:
4388 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
4389 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
4390 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
4391 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
4392 target.
4393
0876f84a
DJ
4394qXfer:auxv:read:
4395 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
4396 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
4397
9ebce043
DJ
4398qXfer:memory-map:read:
4399 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
4400 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
4401
4402vFlashErase:
4403vFlashWrite:
4404vFlashDone:
4405 Erase and program a flash memory device.
4406
0876f84a
DJ
4407* Removed remote packets
4408
4409qPart:auxv:read:
4410 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
4411 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
4412
e374b601 4413*** Changes in GDB 6.5
53e5f3cf 4414
96309189
MS
4415* New targets
4416
4417Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
4418
4419Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
4420
53e5f3cf
AS
4421* New commands
4422
4423init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
4424 only if it doesn't already have a value.
4425
ac264b3b
MS
4426The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
4427
4428checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
4429
4430restart <n> Return the program state to a
4431 previously saved state.
4432
4433info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
4434
4435delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
4436
4437set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
4438 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
4439
4440info forks List forks of the user program that
4441 are available to be debugged.
4442
4443fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
4444 forks of the user program that are
4445 available to be debugged.
4446
4447delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
4448 that are available to be debugged (and
4449 kill the forked process).
4450
4451detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
4452 that are available to be debugged (and
4453 allow the process to continue).
4454
3950dc3f
NS
4455* New architecture
4456
4457Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
4458
0ea3f30e
DJ
4459* Improved Windows host support
4460
4461GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
4462native console support, and remote communications using either
4463network sockets or serial ports.
4464
f79daebb
GM
4465* Improved Modula-2 language support
4466
4467GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
4468basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
4469pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
4470printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
4471written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
4472GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
4473
acab6ab2
MM
4474* REMOVED features
4475
4476The ARM rdi-share module.
4477
f4267320
DJ
4478The Netware NLM debug server.
4479
53e5f3cf 4480*** Changes in GDB 6.4
156a53ca 4481
e0ecbda1
MK
4482* New native configurations
4483
02a677ac 4484OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
e0ecbda1
MK
4485OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
4486
d64a6579
KB
4487* New targets
4488
4489Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
4490
b33a6190
AS
4491* New command line options
4492
4493--batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
4494--return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
4495 the child (debugged) program exited with.
4496--eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
4497 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
4498 specified multiple times and in conjunction
4499 with the --command (-x) option.
4500
11dced61
AC
4501* Deprecated commands removed
4502
4503The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
4504removed:
4505
4506 Command Replacement
4507 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
4508 othernames set arm disassembler
4509 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
4510 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
4511 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
4512 regs info registers
4513
6fe85783
MK
4514* New BSD user-level threads support
4515
4516It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
4517library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
4518configurations are:
4519
4520FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
4521FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
4522OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
4523
4524Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
4525are not yet supported.
4526
5260ca71
MS
4527* New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
4528(Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
4529
e84ecc99
AC
4530* REMOVED configurations and files
4531
4532VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
9445aa30 4533Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
9445aa30 4534National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
156a53ca 4535
31e35378
JB
4536* New "set print array-indexes" command
4537
4538After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
4539when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
4540behavior.
4541
e85e5c83
MK
4542* VAX floating point support
4543
4544GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
4545
d91e9901
AS
4546* User-defined command support
4547
4548In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
4549to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
4550section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
4551
f2cb65ca
MC
4552*** Changes in GDB 6.3:
4553
f47b1503
AS
4554* New command line option
4555
4556GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
4557debugging.
4558
f2cb65ca
MC
4559* GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
4560
4561GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
4562information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
4563by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
4564proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
4565to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
860660cb 4566
d08c0230
AC
4567* Internationalization
4568
4569When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
4570internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
4571continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
4572
117ea3cf
PH
4573* Ada
4574
4575Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
4576implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
4577into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
4578
d08c0230
AC
4579* New native configurations
4580
4581GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
4582
4583* Remote 'p' packet
4584
4585GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
4586packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
4587
4588* END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
4589
4590GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
4591The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
4592features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
4593i386 application).
4594
4595GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
4596compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
4597continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
4598configurations:
4599
4600hppa-*-hpux
4601ia64-*-aix
4602mips-*-irix*
4603*-*-lynx
4604mips-*-linux-gnu
4605sds protocol
4606xdr protocol
4607powerpc bdm protocol
4608
4609Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
4610made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
4611
4612* OBSOLETE configurations and files
4613
4614Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
4615been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
4616configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
4617permanently REMOVED.
4618
4619h8300-*-*
4620mcore-*-*
4621mn10300-*-*
4622ns32k-*-*
4623sh64-*-*
4624v850-*-*
4625
ebb7c577
AC
4626*** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
4627
4628* MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
4629
4630When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
4631heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
4632been fixed.
4633
4634* MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
4635
4636When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
4637fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
4638IRIX long double values).
4639
4640* VAX and "next"
4641
4642A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
4643command. This problem has been fixed.
4644
860660cb 4645*** Changes in GDB 6.2:
faae5abe 4646
0dea2468
AC
4647* Fix for ``many threads''
4648
4649On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
4650rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
4651error message:
4652
4653 ptrace: No such process.
4654 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
4655
4656This problem has been fixed.
4657
2c07db7a
AC
4658* "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
4659
4660Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
4661GDB to dump core).
4662
c23968a2
JB
4663* New ``start'' command.
4664
4665This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
4666
71009278
MK
4667* New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
4668
4669Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
4670live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
4671platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
4672
4673FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
4674FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
4675NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
4676NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
4677NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
4678OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
4679OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
4680OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
4681OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
4682
3c0b7db2
AC
4683* Signal trampoline code overhauled
4684
4685Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
4686These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
4687of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
4688call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
4689signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
4690
73cc75f3
AC
4691Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
4692features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
4693include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
3c0b7db2 4694
7243600a
BF
4695* Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
4696
6f606e1c
MK
4697* New native configurations
4698
97dc871c 4699GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
0e56aeaf 4700OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
bf2ca189
MK
4701OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
4702OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
d195bc9f 4703OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 4704NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
9f076e7a 4705OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
6f606e1c 4706
a1b461bf
AC
4707* END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
4708
4709GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
4710The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
4711including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
4712migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
4713compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
4714work, was also included.
4715
4716GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
4717module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
4718
4719h8300-*-*
4720mcore-*-*
4721mn10300-*-*
4722ns32k-*-*
4723sh64-*-*
4724v850-*-*
4725xstormy16-*-*
4726
4727Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
4728made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
4729
3c7012f5
AC
4730* REMOVED configurations and files
4731
4732Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
4733Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
4734Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
4735Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
4736Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
4737AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
4738Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
4739decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
4740riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
4741sonymips mips-sony-*
4742sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
4743
e5fe55f7
AC
4744*** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
4745
4746* TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
4747
4748The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
4749GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
4750command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
4751program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
4752with GDB".
4753
4754* Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
4755
4756Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
4757libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
4758cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
4759GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
4760shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
4761the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
4762are created.
4763
4764Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
4765
4766* Fixed ISO-C build problems
4767
4768The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
4769non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
4770compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
4771
4772* Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
4773
4774Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
4775wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
4776
4777* Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
4778
4779The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
4780permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
4781systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
4782
4783* Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
4784
4785Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
4786has been updated to use constant array sizes.
4787
4788* Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
4789
4790GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
4791its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
4792panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
4793
4794* Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
4795
4796When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
4797by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
4798not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
4799
faae5abe 4800*** Changes in GDB 6.1:
f2c06f52 4801
9175c9a3
MC
4802* Removed --with-mmalloc
4803
4804Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
4805conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
4806
3cc87ec0
MK
4807* Changes in AMD64 configurations
4808
4809The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
4810the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
4811and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
4812you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
4813
f0424ef6
MK
4814* Revised SPARC target
4815
4816The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
4817FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
03cebad2
MK
4818support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
4819from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
4820(Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
f0424ef6 4821
59659be2
ILT
4822* New C++ demangler
4823
4824GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
4825names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
4826with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
4827programs.
4828
9e08b29b
DJ
4829* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
4830
4831GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
4832arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
4833encountered these.
4834
8dfe8985
DC
4835* C++ nested types and namespaces
4836
4837GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
4838improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
4839is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
4840Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
4841namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
4842"Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
4843frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
4844if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
4845GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
4846
cced5e27
MK
4847* New native configurations
4848
4849NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
27d1e716 4850OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2031c21a 4851OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
f2cab569
MK
4852OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
4853OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
cced5e27 4854
b4b4b794
KI
4855* New debugging protocols
4856
4857M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
4858
7989c619
AC
4859* "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
4860
4861The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
4862and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
4863tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
4864
5994185b
AC
4865* OBSOLETE configurations and files
4866
4867Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
4868been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
4869configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
4870permanently REMOVED.
4871
4872Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
4873Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
4874Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
4875Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
4876Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
4877AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
4878Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
0748d941
AC
4879decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
4880riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
4881sonymips mips-sony-*
4882sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
5994185b 4883
0ddabb4c
AC
4884* REMOVED configurations and files
4885
4886SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
4887SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4a8269c0
AC
4888Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
4889Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
4890H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
4891HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
4892HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
4893HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
4894PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
cf7c5c23 4895386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
4a8269c0
AC
4896Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
4897 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
4898 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f0424ef6
MK
4899SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
4900SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
4a8269c0
AC
4901Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
4902Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
0ddabb4c 4903
c7f1390e
DJ
4904*** Changes in GDB 6.0:
4905
1fe43d45
AC
4906* Objective-C
4907
4908Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
4909integrated into GDB.
4910
e6beb428
AC
4911* New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
4912
4913DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
4914information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
4915By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
4916backtraces.
4917
4918The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
4919have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
4920DWARF 2 CFI support.
4921
4922* Hosted file I/O.
4923
4924GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
4925file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
4926remote protocol documentation for details.
4927
4928* All targets using the new architecture framework.
4929
4930All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
4931architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
4932to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
4933ppc32 on ppc64).
4934
4935* GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
4936
4937GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
4938per-thread variables.
4939
4940* GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
4941
4942GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
4943GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
4944
4945* Separate debug info.
4946
4947GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
4948automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
4949of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
4950system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
4951and optional debug files.
4952
4953* DWARF 2 Location Expressions
4954
4955DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
4956describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
4957debugger.
4958
4959GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
4960for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
4961
4962* Java
4963
4964A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
4965Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
4966considered "useable".
4967
85f8f974
DJ
4968* GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
4969
4970The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
4971commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
4972kernel.
4973
0fac0b41
DJ
4974* GDB supports logging output to a file
4975
4976There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
4977used to capture GDB's output to a file.
f2c06f52 4978
6ad8ae5c
DJ
4979* The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
4980
4981The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
4982disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
4983command.
4984
e286caf2 4985* d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
5f601589
AC
4986
4987The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
4988registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
4989
d28f9cdf
DJ
4990* Profiling support
4991
4992A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
4993be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
4994session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
4995"--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
4996data, for more informative profiling results.
4997
da0f9dcd
AC
4998* Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
4999
5000The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
5001option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
b68767c1 5002"mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
da0f9dcd
AC
5003
5004Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
5005removed.
5006
fb9b6b35
JJ
5007Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
5008Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
5009Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
5010 in a subsequent -var-update.
5011
954a4db8
MK
5012* New native configurations.
5013
5014FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
5015
6760f9e6
JB
5016* Multi-arched targets.
5017
b4263afa 5018HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
85a453d5 5019Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
6760f9e6 5020
1b831c93
AC
5021* OBSOLETE configurations and files
5022
5023Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5024been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5025configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5026permanently REMOVED.
5027
8b0e5691 5028Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
67f16606 5029Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
fd2299bd 5030H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
56056df7
AC
5031HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
5032HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
5033HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
78c43945 5034PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2fbce691
AC
5035Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
5036 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
5037 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
f81824a9
AC
5038Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
5039Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
fd2299bd 5040
5835abe7
NC
5041* REMOVED configurations and files
5042
5043V850EA ISA
1b831c93
AC
5044Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
5045IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
5046i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
5047i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
5048i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
5049HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
5050 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
5051 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
5052Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
5053Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
5054Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
5055OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
5056I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5835abe7 5057
a094c6fb
AC
5058* MIPS $fp behavior changed
5059
5060The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
5061the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
5062context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
5063address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
5064The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
5065
299ffc64 5066*** Changes in GDB 5.3:
37057839 5067
46248966
AC
5068* GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
5069
5070When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
5071`/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
5072in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
5073library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
5074shared libs like mad''.
5075
b9d14705 5076* ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
6da02953 5077
b9d14705
DJ
5078Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
5079the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
5080arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
5081powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
6da02953 5082
e0e9281e
JB
5083* GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
5084
5085GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
5086and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
5087they expand.
5088
dd73b9bb
AC
5089The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
5090invocations in expression, and shows the result.
5091
5092The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
5093macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
5094
e0e9281e
JB
5095Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
5096information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
5097your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
5098information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
5099
2250ee0c
CV
5100* Multi-arched targets.
5101
6e3ba3b8
JT
5102DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
5103DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
2250ee0c 5104NEC V850 v850-*-*
6e3ba3b8 5105National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
a1789893
GS
5106Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
5107Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
2250ee0c 5108
cd9bfe15 5109* New targets.
e33ce519 5110
456f8b9d
DB
5111Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
5112
e33ce519 5113
da8ca43d
JT
5114* New native configurations
5115
5116Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
029923d4 5117SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
45888261 5118MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
9ce5c36a 5119UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
da8ca43d 5120
cd9bfe15
AC
5121* OBSOLETE configurations and files
5122
5123Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5124been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5125configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5126permanently REMOVED.
5127
92eb23c5 5128Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
a99a9e1b 5129OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1c7cc583 5130IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
7a3085c1 5131Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
7fb623f7 5132Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
eb4c54a2 5133Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
d8ee244c
MK
5134i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
5135i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
5136i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
822e978b
AC
5137HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
5138 m68*-apollo*-bsd*,
5139 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
4d210288 5140I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
92eb23c5 5141
db034ac5
AC
5142* OBSOLETE languages
5143
5144CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
5145
cd9bfe15
AC
5146* REMOVED configurations and files
5147
5148AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
5149A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
5150AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
5151AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
5152AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
5153
5154testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
5155
20f01a46
DH
5156* New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
5157
5158This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
5159commands. The default is 1024.
5160
a5941fbf
MK
5161* Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
5162
5163Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
5164
89743e04
MS
5165* New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
5166
5167These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
5168to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
5169from a file into memory (restore).
37057839 5170
9fb14e79
JB
5171* Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
5172
5173The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
5174including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
5175of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
5176
2037aebb
AC
5177*** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
5178
5179* New targets.
5180
5181Atmel AVR avr*-*-*
5182
5183* Bug fixes
5184
5185gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
5186mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
5187Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
5188
5189gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
5190dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
5191Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
5192
5193Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
5194Surprisingly enough, it works now.
5195By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
5196
5197i386 hardware watchpoint support:
5198avoid misses on second run for some targets.
5199By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
5200
37057839 5201*** Changes in GDB 5.2:
eb7cedd9 5202
1a703748
MS
5203* New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
5204
5205This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
5206really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
5207In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
5208target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
5209This can be a significant performance improvement on some
5210(notably embedded) targets.
5211
cefd4ef5
MS
5212* New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
5213
55241689
AC
5214This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
5215process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
5216GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
5217hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
cefd4ef5 5218
352ed7b4
MS
5219* New command line option
5220
5221GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
5222
5223* Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
5224
5225There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
5226command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
5227a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
5228be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
5229open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
5230issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
5231a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
5232it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
5233GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
5234is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
5235
fe419ffc
RE
5236* Changes in ARM configurations.
5237
5238Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
5239configuration is fully multi-arch.
5240
eb7cedd9
MK
5241* New native configurations
5242
fe419ffc 5243ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
eb7cedd9 5244x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
55241689 5245AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
768f0842 5246Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
eb7cedd9 5247
c9f63e6b
CV
5248* New targets
5249
5250Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
5251
9b4ff276
AC
5252* OBSOLETE configurations and files
5253
5254Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5255been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5256configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5257permanently REMOVED.
5258
5259AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
5260A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
5261AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
5262AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
5263AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
5264
b4ceaee6 5265testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
9b4ff276 5266
e2caac18
AC
5267* REMOVED configurations and files
5268
5269TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
7bc65f05 5270WDC 65816 w65-*-*
7768dd6c
AC
5271PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
5272PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
5273PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
5e734e1f 5274Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1406caf7
AC
5275Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
5276 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
7e24f0b1 5277SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
9b567150 5278Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
3680c638
AC
5279Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
5280ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
a752853e 5281Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
e2caac18 5282
c2a727fa
TT
5283* Changes to command line processing
5284
5285The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
5286for the inferior from gdb's command line.
5287
467d8519
TT
5288* Changes to key bindings
5289
5290There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
5291
7072a954
AC
5292*** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
5293
5294Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
5295
5296Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
5297corrupted.
5298
5299Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
5300
5301Numerous documentation fixes.
5302
5303Numerous testsuite fixes.
5304
34f47bc4 5305*** Changes in GDB 5.1:
139760b7
MK
5306
5307* New native configurations
5308
5309Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
5310x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
55241689 5311MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
e23194cb
EZ
5312MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
5313ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
55241689 5314s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
139760b7 5315
bf64bfd6
AC
5316* New targets
5317
def90278 5318Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
24be5c34 5319CRIS cris-axis
55241689 5320UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
def90278 5321
17e78a56 5322* OBSOLETE configurations and files
bf64bfd6
AC
5323
5324x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
9b9c068d 5325Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
bb19ff3b
AC
5326Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
5327 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
76f4ea53
AC
5328TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
5329WDC 65816 w65-*-*
4a1968f4 5330Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1b2b2c16
AC
5331PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
5332PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
5333PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
24f89b68 5334SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
514e603d
AC
5335Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
5336ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
d036b4d9 5337Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
bf64bfd6 5338
17e78a56
AC
5339stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
5340kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
5341
7fcca85b
AC
5342Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
5343been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
5344configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
5345permanently REMOVED.
5346
a196c81c 5347* REMOVED configurations and files
7fcca85b
AC
5348
5349Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
5350Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
5351Pyramid pyramid-*-*
5352ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
5353Tahoe tahoe-*-*
a196c81c 5354ser-ocd.c *-*-*
bf64bfd6 5355
6d6b80e5 5356* GDB has been converted to ISO C.
e23194cb 5357
6d6b80e5 5358GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
e23194cb
EZ
5359sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
5360present.
5361
bf64bfd6
AC
5362* Other news:
5363
e23194cb
EZ
5364* "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
5365
5366* The MI enabled by default.
5367
5368The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
5369revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
5370engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
5371using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
5372which is now deprecated.
5373
5374* Support for debugging Pascal programs.
5375
5376GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
5377main features are supported:
5378
5379 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
5380
5381 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
5382 extension;
5383
5384 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
5385
5386 - a Pascal expression parser.
5387
5388However, some important features are not yet supported.
5389
5390 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
5391
5392 - there are some problems with boolean types;
5393
5394 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
5395 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
5396
5397 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
5398
5399 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
5400
5401* Changes in completion.
5402
5403Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
5404to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
5405users expect at the shell prompt.
5406
5407Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
5408`breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
5409program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
5410files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
5411be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
5412considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
5413name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
5414
5415`set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
5416
5417* New platform-independent commands:
5418
5419It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
5420hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
5421documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
5422
5423* Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
5424
d7275149
MK
5425Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
5426revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
5427many threads as your system allows you to have.
5428
e23194cb
EZ
5429Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
5430
d7275149
MK
5431Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
5432multi-threaded programs though.
e23194cb
EZ
5433
5434* Changes in MIPS configurations.
bf64bfd6
AC
5435
5436Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
5437
e23194cb
EZ
5438GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
5439debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
5440supported.)
5441
5442* Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
5443
5444Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
5445breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
5446implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
5447put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
5448and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
5449registers.
5450
5451The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
5452debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
5453watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
5454
5455* Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
5456
5457New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
5458the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
5459
5460New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
5461display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
5462IDT.
5463
5464New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
5465from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
5466New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
5467a given linear address.
5468
5469GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
5470program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
5471which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
5472
5473DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
5474
6c56c069
EZ
5475It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
5476
e23194cb
EZ
5477* Changes in documentation.
5478
5479All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
5480Documentation License.
5481
5482Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
5483manual.
5484
5485TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
5486
5487Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
5488manual.
5489
5490The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
5491documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
5492hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
5493
5d6640b1
AC
5494* GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
5495
5496The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
5497``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
5498contents of this file.
5499
1a1d8446
AC
5500* gdba.el deleted
5501
5502GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
139760b7 5503
9debab2f 5504*** Changes in GDB 5.0:
7a292a7a 5505
c63ce875
EZ
5506* Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
5507
5508Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
5509programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
5510displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
5511greater level of detail.
5512
5513* Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
5514
5515It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
5516bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
5517on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
5518written.
5519
5520* Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
5521
5522The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
5523necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
5524machines ``out of the box''.
5525
5526The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
5527possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
5528signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
5529would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
5530interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
5531
5532It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
5533standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
5534even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
5535and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
5536terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
5537
5538The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
5539enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
5540also works.
5541
5542DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
5543GDB.
5544
5545It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
5546directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
5547times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
5548breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
5549
ed9a39eb
JM
5550* New native configurations
5551
5552ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
afc05dd4 5553PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
ed9a39eb 5554
7a292a7a
SS
5555* New targets
5556
96baa820 5557Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
adf40b2e
JM
5558x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
5559PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
7a292a7a
SS
5560TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
5561
085dd6e6
JM
5562* OBSOLETE configurations
5563
5564Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
5565Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
9846de1b 5566Pyramid pyramid-*-*
ed9a39eb 5567ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
104c1213 5568Tahoe tahoe-*-*
7a292a7a 5569
9debab2f
AC
5570Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
5571but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
5572these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
5573be permanently REMOVED.
5574
5330533d
SS
5575* Gould support removed
5576
5577Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
5578
bc9e5bbf
AC
5579* New features for SVR4
5580
5581On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
5582without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
5583load symbols from the running process's executable file.
5584
5585* Many C++ enhancements
5586
5587C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
5588in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
5589
adf40b2e
JM
5590* Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
5591
5592A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
5593sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
5594with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
5595``|<program> <args>'' vis:
5596
5597 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
5598 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
5599
43e526b9
JM
5600* MIPS 64 remote protocol
5601
5602A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
5603expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
5604instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
5605
5606The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
5607added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
5608
96baa820
JM
5609* ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
5610
5611The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
5612``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
5613include ``set remote P-packet''.
5614
11cf8741
JM
5615* Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
5616
5617The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
5618accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
5619``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
5620
7876dd43
DB
5621* ``apropos'' command added.
5622
5623The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
5624documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
5625try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
5626
bc9e5bbf
AC
5627* New MI interface
5628
5629A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
5630interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
7162c0ca
EZ
5631process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
5632"GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
5633enabled by configuring with:
bc9e5bbf
AC
5634
5635 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
5636
c906108c
SS
5637*** Changes in GDB-4.18:
5638
5639* New native configurations
5640
5641HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
5642HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
55241689 5643M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
c906108c
SS
5644
5645* New targets
5646
5647Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
5648Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
5649Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
5650
5651* OBSOLETE configurations
5652
5653Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
5654
5655Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
5656but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
5657these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
5658be permanently REMOVED.
5659
5660* ANSI/ISO C
5661
5662As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
5663buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
5664containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
5665use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
5666available. If this is not true, please report the affected
5667configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
5668information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
5669already.
5670
5671* Readline 2.2
5672
5673GDB now uses readline 2.2.
5674
5675* set extension-language
5676
5677You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
5678languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
5679you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
5680 set extension-language .c c++
5681The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
5682and their associated languages.
5683
5684* Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
5685
5686When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
5687you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
5688PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
5689
5690 set processor NAME
5691
5692sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
5693following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
5694
5695 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
5696 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
5697 403 IBM PowerPC 403
5698 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
5699 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
5700 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
5701 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
5702 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
5703 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
5704 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
5705 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
5706
5707At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
5708special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
5709registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
5710only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
5711
5712* HP-UX support
5713
5714Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
5715more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
5716library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
5717support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
5718for xdb and dbx commands.
5719
5720* Catchpoints
5721
5722HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
5723generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
5724to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
5725
5726This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
5727argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
5728output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
5729
5730* Debugging across forks
5731
5732On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
5733in the inferior.
5734
5735* TUI
5736
5737HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
5738it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
5739configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
5740
5741* GDB remote protocol additions
5742
5743A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
5744Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
5745fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
5746allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
5747
5748For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
5749full 64-bit address. The command
5750
5751 set remoteaddresssize 32
5752
5753can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
5754the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
5755will be discarded.
5756
5757In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
5758command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
5759
5760 maint packet heythere
5761
5762sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
5763disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
5764time.
5765
5766The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
5767target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
5768downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
5769
5770* Tracing can collect general expressions
5771
5772You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
5773further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
5774doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
5775
5776* mask-address variable for Mips
5777
5778For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
5779a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
5780of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
5781
5782* Higher serial baud rates
5783
5784GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
5785230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
5786to achieve all of these rates.)
5787
5788* i960 simulator
5789
5790The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
5791builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
5792
5793
5794*** Changes in GDB-4.17:
5795
5796* New native configurations
5797
5798Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
5799Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
5800Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
5801PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
5802PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
5803Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
5804Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
5805
5806* New targets
5807
5808Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
5809Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
5810Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
5811Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
5812MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
5813MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
5814MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
5815Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
5816Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
5817Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
5818NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
5819
5820* New debugging protocols
5821
5822ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
5823M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
5824DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
5825PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
5826PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
5827Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
5828
5829* DWARF 2
5830
5831All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
5832format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
5833information.
5834
5835* Java frontend
5836
5837GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
5838only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
5839
5840* solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
5841
5842For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
5843loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
5844locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
5845
5846* Live range splitting
5847
5848GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
5849range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
5850more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
5851
5852* Hurd support
5853
5854GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
5855updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
5856
5857* ARM Thumb support
5858
5859GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
5860instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
5861instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
5862accordingly.
5863
5864* MIPS16 support
5865
5866GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
5867instruction set.
5868
5869* Overlay support
5870
5871GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
5872linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
5873will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
5874control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
5875additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
5876in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
5877
5878* info symbol
5879
5880The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
5881the symbol at the specified address.
5882
5883* Trace support
5884
5885The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
5886asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
5887extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
5888includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
5889file tracepoint.c for more details.
5890
5891* MIPS simulator
5892
5893Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
5894by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
5895of most MIPS variants.
5896
5897* Sparc simulator
5898
5899Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
5900by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
5901Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
5902
5903* set architecture
5904
5905For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
5906basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
5907architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
5908the possible architectures.
5909
5910*** Changes in GDB-4.16:
5911
5912* New native configurations
5913
5914Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
5915M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
5916PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
5917PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
5918PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
5919RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
5920
5921* New targets
5922
5923ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
5924I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
5925MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
5926MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
5927PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
5928Hitachi SH3 sh-*-*
5929Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
5930
5931* PowerPC simulator
5932
5933The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
5934contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
5935PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
5936basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
5937performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
5938
5939* Solaris 2.5
5940
5941GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
5942
5943* Windows 95/NT native
5944
5945GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
5946To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
5947which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
5948Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
5949ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
5950
5951* dont-repeat command
5952
5953If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
5954command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
5955useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
5956extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
5957
5958* Send break instead of ^C
5959
5960The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
5961rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
5962GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
5963
5964* Remote protocol timeout
5965
5966The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
5967that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
5968to read from the target. The default value is 2.
5969
5970* Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
5971
5972By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
5973loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
5974stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
5975when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
5976in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
5977
5978Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
5979/usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
5980automatically on hpux10.
5981
5982* Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
5983
5984Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
5985
5986* Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
5987
5988When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
5989may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
5990the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
5991every character. The default value is 1050.
5992
5993* Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
5994
5995If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
5996a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
5997replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
5998details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
5999remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
6000to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
6001
6002* Speedups for remote debugging
6003
6004GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
6005the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
6006and more efficient S-record downloading.
6007
6008* Memory use reductions and statistics collection
6009
6010GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
6011Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
6012
6013*** Changes in GDB-4.15:
6014
6015* Psymtabs for XCOFF
6016
6017The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
6018can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
6019
6020* Remote targets use caching
6021
6022Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
6023remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
6024it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
6025debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
6026off' turns the the data cache off.
6027
6028* Remote targets may have threads
6029
6030The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
6031in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
6032gdb/remote.c for details.
6033
6034* NetROM support
6035
6036If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
6037support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
6038acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
6039write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
6040support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
6041another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
6042sequence is something like
6043
6044 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
6045 load <prog>
6046 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
6047
6048* Macintosh host
6049
6050GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
6051may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
6052it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
6053available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
6054device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
6055directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
6056scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
6057mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
6058
6059* Autoconf
6060
6061GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
6062but does simplify configuration and building.
6063
6064* hpux10
6065
6066GDB now supports hpux10.
6067
6068*** Changes in GDB-4.14:
6069
6070* New native configurations
6071
6072x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
6073x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
6074NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
6075Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
6076
6077* New targets
6078
6079A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
6080HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
6081CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
6082PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
6083WDC 65816 w65-*-*
6084
6085* Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
6086
6087GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
6088possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
6089filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
6090the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
6091if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
6092
6093* Arguments to user-defined commands
6094
6095User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
6096Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
6097trivial example:
6098define adder
6099 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
6100
6101To execute the command use:
6102adder 1 2 3
6103
6104Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
6105Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
6106use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
6107
6108* New `if' and `while' commands
6109
6110This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
6111commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
6112expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
6113execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
6114terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
6115`else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
6116if the expression is zero.
6117
6118* Fortran source language mode
6119
6120GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
6121Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
6122variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
6123with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
6124Fortran compilers.
6125
6126* Better HPUX support
6127
6128Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
6129running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
6130processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
6131for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
6132that behavior do the following before running the program:
6133
6134 adb -w a.out
6135 __dld_flags?W 0x5
6136 control-d
6137
6138This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
6139To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
6140
6141 adb -w a.out
6142 __dld_flags?W 0x4
6143 control-d
6144
6145You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
6146the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
6147external linkage.
6148
6149GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
6150HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
6151
6152* Target byte order now dynamically selectable
6153
6154You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
6155commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
6156current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
6157"set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
6158associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
6159configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
6160
6161* New DOS host serial code
6162
6163This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
6164no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
6165a PC's serial port.
6166
6167*** Changes in GDB-4.13:
6168
6169* New "complete" command
6170
6171This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
6172were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
6173
6174* Trailing space optional in prompt
6175
6176"set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
6177allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
6178
6179* Breakpoint hit counts
6180
6181"info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
6182has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
6183can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
6184to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
6185less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
6186that breakpoint.
6187
6188* Ability to stop printing at NULL character
6189
6190"set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
6191an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
6192arrays actually contain only short strings.
6193
6194* Shared library breakpoints
6195
6196In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
6197breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
6198
6199* Hardware watchpoints
6200
6201There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
6202targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
6203
55241689 6204Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
c906108c
SS
6205
6206* Annotations
6207
6208Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
6209and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
6210
6211* Improved Irix 5 support
6212
6213GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
6214
6215* Improved HPPA support
6216
6217GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
6218
6219* New native configurations
6220
6221Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
6222HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
6223Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
6224RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
6225
6226* New targets
6227
6228OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
6229MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
6230Sparc64 sparc64-*-*
6231
6232* Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
6233
6234There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
6235This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
6236
6237* Fixes
6238
6239As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
6240and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
6241
6242*** Changes in GDB-4.12:
6243
6244* Irix 5 is now supported
6245
6246* HPPA support
6247
6248GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
6249to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
6250GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
6251of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
6252can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
6253
6254
6255*** Changes in GDB-4.11:
6256
6257* User visible changes:
6258
6259* Remote Debugging
6260
6261The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
6262target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
6263debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
6264integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
6265debugging info for the mips target).
6266
6267* DEC Alpha native support
6268
6269GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
6270debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
6271work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
6272Alpha-specific notes.
6273
6274* Preliminary thread implementation
6275
6276GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
6277
6278* LynxOS native and target support for 386
6279
6280This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
6281to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
6282for details).
6283
6284* Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
6285
6286This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
6287mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
6288call methods, ...etc.
6289
6290*** Changes in GDB-4.10:
6291
6292 * User visible changes:
6293
6294Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
6295supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
6296other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
6297somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
6298
6299Filename completion now works.
6300
6301When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
6302arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
6303addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
6304
6305All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
6306vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
6307should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
6308your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
6309to be on the far side of a thin network line.
6310
6311 * DEC alpha support
6312
6313This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
6314cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
6315
6316
6317*** Changes in GDB-4.9:
6318
6319 * Testsuite
6320
6321This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
6322The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
6323via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
6324
6325 * C++ demangling
6326
6327'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
6328emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
6329Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
6330disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
6331use gdb with AT&T cfront.
6332
6333 * Simulators
6334
6335GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
6336So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
6337Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
6338
6339 * New targets supported
6340
6341H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
6342H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
6343SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
6344Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
6345IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
6346
6347Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
6348version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
6349GO32 memory extender.
6350
6351 * New remote protocols
6352
6353MIPS remote debugging protocol.
6354
6355 * New source languages supported
6356
6357This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
6358used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
6359into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
6360
6361
6362*** Changes in GDB-4.8:
6363
6364 * HP Precision Architecture supported
6365
6366GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
6367version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
6368University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
6369compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
6370format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
6371(as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
6372
6373Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
6374
6375 * Faster and better demangling
6376
6377We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
6378demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
6379character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
6380only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
6381This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
6382increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
6383symbol lookups.
6384
6385`Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
6386from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
6387compiler does not actually implement.
6388
6389 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
6390
6391In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
6392inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
6393recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
6394very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
6395The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
6396circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
6397fix.
6398
6399The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
6400release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
6401
6402 * Improved configure script
6403
6404The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
6405you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
6406host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
6407done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
6408
6409We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
6410version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
6411`--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
6412The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
6413only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
6414We hope to make this the default in a future release.
6415
6416 * Documentation improvements
6417
6418There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
6419produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
6420before submitting changes.
6421
6422The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
6423M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
6424`info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
6425you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
6426a future texinfo-X.Y release.
6427
6428*NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
6429We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
6430been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
6431or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
6432`texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
6433around this problem.
6434
6435 * New features
6436
6437GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
6438the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
6439`print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
6440the target program.
6441
6442The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
6443how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
6444
6445 * New native hosts supported
6446
6447HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
6448386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
6449
6450 * New targets supported
6451
6452AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
6453
6454 * New file formats supported
6455
6456BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
6457HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
6458
6459 * Major bug fixes
6460
6461Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
6462
6463We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
6464printf_filtered("%s") problems.
6465
6466We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
6467for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
6468release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
6469
6470You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
6471will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
6472
6473We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
6474for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
6475especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
6476libraries.
6477
6478The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
6479information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
6480command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
6481any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
6482when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
6483
6484 * Internal improvements
6485
6486GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
6487debugging of multiple languages in the future.
6488
6489GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
6490Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
6491symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
6492contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
6493shared code that handles any of them.
6494
6495 * New command line options
6496
6497We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
6498
6499 * Mmalloc licensing
6500
6501The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
6502General Public License.
6503
6504*** Changes in GDB-4.7:
6505
6506 * Host/native/target split
6507
6508GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
6509hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
6510target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
6511local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
6512ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
6513
6514The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
6515GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
6516is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
6517code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
6518any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
6519built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
6520handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
6521
6522GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
6523It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
6524plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
6525
6526 * New hosts supported
6527
6528HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
6529386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
6530386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
6531
6532 * New targets supported
6533
6534Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
653568030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
6536
6537 * New native hosts supported
6538
6539386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
6540 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
6541386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
6542
6543 * New file formats supported
6544
6545BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
6546supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
6547format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
6548
6549 * New commands
6550
6551`show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
6552`show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
6553These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
6554
6555`info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
6556
6557You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
6558scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
6559prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
6560executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
6561
6562 * C++ improvements
6563
6564We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
6565info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
6566symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
6567
6568Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
6569
6570 * Major bug fixes
6571
6572The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
6573fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
6574by the compiler.
6575
6576We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
6577support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
6578
6579John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
6580slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
6581that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
6582purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
6583the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
6584mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
6585
6586Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
6587about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
6588completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
6589we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
6590
6591 * AMD 29k support
6592
6593A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
6594specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
6595calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
6596usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
6597in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
6598
6599We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
6600Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
6601of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
6602resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
6603
6604 * Remote interfaces
6605
6606We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
6607with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
6608message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
6609This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
6610needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
6611breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
6612each instruction being stepped through.
6613
6614The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
6615registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
6616
6617There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
6618find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
6619Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
6620processor with a serial port.
6621
6622 * Configuration
6623
6624Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
6625`table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
6626supported, and what files each one uses.
6627
6628 * Library changes
6629
6630There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
6631disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
6632Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
6633disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
6634
6635The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
6636Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
6637can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
6638grants all the rights from the General Public License.
6639
6640 * Documentation
6641
6642The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
6643reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
6644as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
6645encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
6646system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
6647bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
6648
6649And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
6650
6651
6652*** Changes in GDB-4.6:
6653
6654 * Better support for C++ function names
6655
6656GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
6657names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
6658(using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
6659single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
6660Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
6661
6662GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
6663the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
6664You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
6665lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
6666for the list of formats.
6667
6668 * G++ symbol mangling problem
6669
6670Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
6671C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
6672directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
6673can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
6674usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
6675about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
6676this problem.)
6677
6678 * New 'maintenance' command
6679
6680All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
6681the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
6682can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
6683
6684 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
6685 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
6686 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
6687 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
6688 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
6689 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
6690
6691The following commands are new:
6692
6693 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
6694 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
6695 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
6696
6697 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
6698
6699We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
6700(e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
6701be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
6702read after argv processing.
6703
6704 * New hosts supported
6705
6706Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
6707
55241689 6708GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
c906108c
SS
6709
6710We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
6711is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
6712for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
6713masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
6714fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
6715It costs extra.
6716
6717 * New targets supported
6718
6719Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
6720
6721 * More smarts about finding #include files
6722
6723GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
6724all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
6725greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
6726especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
6727the one that contains your sources.
6728
6729We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
6730breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
6731try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
6732
6733 * Interesting infernals change
6734
6735GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
6736section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
6737target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
6738stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
6739
6740 * Bug fixes (of course!)
6741
6742There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
6743 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
6744 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
6745
6746See the ChangeLog for details.
6747
6748*** Changes in GDB-4.5:
6749
6750 * New machines supported (host and target)
6751
6752IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
6753
6754SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
6755
6756 * New malloc package
6757
6758GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
6759Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
6760capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
6761This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
6762pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
6763more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
6764
6765 * info proc
6766
6767The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
6768'help info proc' for details.
6769
6770 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
6771
6772The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
6773Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
6774possible.
6775
6776 * File name changes for MS-DOS
6777
6778Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
6779support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
6780conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
6781environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
6782that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
6783in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
6784
6785 * Cross byte order fixes
6786
6787Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
6788targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
6789
6790 * New -mapped and -readnow options
6791
6792If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
6793system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
6794`symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
6795program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
6796called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
6797Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
6798and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
6799the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
6800option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
6801starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
6802
6803You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
6804the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
6805information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
6806slower, but makes future operations faster.
6807
6808The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
6809build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
6810A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
6811use is:
6812
6813 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
6814
6815The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
6816It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
6817shared across multiple host platforms.
6818
6819 * longjmp() handling
6820
6821GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
6822siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
6823all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
6824platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
6825
6826 * Solaris 2.0
6827
6828Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
6829this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
6830reading symbols.
6831
6832 * Bug fixes
6833
6834As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
6835People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
6836crashes and trashed symbol tables.
6837
6838*** Changes in GDB-4.4:
6839
6840 * New machines supported (host and target)
6841
6842SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
6843 (except core files)
6844BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
6845Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
6846
6847 * New machines supported (target)
6848
6849AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
6850
6851 * C++ support
6852
6853GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
6854The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
6855per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
6856
6857GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
6858`ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
6859extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
6860good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
6861will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
6862released.
6863
6864 * New features for SVR4
6865
6866GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
6867shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
6868only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
6869
6870The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
6871on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
6872it prints the address mappings of the process.
6873
6874If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
6875bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
6876
6877 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
6878
6879Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
6880now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
6881skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
6882make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
6883same code linked statically.
6884
6885 * New Getopt
6886
6887GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
6888version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
6889continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
6890Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
6891added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
6892future by other options that begin with the same letter.
6893
6894 * Bugs fixed
6895
6896The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
6897Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
6898See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
6899
6900
6901*** Changes in GDB-4.3:
6902
6903 * New machines supported (host and target)
6904
6905Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
6906NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
6907Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
6908
6909 * Almost SCO Unix support
6910
6911We had hoped to support:
6912SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
6913(except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
6914that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
6915about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
6916
6917 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
6918
6919GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
6920debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
6921is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
6922send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
6923reqired (if any).
6924
6925 * New Readline
6926
6927GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
6928is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
6929required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
6930
6931 * Bugs fixed
6932
6933The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
6934Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
6935See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
6936
6937 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
6938
6939GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
6940supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
6941symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
6942
6943Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
6944mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
6945debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
6946mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
6947version 2.
6948
6949Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
6950really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
6951line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
6952variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
6953situation somewhat.
6954
6955When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
6956However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
6957methods.
6958
6959We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
6960DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
6961encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
6962
6963
6964*** Changes in GDB-4.2:
6965
6966 * Improved configuration
6967
6968Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
6969Porting BFD is simpler.
6970
6971 * Stepping improved
6972
6973The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
6974of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
6975in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
6976function that has debugging information is called within the line.
6977
6978 * Bug fixing
6979
6980Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
6981
6982 * New host supported (not target)
6983
6984Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
6985
6986
6987*** Changes in GDB-4.1:
6988
6989 * Multiple source language support
6990
6991GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
6992It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
6993and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
6994language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
6995You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
6996`set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
6997
6998 * GDB and Modula-2
6999
7000GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
7001currently under development at the State University of New York at
7002Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
7003continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
7004
7005Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
7006debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
7007symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
7008
7009There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
7010in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
7011
7012 * set write on/off
7013
7014GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
7015a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
7016the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
7017by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
7018effect immediately.
7019
7020 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
7021
7022When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
7023shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
7024The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
7025examining core files.
7026
7027 * set listsize
7028
7029You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
7030The default is 10.
7031
7032 * New machines supported (host and target)
7033
7034SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
7035Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
7036Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
7037
7038 * New hosts supported (not targets)
7039
7040IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
7041
7042 * New targets supported (not hosts)
7043
7044AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
7045AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
7046Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
7047
7048 * New remote interfaces
7049
7050AMD 29000 Adapt
7051AMD 29000 Minimon
7052
7053
7054*** Changes in GDB-4.0:
7055
7056 * New Facilities
7057
7058Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
7059
7060Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
7061target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
7062is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
7063remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
7064remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
7065also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
7066using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
7067stub on the target system.
7068
7069New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
7070
7071GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
7072library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
7073object file types such as a.out and coff.
7074
7075There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
7076refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
7077
7078
7079 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
7080
7081All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
7082by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
7083
7084For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
7085``Show prompt'' produces the response:
7086Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
7087
7088What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
7089print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
7090will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
7091all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
7092
7093confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
7094 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
7095 it is already running. Default is ON.
7096
7097editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
7098 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
7099 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
7100 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
7101 Default is ON.
7102
7103history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
7104 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
7105 or the value of the environment variable
7106 GDBHISTFILE.
7107
7108history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
7109 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
7110 HISTSIZE.
7111
7112history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
7113 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
7114 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
7115
7116history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
7117 history expansion will be performed on
7118 command line input. The default is OFF.
7119
7120radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
7121 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
7122 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
7123
7124height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
7125 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
7126 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
7127 variable TERM.
7128
7129width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
7130 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
7131 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
7132 variable TERM.
7133
7134Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
7135``set width'' instead.
7136
7137print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
7138 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
7139 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
7140 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
7141
7142print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
7143 is OFF.
7144
7145print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
7146 "raw" form if off.
7147
7148print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
7149 like instructions.
7150
7151print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
7152
7153
7154 * Support for Epoch Environment.
7155
7156The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
7157new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
7158are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
7159window.
7160
7161
7162 * Support for Shared Libraries
7163
7164GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
7165Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
7166before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
7167happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
7168At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
7169from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
7170shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
7171It can be abbreviated ``share''.
7172
7173sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
7174 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
7175 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
7176
7177info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
7178
7179
7180 * Watchpoints
7181
7182A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
7183expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
7184tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
7185quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
7186problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
7187more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
7188
7189watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
7190
7191info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
7192
7193delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
7194disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
7195enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
7196
7197
7198 * C++ multiple inheritance
7199
7200When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
7201for C++ programs.
7202
7203 * C++ exception handling
7204
7205Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
7206ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
7207the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
7208handler's context).
7209
7210catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
7211 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
7212 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
7213
7214info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
7215 current stack frame.
7216
7217
7218 * Minor command changes
7219
7220The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
7221command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
7222is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
7223
7224The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
7225at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
7226frames without printing.
7227
7228 * New directory command
7229
7230'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
7231The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
7232about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
7233with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
7234find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
7235
7236 * Configuring GDB for compilation
7237
7238For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
7239for more details.
7240
7241GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
7242two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
7243Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
7244where the program that you are debugging will run.