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252b5132 1-*- text -*-
7feec526 2
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L
3* Add support for ELF SHF_GNU_MBIND and PT_GNU_MBIND_XXX.
4
46bed679
L
5* Add support for ELF GNU program properties.
6
0220170b
DD
7* Add support for the Texas Instruments PRU processor.
8
d7488716
AB
9* When configuring for arc*-*-linux* targets the default linker emulation will
10 change if --with-cpu=nps400 is used at configure time.
11
77f5e65e
AB
12* Improve assignment of LMAs to orphan sections in some edge cases where a
13 mixture of both AT>LMA_REGION and AT(LMA) are used.
14
14ea2c1b
AB
15* Orphan sections placed after an empty section that has an AT(LMA) will now
16 take an load memory address starting from LMA.
17
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AB
18* Section groups can now be resolved (the group deleted and the group members
19 placed like normal sections) at partial link time either using the new linker
20 option --force-group-allocation or by placing FORCE_GROUP_ALLOCATION into the
21 linker script.
22
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TG
23Changes in 2.28:
24
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25* The EXCLUDE_FILE linker script construct can now be applied outside of the
26 section list in order for the exclusions to apply over all input sections in
27 the list.
28
e23eba97 29* Add support for the RISC-V architecture.
76359541 30
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NC
31* The command line option --no-eh-frame-hdr can now be used in ELF based
32 linkers to disable the automatic generation of .eh_frame_hdr sections.
33
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TP
34* Add --in-implib=<infile> to the ARM linker to enable specifying a set of
35 Secure Gateway veneers that must exist in the output import library specified
36 by --out-implib=<outfile> and the address they must have. As such,
37 --in-implib is only supported in combination with --cmse-implib.
38
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TP
39* Extended the --out-implib=<file> option, previously restricted to x86 PE
40 targets, to any ELF based target. This allows the generation of an import
41 library for an ELF executable, which can then be used by another application
42 to link against the executable.
43
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TG
44Changes in 2.27:
45
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L
46* Add a configure option --enable-relro to decide whether -z relro should
47 be enabled in ELF linker by default. Default to yes for all Linux
48 targets except FRV, HPPA, IA64 and MIPS.
49
4c10bbaa
L
50* Support for -z noreloc-overflow in the x86-64 ELF linker to disable
51 relocation overflow check.
52
b8871f35
L
53* Add -z common/-z nocommon options for ELF targets to control whether to
54 convert common symbols to the STT_COMMON type during a relocatable link.
55
aec6b87e
L
56* Support for -z nodynamic-undefined-weak in the x86 ELF linker, which
57 avoids dynamic relocations against undefined weak symbols in executable.
58
cdf96953
MF
59* The NOCROSSREFSTO command was added to the linker script language.
60
1f56df9d
JW
61* Add --no-apply-dynamic-relocs to the AArch64 linker to do not apply link-time
62 values for dynamic relocations.
63
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64Changes in 2.26:
65
a504d23a
LA
66* Add --fix-stm32l4xx-629360 to the ARM linker to enable a link-time
67 workaround for a bug in the bus matrix / memory controller for some of
68 the STM32 Cortex-M4 based products (STM32L4xx)
81c23f82 69
6c3bc0f8
NC
70* Add a configure option --enable-compressed-debug-sections={all,ld} to
71 decide whether DWARF debug sections should be compressed by default.
72
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NC
73* Add support for the ARC EM/HS, and ARC600/700 architectures.
74
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KT
75* Experimental support for linker garbage collection (--gc-sections)
76 has been enabled for COFF and PE based targets.
77
ea556d25
L
78* New command line option for ELF targets to compress DWARF debug
79 sections, --compress-debug-sections=[none|zlib|zlib-gnu|zlib-gabi].
80
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AB
81* New command line option, --orphan-handling=[place|warn|error|discard], to
82 adjust how orphan sections are handled. The default is 'place' which gives
83 the current behaviour, 'warn' and 'error' issue a warning or error
84 respectively when orphan sections are found, and 'discard' will discard all
85 orphan sections.
3ea60775 86
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87* Add support for LLVM plugin.
88
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89* Add --print-memory-usage option to report memory blocks usage.
90
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91* Add --require-defined option, it's like --undefined except the new symbol
92 must be defined by the end of the link.
93
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94Changes in 2.25:
95
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96* PE binaries now once again contain real timestamps by default. To disable
97 the inclusion of a timestamp in a PE binary, use the --no-insert-timestamp
98 command line option.
99
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CS
100* Replace support for openrisc and or32 with support for or1k.
101
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JT
102* Add support for the --build-id command line option to COFF based targets.
103
104* x86/x86_64 pe-coff now supports the --build-id option.
105
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106* Add support for the Andes NDS32.
107
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108Changes in 2.24:
109
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NC
110* Add LOG2CEIL() builtin function to the linker script language
111
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NC
112* Add support for the Texas Instruments MSP430X processor.
113
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114* Add support for Altera Nios II.
115
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NC
116* Add support for the V850E3V5 architecture.
117
a3c62988
NC
118* Add support for the Imagination Technologies Meta processor.
119
b1b00fcc
MF
120* --enable-new-dtags no longer generates old dtags in addition to new dtags.
121
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RS
122* Remove linker support for MIPS ECOFF targets.
123
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NC
124* Add ALIGN_WITH_INPUT to the linker script language to force the alignment of
125 an output section to use the maximum alignment of all its input sections.
126
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127Changes in 2.23:
128
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129* Enable compressed debug section feature for x86/x86_64 pe-coff.
130
da2bb560
NC
131* Add support for the 64-bit ARM architecture: AArch64.
132
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L
133* Added SORT_NONE to the linker script language to disable section sorting.
134
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135* Add a linker-provided symbol when producing ELF output, '__ehdr_start'
136 to point to the ELF file header (and nearby program headers) in the
137 program's memory image.
138
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139* Add support for S12X processor.
140
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JL
141* Add support for the VLE extension to the PowerPC architecture.
142
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143* Add support for the Freescale XGATE architecture.
144
a72173de
TG
145* Add option -f FILE on AIX (for response file).
146
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DD
147* Add support for the Renesas RL78 architecture.
148
cfb8c092
NC
149* Add support for the Adapteva EPIPHANY architecture.
150
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TG
151Changes in 2.22:
152
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NC
153* --copy-dt-needed-entries is no longer enabled by default. Instead
154 --no-copy-dt-needed-entries is the default.
155
ae17ab41 156* INPUT_SECTION_FLAGS has been added to the linker script language
cfb8c092 157 to allow selection of input sections by section header section flags.
ae17ab41 158
69f56ae1 159* Add support for the Tilera TILEPro and TILE-Gx architectures.
90b3661c 160
02ecc8e9 161* Added SORT_BY_INIT_PRIORITY to the linker script language to permit
cfb8c092
NC
162 sorting sections by numerical value of the GCC init_priority attribute
163 encoded in the section name.
02ecc8e9 164
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165Changes in 2.21:
166
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L
167* Linker script expression evaluation is somewhat more sane. This may
168 break scripts that depend on quirks of the old expression evaluation.
169
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KT
170* Turn off underscoring for x86_64 PE+-COFF targets. For old behavior the
171 option --enable-leading-mingw64-underscores can be used on configure of
172 bfd.
173
40b36596
JM
174* Add support for the TMS320C6000 (TI C6X) processor family.
175
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NC
176* --add-needed renamed to --copy-dt-needed-entries in order to avoid confusion
177 with --as-needed option.
178
7fcab871
KT
179* Extend .def file syntax by '== <ID>' for imports and exports. This allows
180 to alias the import/export table name written in PE image.
181
a72173de 182* Add --exclude-all-symbols option to PE based linkers. This prevents all
2927aaca
NC
183 symbols from automatically being exported.
184
c7927a3c
NC
185* Add support for the Renesas RX processor.
186
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TG
187* Add support for alpha-vms target.
188
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189Changes in 2.20:
190
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NC
191* GNU/Linux targets now support the STB_GNU_UNIQUE symbol binding. This is a
192 GNU extension to the standard set of ELF symbol bindings. The binding will
193 be passed on to the dynamic linker which will make sure that in the entire
194 process there is just one symbol with the given name and type in use.
ce11ba6c 195
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DK
196* PE targets now support a GNU extension to allow the alignment of common
197 common symbols to be specified. This support uses custom options in
198 the .drectve section, which will be disregarded by the native tools.
199
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DK
200* PE targets now add primitive support for ELF version scripts; symbols
201 are not versioned, but the local and global symbol visibility directives
202 are respected when filtering symbols in auto-export mode.
203
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CD
204* New option --no-export-dynamic to undo the effect of the -E and
205 --export-dynamic options.
206
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L
207* ELF: --warn-alternate-em option to warn if an object has alternate
208 ELF machine code.
209
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NC
210* New script function REGION_ALIAS to add alias names to memory regions.
211
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DK
212* PE targets no longer make use of the long section names PE extension to
213 the COFF format when generating executable images, by default. The old
214 (slightly non-conformant) behaviour can still be invoked by using the
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215 new '--enable-long-section-names' command-line option. It is also enabled
216 automatically in the presence of un-stripped debug information, as GDB
217 needs to be able to find the debug info sections by their full names.
88183869 218
d8045f23
NC
219* For GNU/Linux systems the linker will now avoid processing any relocations
220 made against symbols of the STT_GNU_IFUNC type and instead emit them into
221 the resulting binary for processing by the loader.
222
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L
223* --as-needed now links in a dynamic library if it satisfies undefined
224 symbols in regular objects, or in other dynamic libraries. In the
225 latter case the library is not linked if it is found in a DT_NEEDED
226 entry of one of the libraries already linked.
227
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228* Add a new command line option, -Ttext-segment ADDR, for ELF targets
229 to set the address of the first byte of the text segment.
230
c3b7224a
NC
231* Add support for Sunplus score architecture.
232
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KT
233* Add new option --use-nul-prefixed-import-tables to ld for PE targets to
234 allow fallback to old import table generation with null element prefix.
235
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DK
236* Windows PE systems now support a new --exclude-modules-for-implib option,
237 allowing users to partition object files and archive members between a DLL
238 and its associated import library as they are generated during linking.
239
84e94c90
NC
240* Add support for Lattice Mico32 (lm32) architecture.
241
62655c7b 242* Add CR16 ELF --embedded-relocs (used to embedded relocations into binaries
7251ccbf
SR
243 for Embedded-PIC code) option.
244
6cb442d3
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245* Add to the PE/PE+ targets the support of two different kinds of
246 pseudo-relocations. They can be selected by the switches
247 --enable-runtime-pseudo-reloc-v1 and --enable-runtime-pseudo-reloc-v2.
248 For the switch --enable-runtime-pseudo-reloc it uses for 32-bit
249 runtime pseudo relocation version one, for 64-bit the version two.
250
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TG
251Changes in 2.19:
252
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AM
253* Linker scripts support a new INSERT command that makes it easier to
254 augment the default script.
255
967928e9 256* Linker script input section filespecs may now specify a file within an
66c103b7 257 archive by writing "archive:file".
967928e9 258
de7dd2bd
NC
259* The --sort-common switch now has an optional argument which specifies the
260 direction of sorting.
261
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262* The M68K linker now supports multiple GOT generation schemes controlled via
263 the --got=<type> command line option.
264
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AM
265* The ARM EABI linker will now generate stubs for function calls to symbols
266 that are too far away. The placement of the stubs is controlled by a new
267 linker command line option: --stub-group-size=N.
726150b7 268
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NC
269Changes in 2.18:
270
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NC
271* Linker sources now released under version 3 of the GNU General Public
272 License.
273
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RM
274* ELF: New --build-id option to generate a unique per-binary identifier
275 embedded in a note section.
276
3d3d428f 277* Added support for National Semicondutor CompactRISC (ie CR16) target.
a19bcec6 278
bcb674cf
RS
279* -l:foo now searches the library path for a filename called foo,
280 without converting it to libfoo.a or libfoo.so.
281
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L
282* Add a new command line option '--default-script=FILE' or '-dT FILE'
283 which specifies a replacement for the built in, default linker
284 script.
285
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L
286* ELF: Add -Bsymbolic-functions, --dynamic-list-cpp-new, which puts C++
287 operator new and delete on the dynamic list, and --dynamic-list-data,
288 builtin list for --dynamic-list, which puts global data symbols on the
289 dynamic list.
290
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291* Add support for x86_64 PE+ target.
292
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293* Add support for Score target.
294
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L
295* ELF: Add --dynamic-list option to specify a list of global symbols
296 whose references shouldn't be bound to the definition within the
297 shared library, or a list of symbols which should be added to the
298 symbol table in the executable.
299
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AM
300* The default output section LMA has changed for allocatable sections from
301 being equal to VMA, to keeping the difference between LMA and VMA the same as
302 the previous output section in the same region. This is a more useful
303 default when using overlays and other cases where you specify an LMA
304 differing from the VMA for some sections.
305
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306* New switch: --print-gc-sections to list any sections removed by garabge
307 collection.
308
c6dd86c6 309* ARM: Added --vfp11-denorm-fix option to work around an erratum in current
f96b4a7b 310 VFP11 coprocessors.
c6dd86c6 311
c17d87de 312Changes in 2.17:
cf88bb9f 313
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314* Support for the Infineon XC16X has been added by KPIT Cummins Infosystems.
315
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AM
316* Modify the Linux linker search order to better match ld.so search order.
317 Look for DT_NEEDED libraries in paths specified by ld.so.conf before
318 searching the default directories, rather than vice versa.
319 Use $prefix/etc/ld.so.conf if it exists, otherwise /etc/ld.so.conf.
c1446dba 320
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321* PE-COFF: Forward exports from DLL's can now be specified in .def files
322 passed directly to ld.
323
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NC
324* Support for the Z80 processor family has been added.
325
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MM
326* Add support for the "@<file>" syntax to the command line, so that extra
327 switches can be read from <file>.
328
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NC
329Changes in 2.16:
330
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JB
331* Support for the R_ARM_V4BX relocation as defined in the ARM AAELF
332 specification has been added via the --fix-v4bx command-line option.
333
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JJ
334* New linker script construct AS_NEEDED(), which sets the --as-needed flag
335 for input files listed inside of it.
336
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337* A new command-line option, --sysroot, can be used to override the
338 default sysroot location. It only applies to toolchains that were
339 configured using --with-sysroot.
340
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341* New linker script functions: ORIGIN() and LENGTH() which return information
342 about a specified memory region.
343
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344* Port to MAXQ processor contributed by HCL Tech.
345
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346* Added SEGMENT_START to the linker script language to permit the user to
347 override the base address for a segment from the command-line.
348
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349* ELF: --warn-shared-textrel option to warn if adding a DT_TEXTREL to a shared
350 object.
351
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L
352* Added SORT_BY_NAME and SORT_BY_ALIGNMENT to the linker script
353 language to permit sorting sections by section name or section
354 maximum alignment.
355
356* Added a new linker command line switch, --sort-section name|alignment,
357 to sort sections by section name or maximum alignment.
358
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NC
359* ELF: --add-needed/--no-add-needed options to control if a DT_NEEDED tag
360 should be added when a shared library comes from DT_NEEDED tags.
14b3c463 361
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NC
362* Support for the crx-elf target added.
363
1a320fbb 364* Support for the sh-symbianelf target added.
1fe1f39c 365
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NC
366* A new linker command line switch has been added which allows the hash table
367 size to be set to a suitable prime value near to its argument. This switch
368 is --hash-size=<NUMBER>. Also if the switch --reduce-memory-overheads is
369 used, and --hash-size has not been used, then the default value will be set
370 to 1021.
371
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JR
372* Linker map files are now generated with an O(N) algorithm for finding symbols
373 that are defined in each section. This uses about 40% more memory for
374 symbols than the old O(N^2) algorithm. You can use the new
375 --reduce-memory-overheads option to select the old algorithm; this option
376 might also be used in the future to select similar tradeoffs.
377
2d643429 378Changes in 2.15:
14b3c463 379
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NC
380* ELF: --as-needed/--no-as-needed options to control if a DT_NEEDED tag should
381 be added only when a shared library is referenced.
c0065db7 382
8fdd7217 383* PE: --large-address-aware option to indicate executables support virtual
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BF
384 addresses greater than 2 gigabytes.
385
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BF
386* DWARF 2 support for i386pe added.
387
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388* The linker script operator DEFINED() will now yield 1 only for a symbol that
389 is defined before the statement where DEFINED is used.
390
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CD
391* The MIPS --embedded-relocs (used to embed relocations into binaries for
392 Embedded-PIC code) is deprecated and will be removed in a future release.
393
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NC
394* cr16c support added by NSC.
395
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NC
396* m32r Linux (ELF) support added by Renesas.
397
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NC
398* Improved linker's handling of unresolved symbols. The switch
399 --unresolved-symbols=<method> has been added to tell the linker when it
400 should report them and the switch --warn-unresolved-symbols has been added to
401 make reports be issued as warning messages rather than errors.
402
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CD
403Changes in 2.14:
404
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NC
405* Added support for Xtensa architecture.
406
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DJ
407* Added --with-sysroot configure switch to specify a target system root, for
408 linking against a target filesystem image.
409
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NC
410* Added --accept-unknown-linker-format to restore old linker behaviour (pre
411 2.14) of silently accepting and linking in any files in an unknown binary
412 file format.
413
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NC
414* Added --no-omagic to undo the effects of the -N option.
415
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NC
416* Support for Texas Instruments TMS320C4x and TMS320C3x series of
417 DSP's contributed by Michael Hayes and Svein E. Seldal.
c0065db7 418
8e523c23
NC
419* Added --with-lib-path configure switch to specify default value for
420 LIB_PATH.
421
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NC
422* ARM port to QNX operating system added by Graeme Peterson.
423
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NC
424* IP2K support added by Denis Chertykov.
425
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NC
426Changes in 2.13:
427
428* Support for the Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat. Models for FR400
429 and FR500 included.
7d553a40 430
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JT
431Changes in version 2.13:
432
433* DEC VAX ELF support, by Matt Thomas.
434
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NC
435Changes in version 2.12:
436
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HPN
437* Support for Don Knuth's MMIX, by Hans-Peter Nilsson.
438
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NC
439* Support for the OpenRISC 32-bit embedded processor by OpenCores.
440
8bd621d8
AM
441* Support for -z nocopyreloc in the x86 ELF linker, which disables
442 production of copy relocs. Warning: using this option may result in
443 non-sharable applications.
5b343f5a 444
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JJ
445* Support for -z combreloc in the ELF linker, which puts dynamic
446 relocations against the same symbol together, so that dynamic linker
447 can use an one-entry symbol lookup cache.
448
449* Support for ELF SHF_MERGE section merging, by Jakub Jelinek.
450
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NC
451Changes in version 2.11:
452
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JH
453* Support for AMD x86-64 architecture, by Jan Hubicka, SuSE Labs.
454
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NC
455* Support added for eliminating duplicate DWARF2 debug information by
456 having the compiler generate the information in sections called
457 .gnu.linkonce.wi.XXXX where XXXX is a checksum for the contents. The
458 linker then merges these sections together into the normal .debug_info
459 section.
252b5132 460
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461* The native ELF linker now searches the directories in DT_RUNPATH or
462 DT_RPATH of a shared library for shared libraries needed by it.
463
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464* TI C54x support, by Timothy Wall.
465
176355da 466* Added command line switch --section-start to set the start address of any
c0065db7 467 specified section.
176355da 468
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NC
469* Added ability to emit full relocation information in linked executables,
470 enabled by --emit-relocs. Some post-linkage optimization tools need
471 this information in order to be able to correctly identify and perform
472 symbol relative addressing in the event of changes in section contents
473 (instructions being added or deleted, extending data sections, etc.)
474
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475* Support for i860, by Jason Eckhardt (preliminary, alpha quality).
476
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HPN
477* Support for CRIS (Axis Communications ETRAX series).
478
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NC
479* Support for PDP-11 and 2.11BSD a.out format, by Lars Brinkhoff.
480
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AM
481Changes in version 2.10:
482
c0065db7 483* Added AT> to the linker script language to allow load-time allocation of
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TW
484 sections into regions.
485
c0065db7 486* Added garbage collection of unused sections, enabled by --gc-sections.
252b5132 487 It does require a bit of backend support; currently implemented are
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AM
488 arm-elf, avr-elf, d10v-elf, fr30-elf, i386-elf, m32r-elf, m68k-elf,
489 mcore-elf, mips-elf, mn10300-elf, ppc-elf, sh-elf, sparc-elf, and v850-elf.
987fd5b4 490 Others will ignore the option.
252b5132
RH
491
492* Added SORT to the linker script language to permit sorting sections by file
493 name or section name.
494
495* Added EXTERN to the linker script language as an equivalent to the -u
496 command-line option.
497
498* Added ASSERT to the linker script language.
499
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500* Added EXCLUDE_FILE to the linker script language for further control over
501 wildcard file names.
502
252b5132 503* Added -O option to optimize linker output (as of this writing, this only
500800ca 504 affects ELF shared library generation).
252b5132
RH
505
506* The -e option now accepts a number as well as a symbol name.
507
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ILT
508* Added --no-undefined option to disallow undefined symbols when creating a
509 shared library.
510
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ILT
511* The linker now issues a warning, not an error, for an undefined symbol when
512 using -Bsymbolic; use the new --no-undefined option to get the old
513 behaviour.
514
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RH
515* Added --demangle and --no-demangle options.
516
517Changes in version 2.9:
518
519* Added SQUAD to the linker script language.
520
521* New option --no-warn-mismatch.
522
523* The MEMORY command now parses the attributes to determine where sections that
524 are not placed in a specific memory region are placed.
525
526Changes in version 2.8:
527
528* Linker scripts may now contain shell wildcard characters for file and section
529 names.
530
531* The linker now supports symbol versions in ELF.
532
533* The NOCROSSREFS command was added to the linker script language.
534
535* The LOADADDR expression was added to the linker script language.
536
537* MAX and MIN functions were added to the linker script language.
538
539* The OVERLAY construct was added to the linker script language.
540
541* New option --warn-section-align to warn when the address of an output section
542 changes due to alignment of an input section.
543
544* New options --filter/-F and --auxiliary/-f.
545
546Changes in version 2.7:
547
548* New option --cref to print out a cross reference table.
549
550* New option --wrap SYMBOL.
551
552* New option --no-whole-archive, to turn off the effect of --whole-archive.
553
554* Input sections assigned to the output section /DISCARD/ in the linker script
555 are not included in the output file.
556
557* The SunOS and ELF linkers now merge stabs debugging information which uses
558 the N_BINCL and N_EINCL stab types. This reduces the amount of debugging
559 information generated.
560
561Changes in version 2.6:
562
563* When an ELF section name is representable as a C identifier (this is not true
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564of most ELF section names), the linker will automatically define symbols
565__start_SECNAME and __stop_SECNAME, where SECNAME is the section name, at the
566beginning and the end of the section. This is used by glibc.
567
568 Addendum: Current versions of the linker (at least for version 2.18 onwards
569and possibly much earlier as well) place two restrictions on this feature: The
570symbols are only implemented for orphaned sections, not for explicitly placed
571sections and they are PROVIDEd rather than being defined.
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572
573* When an ELF section named .gnu.warning is encountered in an input file, the
574contents of the section are displayed as an error message, and the section is
575not copied into the output file. This is used by glibc.
576
577* When an ELF section named .gnu.warning.SYMBOL is encountered in an input
578file, and the symbol SYMBOL is referenced by some object file, the contents of
579the section are displayed as an error message. The section is not copied into
1049f94e 580the output file, unless doing a relocatable or shared link. This is used by
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581glibc.
582
583* New options -split-by-reloc and -split-by-file.
584
585* The linker now supports linking PIC compiled code on SPARC SunOS. It can
586also create SPARC SunOS shared libraries, and, like the native SunOS linker,
587will do so whenever there is an undefined symbol in the link and neither the -e
588nor the -r option was used.
589
590* The -rpath option may be used on SunOS to set the list of directories to be
591searched at run time. This overrides the default of building the list from the
592-L options.
593
594* The COFF linker now combines debugging information for structs, unions, and
595enums, so that even if the same type is defined in multiple input files it will
596only be defined once in the output file. The --traditional-format switch will
597prevent this optimization.
598
599Changes in version 2.5:
600
601* The linker now supports linking against SunOS shared libraries. It still can
602not link SunOS PIC (Position Independent Code) files, so it can not be used to
07f3b6ad 603generate shared libraries.
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604
605* The linker now supports linking against ELF shared libraries for the i386
606(UnixWare) and SPARC (Solaris). It can also link ELF PIC files, and can be
607used to generate shared libraries. Shared library generation is not well
608tested; please report any problems encountered. The linker is now enabled for
609Solaris again.
610
611* Eric Youngdale has contributed Linux support code, including linking against
612Linux a.out shared libraries. The linker produces Linux QMAGIC binaries.
613
614* The ELF backend has been converted to the new linker code. To use the new
615ELF linker, each particular target requires a relocation function. So far,
616this function has been written for i386 (UnixWare), SPARC (Solaris) MIPS (Irix
6175), and HPPA ELF targets.
618
619* The -( (--start-group) and -) (--end-group) options have been added to
620support searching a group of archives as though they were a single archive.
621This can also be used in a linker script, as GROUP ( files ).
622
623* When a file is named on the command line, and the linker does not recognize
624it as an object file, the linker will now treat the file as a linker script
625file. A linker script named in this way augments, but does not replace, the
626default linker script.
627
628* The -warn-once option was added. It causes the linker to only warn once per
629undefined symbol, rather than once per reference.
630
631* The COFF backend has been converted to the new linker code. As with ELF, to
632use the new linker, each particular target requires a relocation function. So
633far, this function has been written for the i386, m68k, a29k and SH targets.
634
635* The -V flag was made a synonym for -v, for SVR4 compatibility. The old -V
636behaviour is available via --verbose.
637
638Changes in version 2.4:
639
640* New linker code, by Steve Chamberlain and Ian Taylor. For a.out and ecoff
641 formats (so far), this should result in considerable savings in time
642 and memory used while linking; slightly poorer performance than
643 before for formats not converted yet.
644
645* Command-line parsing is no longer done with flex. This means
646 oddball characters in filenames won't get treated as argument
647 separators.
648
649* HP-PA ELF support, by Jeff Law. (No SOM support yet.)
650
651* Mach i386 support, by David Mackenzie.
652
653* Irix 4 shared libraries are now supported (Irix 5 uses ELF, and ELF shared
654 libraries are not yet supported).
655
656* COFF shared libraries (as on SCO) should work as well.
657
658* The linker is disabled for Solaris. (Actually, it was in 2.3 also, I just
659 forgot to note it.) Some of their C library routines don't work when
660 statically linked, and the GNU linker doesn't support dynamic linking yet.
661
662Changes in version 2.3:
663
664* Weak symbols are now supported.
665
666* ELF support has been added. The linker has been bootstrapped on
667 UnixWare and Solaris.
668
669* Alpha OSF/1 support has been added (non dynamic linking only).
670
671Changes in version 2.2:
672
673* The `bfd' library has been updated to reduce a.out-format string
674 table size. The effect of this is that files linked from many input
675 files with duplicate symbols (`-g' debugging records, or identical
676 static symbols) should be much smaller.
677
678Changes in version 2.1:
679
680* The ld -ySYMBOL flag (to trace references to SYMBOL) is now implemented.
681
682* There is now support for writing ECOFF files, so ld and the
683 other utilities should work on Risc/Ultrix and Irix.
684
685\f
2571583a 686Copyright (C) 2012-2017 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
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687
688Copying and distribution of this file, with or without modification,
689are permitted in any medium without royalty provided the copyright
690notice and this notice are preserved.
691
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692Local variables:
693fill-column: 79
694End: