1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB 6.8
6 * GDB now has an interface for JIT compilation. Applications that
7 dynamically generate code can create symbol files in memory and register
8 them with GDB. For users, the feature should work transparently, and
9 for JIT developers, the interface is documented in the GDB manual in the
10 "JIT Compilation Interface" chapter.
12 * Tracepoints may now be conditional. The syntax is as for
13 breakpoints; either an "if" clause appended to the "trace" command,
14 or the "condition" command is available. GDB sends the condition to
15 the target for evaluation using the same bytecode format as is used
16 for tracepoint actions.
18 * "disassemble" command with a /r modifier, print the raw instructions
19 in hex as well as in symbolic form."
21 * Process record and replay
23 In a architecture environment that supports ``process record and
24 replay'', ``process record and replay'' target can record a log of
25 the process execution, and replay it with both forward and reverse
28 * Reverse debugging: GDB now has new commands reverse-continue, reverse-
29 step, reverse-next, reverse-finish, reverse-stepi, reverse-nexti, and
30 set execution-direction {forward|reverse}, for targets that support
33 * GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on MIPS/Linux systems. This
34 feature is available with a native GDB running on kernel version
37 * GDB now has support for multi-byte and wide character sets on the
38 target. Strings whose character type is wchar_t, char16_t, or
39 char32_t are now correctly printed. GDB supports wide- and unicode-
40 literals in C, that is, L'x', L"string", u'x', u"string", U'x', and
41 U"string" syntax. And, GDB allows the "%ls" and "%lc" formats in
42 `printf'. This feature requires iconv to work properly; if your
43 system does not have a working iconv, GDB can use GNU libiconv. See
44 the installation instructions for more information.
46 * GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
47 remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
48 with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
49 the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
51 * "info sharedlibrary" now takes an optional regex of libraries to show,
52 and it now reports if a shared library has no debugging information.
54 * Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
55 now complete on file names.
57 * When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
58 completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
59 For instance, consider:
61 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
62 # struct example variable;
65 If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
66 completions will be "f1" and "f2".
68 * Inlined functions are now supported. They show up in backtraces, and
69 the "step", "next", and "finish" commands handle them automatically.
71 * GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
72 operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
75 * GDB now supports inspecting extra signal information, exported by
76 the new $_siginfo convenience variable. The feature is currently
77 implemented on linux ARM, i386 and amd64.
79 * GDB can now display the VFP floating point registers and NEON vector
80 registers on ARM targets. Both ARM GNU/Linux native GDB and gdbserver
81 can provide these registers (requires Linux 2.6.30 or later). Remote
82 and simulator targets may also provide them.
87 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
90 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
91 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
92 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
95 Kill the process with the specified process ID. Use this in preference
96 to `k' when multiprocess protocol extensions are supported.
99 Obtains additional operating system information
103 Read or write additional signal information.
105 * Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
107 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
108 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
109 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
111 * The "disassemble" command now supports an optional /m modifier to print mixed
114 * GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
115 DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
117 * The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
118 and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
119 `set/show sh calling-convention'.
121 * GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
122 with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
124 * 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
126 * Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
128 * Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
129 which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
131 * The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
132 list of section offsets.
134 * On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
135 conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
136 have also been fixed.
138 * GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
139 From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
140 are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
142 * GDB now parses C++ symbol and type names more flexibly. For
145 template<typename T> class C { };
148 GDB will now correctly handle all of:
150 ptype C<char const *>
152 ptype C<const char *>
155 * New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
157 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
158 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
160 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
161 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
162 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
164 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
165 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
167 - Support for the sparc64-linux-gnu target is now included in
170 - The amd64-linux build of gdbserver now supports debugging both
171 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
173 - The i386-linux, amd64-linux, and i386-win32 builds of gdbserver
174 now support hardware watchpoints, and will use them automatically
179 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
180 available is determined at configure time.
182 New GDB commands can now be written in Python.
184 * Ada tasking support
186 Ada tasks can now be inspected in GDB. The following commands have
190 Print the list of Ada tasks.
192 Print detailed information about task number N.
194 Print the task number of the current task.
196 Switch the context of debugging to task number N.
198 * Support for user-defined prefixed commands. The "define" command can
199 add new commands to existing prefixes, e.g. "target".
201 * Multi-inferior, multi-process debugging.
203 GDB now has generalized support for multi-inferior debugging. See
204 "Debugging Multiple Inferiors" in the manual for more information.
205 Although availability still depends on target support, the command
206 set is more uniform now. The GNU/Linux specific multi-forks support
207 has been migrated to this new framework. This implied some user
208 visible changes; see "New commands" and also "Removed commands"
211 * Target descriptions can now describe the target OS ABI. See the
212 "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for more
215 * Target descriptions can now describe "compatible" architectures
216 to indicate that the target can execute applications for a different
217 architecture in addition to those for the main target architecture.
218 See the "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for
221 * Multi-architecture debugging.
223 GDB now includes general supports for debugging applications on
224 hybrid systems that use more than one single processor architecture
225 at the same time. Each such hybrid architecture still requires
226 specific support to be added. The only hybrid architecture supported
227 in this version of GDB is the Cell Broadband Engine.
229 * GDB now supports integrated debugging of Cell/B.E. applications that
230 use both the PPU and SPU architectures. To enable support for hybrid
231 Cell/B.E. debugging, you need to configure GDB to support both the
232 powerpc-linux or powerpc64-linux and the spu-elf targets, using the
233 --enable-targets configure option.
235 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
237 find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
239 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
241 maint set python print-stack
242 maint show python print-stack
243 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
246 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
251 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
255 Show operating system information about processes.
258 List the inferiors currently under GDB's control.
261 Switch focus to inferior number NUM.
264 Detach from inferior number NUM.
267 Kill inferior number NUM.
272 show spu stop-on-load
273 Control whether to stop for new SPE threads during Cell/B.E. debugging.
275 set spu auto-flush-cache
276 show spu auto-flush-cache
277 Control whether to automatically flush the software-managed cache
278 during Cell/B.E. debugging.
280 set sh calling-convention
281 show sh calling-convention
282 Control the calling convention used when calling SH target functions.
286 Control display of timestamps with GDB debugging output.
288 set disassemble-next-line
289 show disassemble-next-line
290 Control display of disassembled source lines or instructions when
293 set remote noack-packet
294 show remote noack-packet
295 Set/show the use of remote protocol QStartNoAckMode packet. See above
296 under "New remote packets."
298 set remote query-attached-packet
299 show remote query-attached-packet
300 Control use of remote protocol `qAttached' (query-attached) packet.
302 set remote read-siginfo-object
303 show remote read-siginfo-object
304 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:read' (read-siginfo-object)
307 set remote write-siginfo-object
308 show remote write-siginfo-object
309 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:write' (write-siginfo-object)
312 set displaced-stepping
313 show displaced-stepping
314 Control displaced stepping mode. Displaced stepping is a way to
315 single-step over breakpoints without removing them from the debuggee.
316 Also known as "out-of-line single-stepping".
320 Control display of debugging info for displaced stepping.
322 maint set internal-error
323 maint show internal-error
324 Control what GDB does when an internal error is detected.
326 maint set internal-warning
327 maint show internal-warning
328 Control what GDB does when an internal warning is detected.
333 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
335 set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
336 show multiple-symbols
337 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
338 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
339 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
341 set breakpoint always-inserted
342 show breakpoint always-inserted
343 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
344 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
345 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
347 set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
348 show arm fallback-mode
349 set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
351 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
352 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
353 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
354 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
356 set disable-randomization
357 show disable-randomization
358 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
359 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
360 multiple debugging sessions.
364 Control whether other threads are stopped or not when some thread hits
369 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
370 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
371 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
372 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
374 set target-wide-charset
375 show target-wide-charset
376 The target-wide-charset is the name of the character set that GDB
377 uses when printing characters whose type is wchar_t.
379 set tcp auto-retry (on|off)
381 set tcp connect-timeout
382 show tcp connect-timeout
383 These commands allow GDB to retry failed TCP connections to a remote stub
384 with a specified timeout period; this is useful if the stub is launched
385 in parallel with GDB but may not be ready to accept connections immediately.
387 set libthread-db-search-path
388 show libthread-db-search-path
389 Control list of directories which GDB will search for appropriate
392 set schedule-multiple (on|off)
393 show schedule-multiple
394 Allow GDB to resume all threads of all processes or only threads of
400 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `info
401 inferiors' command. To list checkpoints, you can still use the
402 `info checkpoints' command, which was an alias for the `info forks'
406 Replaced by the new `inferior' command. To switch between
407 checkpoints, you can still use the `restart' command, which was an
408 alias for the `fork' command.
411 This is removed, since some targets don't have a notion of
412 processes. To switch between processes, you can still use the
413 `inferior' command using GDB's own inferior number.
416 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `kill
417 inferior' command. To delete a checkpoint, you can still use the
418 `delete checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `delete
422 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `detach
423 inferior' command. To detach a checkpoint, you can still use the
424 `detach checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `detach
427 * New native configurations
429 x86/x86_64 Darwin i[34567]86-*-darwin*
431 x86_64 MinGW x86_64-*-mingw*
435 Lattice Mico32 lm32-*
436 x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
437 x86_64 DICOS x86_64-*-dicos*
440 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports x86 Windows CE
441 (mingw32ce) debugging.
447 These commands were actually not implemented on any target.
449 *** Changes in GDB 6.8
451 * New native configurations
453 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
454 Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
458 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
459 Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
461 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
463 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
464 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
465 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
466 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
468 * GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
469 (mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
471 * Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
474 * GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
475 including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
476 and in inlined functions.
478 * GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
479 accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
480 more than one contiguous range of addresses.
482 * Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
484 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
485 registers on PowerPC targets.
487 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
488 targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
490 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
491 commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
493 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
494 extended-remote mode.
496 * hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
497 The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
498 error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
499 The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
501 * GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
502 building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
503 target architectures.
505 * GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
506 Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
507 now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
508 stored in two consecutive float registers.
510 * The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
513 * Improved support for debugging Ada
514 Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
516 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
517 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
518 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
519 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
521 - Improved command completion in Ada
524 * GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
529 set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
530 show print frame-arguments
531 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
532 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
537 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
544 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
553 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
556 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
560 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
562 *** Changes in GDB 6.7
564 * Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
565 bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
566 Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
568 * When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
569 symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
570 -Bsymbolic linker option.
572 * When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
573 recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
576 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
577 frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
579 * GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
580 32-bit or 64-bit register values.
582 * Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
584 * GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
585 target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
586 a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
588 * Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
589 automatically displayed as character or string data.
591 * The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
592 arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
595 * Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
596 for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
597 only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
599 * GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
602 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
603 ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
604 has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
606 * GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
608 * GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
610 * The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
611 layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
612 segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
614 * The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
615 immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
617 * The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
618 "library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
619 packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
620 where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
621 Windows and SymbianOS).
623 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
624 (DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
626 * GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
627 according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
633 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
634 when debugging using remote targets.
636 set mem inaccessible-by-default
637 show mem inaccessible-by-default
638 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
639 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
640 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
641 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
642 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
644 set breakpoint auto-hw
645 show breakpoint auto-hw
646 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
647 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
648 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
649 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
650 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
651 including "next" and "finish".
654 catch exception unhandled
655 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
658 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
662 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
663 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
664 an alias to "set sysroot".
667 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
668 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
671 * New native configurations
673 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
678 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
679 not query the target for its built-in description.
683 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
684 MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
685 Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
690 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
691 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
694 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
699 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
700 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
702 qXfer:libraries:read:
703 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
704 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
705 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
706 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
710 Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
719 i[34567]86-*-netware*
720 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
721 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
723 i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
726 i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
727 i[34567]86-*-unixware*
736 * Other removed features
743 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
750 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
755 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
756 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
761 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
762 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
764 Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
766 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
767 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
768 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
769 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
773 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
774 in debugging information.
778 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
779 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
781 set mips stack-arg-size
782 set mips saved-gpreg-size
784 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
786 *** Changes in GDB 6.6
791 Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
793 * GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
794 (mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
795 running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
797 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
798 Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
801 * The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
802 broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
804 * The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
805 stub provides the required support.
807 * Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
808 longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
813 unset substitute-path
815 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
816 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
817 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
818 between compilation and debugging.
822 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
823 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
824 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
828 The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
830 Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
831 an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
833 The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
838 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
839 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
840 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
841 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
845 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
846 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
848 qXfer:memory-map:read:
849 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
850 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
855 Erase and program a flash memory device.
857 * Removed remote packets
860 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
861 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
863 *** Changes in GDB 6.5
867 Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
869 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
873 init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
874 only if it doesn't already have a value.
876 The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
878 checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
880 restart <n> Return the program state to a
881 previously saved state.
883 info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
885 delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
887 set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
888 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
890 info forks List forks of the user program that
891 are available to be debugged.
893 fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
894 forks of the user program that are
895 available to be debugged.
897 delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
898 that are available to be debugged (and
899 kill the forked process).
901 detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
902 that are available to be debugged (and
903 allow the process to continue).
907 Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
909 * Improved Windows host support
911 GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
912 native console support, and remote communications using either
913 network sockets or serial ports.
915 * Improved Modula-2 language support
917 GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
918 basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
919 pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
920 printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
921 written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
922 GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
926 The ARM rdi-share module.
928 The Netware NLM debug server.
930 *** Changes in GDB 6.4
932 * New native configurations
934 OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
935 OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
939 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
941 * New command line options
943 --batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
944 --return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
945 the child (debugged) program exited with.
946 --eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
947 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
948 specified multiple times and in conjunction
949 with the --command (-x) option.
951 * Deprecated commands removed
953 The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
957 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
958 othernames set arm disassembler
959 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
960 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
961 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
964 * New BSD user-level threads support
966 It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
967 library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
970 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
971 FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
972 OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
974 Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
975 are not yet supported.
977 * New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
978 (Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
980 * REMOVED configurations and files
982 VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
983 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
984 National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
986 * New "set print array-indexes" command
988 After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
989 when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
992 * VAX floating point support
994 GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
996 * User-defined command support
998 In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
999 to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
1000 section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
1002 *** Changes in GDB 6.3:
1004 * New command line option
1006 GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
1009 * GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
1011 GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
1012 information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
1013 by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
1014 proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
1015 to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
1017 * Internationalization
1019 When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
1020 internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
1021 continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
1025 Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
1026 implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
1027 into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
1029 * New native configurations
1031 GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
1035 GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
1036 packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
1038 * END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
1040 GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
1041 The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
1042 features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
1045 GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
1046 compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
1047 continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
1057 powerpc bdm protocol
1059 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
1060 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
1062 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1064 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1065 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1066 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1067 permanently REMOVED.
1076 *** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
1078 * MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
1080 When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
1081 heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
1084 * MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
1086 When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
1087 fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
1088 IRIX long double values).
1092 A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
1093 command. This problem has been fixed.
1095 *** Changes in GDB 6.2:
1097 * Fix for ``many threads''
1099 On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
1100 rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
1103 ptrace: No such process.
1104 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
1106 This problem has been fixed.
1108 * "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
1110 Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
1113 * New ``start'' command.
1115 This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
1117 * New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
1119 Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
1120 live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
1121 platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
1123 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1124 FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
1125 NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
1126 NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
1127 NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
1128 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
1129 OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
1130 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
1131 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
1133 * Signal trampoline code overhauled
1135 Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
1136 These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
1137 of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
1138 call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
1139 signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
1141 Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
1142 features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
1143 include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
1145 * Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
1147 * New native configurations
1149 GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
1150 OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
1151 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
1152 OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
1153 OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
1154 NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
1155 OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
1157 * END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
1159 GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
1160 The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
1161 including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
1162 migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
1163 compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
1164 work, was also included.
1166 GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
1167 module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
1177 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
1178 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
1180 * REMOVED configurations and files
1182 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
1183 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
1184 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
1185 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
1186 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
1187 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
1188 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
1189 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
1190 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
1191 sonymips mips-sony-*
1192 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
1194 *** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
1196 * TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
1198 The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
1199 GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
1200 command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
1201 program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
1204 * Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
1206 Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
1207 libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
1208 cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
1209 GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
1210 shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
1211 the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
1214 Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
1216 * Fixed ISO-C build problems
1218 The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
1219 non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
1220 compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
1222 * Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
1224 Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
1225 wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
1227 * Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
1229 The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
1230 permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
1231 systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
1233 * Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
1235 Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
1236 has been updated to use constant array sizes.
1238 * Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
1240 GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
1241 its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
1242 panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
1244 * Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
1246 When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
1247 by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
1248 not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
1250 *** Changes in GDB 6.1:
1252 * Removed --with-mmalloc
1254 Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
1255 conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
1257 * Changes in AMD64 configurations
1259 The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
1260 the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
1261 and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
1262 you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
1264 * Revised SPARC target
1266 The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
1267 FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
1268 support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
1269 from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
1270 (Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
1274 GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
1275 names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
1276 with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
1279 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
1281 GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
1282 arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
1285 * C++ nested types and namespaces
1287 GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
1288 improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
1289 is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
1290 Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
1291 namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
1292 "Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
1293 frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
1294 if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
1295 GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
1297 * New native configurations
1299 NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
1300 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
1301 OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
1302 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
1303 OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
1305 * New debugging protocols
1307 M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
1309 * "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
1311 The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
1312 and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
1313 tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
1315 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1317 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1318 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1319 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1320 permanently REMOVED.
1322 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
1323 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
1324 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
1325 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
1326 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
1327 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
1328 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
1329 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
1330 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
1331 sonymips mips-sony-*
1332 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
1334 * REMOVED configurations and files
1336 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
1337 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
1338 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1339 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1340 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1341 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
1342 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1343 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
1344 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
1345 386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
1346 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
1347 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
1348 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
1349 SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
1350 SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
1351 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1352 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
1354 *** Changes in GDB 6.0:
1358 Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
1359 integrated into GDB.
1361 * New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
1363 DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
1364 information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
1365 By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
1368 The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
1369 have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
1370 DWARF 2 CFI support.
1374 GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
1375 file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
1376 remote protocol documentation for details.
1378 * All targets using the new architecture framework.
1380 All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
1381 architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
1382 to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
1385 * GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
1387 GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
1388 per-thread variables.
1390 * GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
1392 GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
1393 GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
1395 * Separate debug info.
1397 GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
1398 automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
1399 of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
1400 system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
1401 and optional debug files.
1403 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
1405 DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
1406 describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
1409 GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
1410 for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
1414 A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
1415 Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
1416 considered "useable".
1418 * GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
1420 The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
1421 commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
1424 * GDB supports logging output to a file
1426 There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
1427 used to capture GDB's output to a file.
1429 * The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
1431 The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
1432 disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
1435 * d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
1437 The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
1438 registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
1442 A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
1443 be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
1444 session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
1445 "--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
1446 data, for more informative profiling results.
1448 * Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
1450 The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
1451 option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
1452 "mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
1454 Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
1457 Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
1458 Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
1459 Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
1460 in a subsequent -var-update.
1462 * New native configurations.
1464 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1466 * Multi-arched targets.
1468 HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
1469 Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
1471 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1473 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1474 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1475 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1476 permanently REMOVED.
1478 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
1479 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
1480 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
1481 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
1482 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
1483 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
1484 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
1485 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
1486 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
1487 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
1488 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
1489 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
1491 * REMOVED configurations and files
1494 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1495 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
1496 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1497 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1498 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
1499 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1501 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
1502 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1503 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1504 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1505 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1506 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1508 * MIPS $fp behavior changed
1510 The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
1511 the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
1512 context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
1513 address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
1514 The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
1516 *** Changes in GDB 5.3:
1518 * GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
1520 When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
1521 `/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
1522 in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
1523 library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
1524 shared libs like mad''.
1526 * ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
1528 Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
1529 the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
1530 arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
1531 powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
1533 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
1535 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
1536 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
1539 The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
1540 invocations in expression, and shows the result.
1542 The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
1543 macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
1545 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
1546 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
1547 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
1548 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
1550 * Multi-arched targets.
1552 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
1553 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
1555 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
1556 Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
1557 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
1561 Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
1564 * New native configurations
1566 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
1567 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
1568 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
1569 UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
1571 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1573 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1574 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1575 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1576 permanently REMOVED.
1578 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
1579 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
1580 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
1581 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
1582 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
1583 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
1584 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
1585 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
1586 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
1587 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
1589 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
1590 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
1592 * OBSOLETE languages
1594 CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
1596 * REMOVED configurations and files
1598 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1599 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1600 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1601 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1602 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1604 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
1606 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
1608 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
1609 commands. The default is 1024.
1611 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
1613 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
1615 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
1617 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
1618 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
1619 from a file into memory (restore).
1621 * Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
1623 The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
1624 including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
1625 of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
1627 *** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
1635 gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
1636 mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
1637 Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
1639 gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
1640 dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
1641 Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
1643 Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
1644 Surprisingly enough, it works now.
1645 By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
1647 i386 hardware watchpoint support:
1648 avoid misses on second run for some targets.
1649 By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
1651 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
1653 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
1655 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
1656 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
1657 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
1658 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
1659 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
1660 (notably embedded) targets.
1662 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
1664 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
1665 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
1666 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
1667 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
1669 * New command line option
1671 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
1673 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
1675 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
1676 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
1677 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
1678 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
1679 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
1680 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
1681 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
1682 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
1683 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
1684 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
1686 * Changes in ARM configurations.
1688 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
1689 configuration is fully multi-arch.
1691 * New native configurations
1693 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
1694 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
1695 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
1696 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
1700 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
1702 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1704 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1705 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1706 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1707 permanently REMOVED.
1709 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
1710 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
1711 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
1712 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
1713 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
1715 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
1717 * REMOVED configurations and files
1719 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1721 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1722 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1723 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
1724 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1725 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1726 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
1727 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
1728 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1729 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1730 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
1731 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
1733 * Changes to command line processing
1735 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
1736 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
1738 * Changes to key bindings
1740 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
1742 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
1744 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
1746 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
1749 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
1751 Numerous documentation fixes.
1753 Numerous testsuite fixes.
1755 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
1757 * New native configurations
1759 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
1760 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
1761 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
1762 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
1763 ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
1764 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
1768 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
1770 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
1772 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1774 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
1775 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
1776 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
1777 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
1778 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
1780 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
1781 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
1782 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
1783 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
1784 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
1785 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
1786 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
1787 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
1789 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
1790 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
1792 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1793 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1794 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1795 permanently REMOVED.
1797 * REMOVED configurations and files
1799 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
1800 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
1802 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
1806 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
1808 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
1809 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
1814 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
1816 * The MI enabled by default.
1818 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
1819 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
1820 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
1821 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
1822 which is now deprecated.
1824 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
1826 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
1827 main features are supported:
1829 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
1831 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
1834 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
1836 - a Pascal expression parser.
1838 However, some important features are not yet supported.
1840 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
1842 - there are some problems with boolean types;
1844 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
1845 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
1847 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
1849 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
1851 * Changes in completion.
1853 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
1854 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
1855 users expect at the shell prompt.
1857 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
1858 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
1859 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
1860 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
1861 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
1862 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
1863 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
1865 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
1867 * New platform-independent commands:
1869 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
1870 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
1871 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
1873 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
1875 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
1876 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
1877 many threads as your system allows you to have.
1879 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
1881 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
1882 multi-threaded programs though.
1884 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
1886 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
1888 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
1889 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
1892 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
1894 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
1895 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
1896 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
1897 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
1898 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
1901 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
1902 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
1903 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
1905 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
1907 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
1908 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
1910 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
1911 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
1914 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
1915 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
1916 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
1917 a given linear address.
1919 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
1920 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
1921 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
1923 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
1925 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
1927 * Changes in documentation.
1929 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
1930 Documentation License.
1932 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1935 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
1937 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
1940 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
1941 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
1942 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
1944 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
1946 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
1947 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
1948 contents of this file.
1952 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
1954 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
1956 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
1958 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
1959 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
1960 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
1961 greater level of detail.
1963 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
1965 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
1966 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
1967 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
1970 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
1972 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
1973 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
1974 machines ``out of the box''.
1976 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
1977 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
1978 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
1979 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
1980 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
1982 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
1983 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
1984 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
1985 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
1986 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
1988 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
1989 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
1992 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
1995 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
1996 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
1997 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
1998 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
2000 * New native configurations
2002 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
2003 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
2007 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
2008 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
2009 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
2010 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2012 * OBSOLETE configurations
2014 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
2015 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
2017 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
2020 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
2021 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
2022 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
2023 be permanently REMOVED.
2025 * Gould support removed
2027 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
2029 * New features for SVR4
2031 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
2032 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
2033 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
2035 * Many C++ enhancements
2037 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
2038 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
2040 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
2042 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
2043 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
2044 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
2045 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
2047 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
2048 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
2050 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
2052 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
2053 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
2054 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
2056 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
2057 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
2059 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
2061 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
2062 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
2063 include ``set remote P-packet''.
2065 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
2067 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
2068 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
2069 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
2071 * ``apropos'' command added.
2073 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
2074 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
2075 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
2079 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
2080 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
2081 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
2082 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
2083 enabled by configuring with:
2085 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
2087 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
2089 * New native configurations
2091 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
2092 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
2093 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
2097 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
2098 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
2099 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
2101 * OBSOLETE configurations
2103 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
2105 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
2106 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
2107 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
2108 be permanently REMOVED.
2112 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
2113 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
2114 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
2115 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
2116 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
2117 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
2118 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
2123 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
2125 * set extension-language
2127 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
2128 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
2129 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
2130 set extension-language .c c++
2131 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
2132 and their associated languages.
2134 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
2136 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
2137 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
2138 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
2142 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
2143 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
2145 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
2146 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
2148 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
2149 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
2150 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
2151 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
2152 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
2153 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
2154 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
2155 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
2157 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
2158 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
2159 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
2160 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
2164 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
2165 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
2166 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
2167 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
2168 for xdb and dbx commands.
2172 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
2173 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
2174 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
2176 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
2177 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
2178 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
2180 * Debugging across forks
2182 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
2187 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
2188 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
2189 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
2191 * GDB remote protocol additions
2193 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
2194 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
2195 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
2196 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
2198 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
2199 full 64-bit address. The command
2201 set remoteaddresssize 32
2203 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
2204 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
2207 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
2208 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
2210 maint packet heythere
2212 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
2213 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
2216 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
2217 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
2218 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
2220 * Tracing can collect general expressions
2222 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
2223 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
2224 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
2226 * mask-address variable for Mips
2228 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
2229 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
2230 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
2232 * Higher serial baud rates
2234 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
2235 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
2236 to achieve all of these rates.)
2240 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
2241 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
2244 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
2246 * New native configurations
2248 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
2249 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
2250 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
2251 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
2252 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2253 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
2254 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
2258 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
2259 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
2260 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
2261 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
2262 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
2263 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
2264 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
2265 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
2266 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
2267 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2268 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
2270 * New debugging protocols
2272 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
2273 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
2274 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
2275 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
2276 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
2277 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
2281 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
2282 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
2287 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
2288 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
2290 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
2292 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
2293 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
2294 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
2296 * Live range splitting
2298 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
2299 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
2300 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
2304 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
2305 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
2309 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
2310 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
2311 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
2316 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
2321 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
2322 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
2323 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
2324 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
2325 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
2326 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
2330 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
2331 the symbol at the specified address.
2335 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
2336 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
2337 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
2338 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
2339 file tracepoint.c for more details.
2343 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
2344 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
2345 of most MIPS variants.
2349 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
2350 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
2351 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
2355 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
2356 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
2357 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
2358 the possible architectures.
2360 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
2362 * New native configurations
2364 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
2365 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
2366 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
2367 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
2368 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2369 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
2373 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
2374 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
2375 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
2376 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
2377 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
2379 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2383 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
2384 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
2385 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
2386 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
2387 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
2391 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
2393 * Windows 95/NT native
2395 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
2396 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
2397 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
2398 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
2399 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
2401 * dont-repeat command
2403 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
2404 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
2405 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
2406 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
2408 * Send break instead of ^C
2410 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
2411 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
2412 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
2414 * Remote protocol timeout
2416 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
2417 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
2418 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
2420 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
2422 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
2423 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
2424 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
2425 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
2426 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
2428 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
2429 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
2430 automatically on hpux10.
2432 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
2434 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
2436 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
2438 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
2439 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
2440 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
2441 every character. The default value is 1050.
2443 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
2445 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
2446 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
2447 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
2448 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
2449 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
2450 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
2452 * Speedups for remote debugging
2454 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
2455 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
2456 and more efficient S-record downloading.
2458 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
2460 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
2461 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
2463 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
2465 * Psymtabs for XCOFF
2467 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
2468 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
2470 * Remote targets use caching
2472 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
2473 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
2474 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
2475 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
2476 off' turns the the data cache off.
2478 * Remote targets may have threads
2480 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
2481 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
2482 gdb/remote.c for details.
2486 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
2487 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
2488 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
2489 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
2490 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
2491 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
2492 sequence is something like
2494 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
2496 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
2500 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
2501 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
2502 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
2503 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
2504 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
2505 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
2506 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
2507 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
2511 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
2512 but does simplify configuration and building.
2516 GDB now supports hpux10.
2518 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
2520 * New native configurations
2522 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
2523 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
2524 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
2525 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
2529 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2530 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
2531 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
2532 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
2535 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
2537 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
2538 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
2539 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
2540 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
2541 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
2543 * Arguments to user-defined commands
2545 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
2546 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
2549 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
2551 To execute the command use:
2554 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
2555 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
2556 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
2558 * New `if' and `while' commands
2560 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
2561 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
2562 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
2563 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
2564 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
2565 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
2566 if the expression is zero.
2568 * Fortran source language mode
2570 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
2571 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
2572 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
2573 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
2576 * Better HPUX support
2578 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
2579 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
2580 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
2581 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
2582 that behavior do the following before running the program:
2588 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
2589 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
2595 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
2596 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
2599 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
2600 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
2602 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
2604 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
2605 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
2606 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
2607 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
2608 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
2609 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
2611 * New DOS host serial code
2613 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
2614 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
2617 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
2619 * New "complete" command
2621 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
2622 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
2624 * Trailing space optional in prompt
2626 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
2627 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
2629 * Breakpoint hit counts
2631 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
2632 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
2633 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
2634 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
2635 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
2638 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
2640 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
2641 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
2642 arrays actually contain only short strings.
2644 * Shared library breakpoints
2646 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
2647 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
2649 * Hardware watchpoints
2651 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
2652 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
2654 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
2658 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
2659 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
2661 * Improved Irix 5 support
2663 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
2665 * Improved HPPA support
2667 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
2669 * New native configurations
2671 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
2672 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2673 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
2674 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
2678 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2679 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
2682 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
2684 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
2685 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
2689 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
2690 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
2692 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
2694 * Irix 5 is now supported
2698 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
2699 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
2700 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
2701 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
2702 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
2705 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
2707 * User visible changes:
2711 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
2712 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
2713 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
2714 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
2715 debugging info for the mips target).
2717 * DEC Alpha native support
2719 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
2720 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
2721 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
2722 Alpha-specific notes.
2724 * Preliminary thread implementation
2726 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
2728 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
2730 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
2731 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
2734 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
2736 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
2737 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
2738 call methods, ...etc.
2740 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
2742 * User visible changes:
2744 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
2745 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
2746 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
2747 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
2749 Filename completion now works.
2751 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
2752 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
2753 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
2755 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
2756 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
2757 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
2758 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
2759 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
2763 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
2764 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
2767 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
2771 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
2772 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
2773 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
2777 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
2778 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
2779 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
2780 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
2781 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
2785 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
2786 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
2787 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
2789 * New targets supported
2791 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
2792 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2793 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
2794 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2795 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
2797 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
2798 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
2799 GO32 memory extender.
2801 * New remote protocols
2803 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
2805 * New source languages supported
2807 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
2808 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
2809 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
2812 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
2814 * HP Precision Architecture supported
2816 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
2817 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
2818 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
2819 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
2820 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
2821 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
2823 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
2825 * Faster and better demangling
2827 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
2828 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
2829 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
2830 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
2831 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
2832 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
2835 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
2836 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
2837 compiler does not actually implement.
2839 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
2841 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
2842 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
2843 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
2844 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
2845 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
2846 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
2849 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
2850 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
2852 * Improved configure script
2854 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
2855 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
2856 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
2857 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
2859 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
2860 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
2861 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
2862 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
2863 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
2864 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
2866 * Documentation improvements
2868 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
2869 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
2870 before submitting changes.
2872 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
2873 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
2874 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
2875 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
2876 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
2878 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
2879 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
2880 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
2881 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
2882 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
2883 around this problem.
2887 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
2888 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
2889 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
2892 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
2893 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
2895 * New native hosts supported
2897 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
2898 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
2900 * New targets supported
2902 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
2904 * New file formats supported
2906 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
2907 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
2911 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
2913 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
2914 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
2916 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
2917 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
2918 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
2920 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
2921 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
2923 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
2924 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
2925 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
2928 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
2929 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
2930 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
2931 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
2932 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
2934 * Internal improvements
2936 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
2937 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
2939 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
2940 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
2941 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
2942 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
2943 shared code that handles any of them.
2945 * New command line options
2947 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
2951 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
2952 General Public License.
2954 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
2956 * Host/native/target split
2958 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
2959 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
2960 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
2961 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
2962 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
2964 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
2965 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
2966 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
2967 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
2968 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
2969 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
2970 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
2972 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
2973 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
2974 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
2976 * New hosts supported
2978 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
2979 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2980 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
2982 * New targets supported
2984 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
2985 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
2987 * New native hosts supported
2989 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
2990 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
2991 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
2993 * New file formats supported
2995 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
2996 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
2997 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
3001 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
3002 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
3003 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
3005 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
3007 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
3008 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
3009 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
3010 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
3014 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
3015 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
3016 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
3018 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
3022 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
3023 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
3026 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
3027 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
3029 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
3030 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
3031 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
3032 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
3033 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
3034 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
3036 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
3037 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
3038 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
3039 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
3043 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
3044 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
3045 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
3046 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
3047 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
3049 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
3050 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
3051 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
3052 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
3056 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
3057 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
3058 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
3059 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
3060 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
3061 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
3062 each instruction being stepped through.
3064 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
3065 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
3067 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
3068 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
3069 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
3070 processor with a serial port.
3074 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
3075 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
3076 supported, and what files each one uses.
3080 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
3081 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
3082 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
3083 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
3085 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
3086 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
3087 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
3088 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
3092 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
3093 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
3094 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
3095 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
3096 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
3097 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
3099 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
3102 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
3104 * Better support for C++ function names
3106 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
3107 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
3108 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
3109 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
3110 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
3112 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
3113 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
3114 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
3115 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
3116 for the list of formats.
3118 * G++ symbol mangling problem
3120 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
3121 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
3122 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
3123 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
3124 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
3125 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
3128 * New 'maintenance' command
3130 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
3131 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
3132 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
3134 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
3135 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
3136 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
3137 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
3138 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
3139 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
3141 The following commands are new:
3143 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
3144 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
3145 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
3147 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
3149 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
3150 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
3151 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
3152 read after argv processing.
3154 * New hosts supported
3156 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
3158 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
3160 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
3161 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
3162 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
3163 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
3164 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
3167 * New targets supported
3169 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
3171 * More smarts about finding #include files
3173 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
3174 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
3175 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
3176 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
3177 the one that contains your sources.
3179 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
3180 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
3181 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
3183 * Interesting infernals change
3185 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
3186 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
3187 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
3188 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
3190 * Bug fixes (of course!)
3192 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
3193 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
3194 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
3196 See the ChangeLog for details.
3198 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
3200 * New machines supported (host and target)
3202 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
3204 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
3206 * New malloc package
3208 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
3209 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
3210 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
3211 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
3212 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
3213 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
3217 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
3218 'help info proc' for details.
3220 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
3222 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
3223 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
3226 * File name changes for MS-DOS
3228 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
3229 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
3230 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
3231 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
3232 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
3233 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
3235 * Cross byte order fixes
3237 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
3238 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
3240 * New -mapped and -readnow options
3242 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
3243 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
3244 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
3245 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
3246 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
3247 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
3248 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
3249 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
3250 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
3251 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
3253 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
3254 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
3255 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
3256 slower, but makes future operations faster.
3258 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
3259 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
3260 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
3263 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
3265 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
3266 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
3267 shared across multiple host platforms.
3269 * longjmp() handling
3271 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
3272 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
3273 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
3274 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
3278 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
3279 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
3284 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
3285 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
3286 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
3288 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
3290 * New machines supported (host and target)
3292 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
3294 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
3295 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
3297 * New machines supported (target)
3299 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
3303 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
3304 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
3305 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
3307 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
3308 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
3309 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
3310 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
3311 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
3314 * New features for SVR4
3316 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
3317 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
3318 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
3320 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
3321 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
3322 it prints the address mappings of the process.
3324 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
3325 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
3327 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
3329 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
3330 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
3331 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
3332 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
3333 same code linked statically.
3337 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
3338 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
3339 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
3340 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
3341 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
3342 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
3346 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
3347 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
3348 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
3351 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
3353 * New machines supported (host and target)
3355 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
3356 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
3357 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
3359 * Almost SCO Unix support
3361 We had hoped to support:
3362 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
3363 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
3364 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
3365 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
3367 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
3369 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
3370 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
3371 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
3372 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
3377 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
3378 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
3379 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
3383 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
3384 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
3385 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
3387 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
3389 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
3390 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
3391 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
3393 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
3394 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
3395 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
3396 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
3399 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
3400 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
3401 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
3402 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
3405 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
3406 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
3409 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
3410 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
3411 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
3414 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
3416 * Improved configuration
3418 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
3419 Porting BFD is simpler.
3423 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
3424 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
3425 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
3426 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
3430 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
3432 * New host supported (not target)
3434 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
3437 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
3439 * Multiple source language support
3441 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
3442 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
3443 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
3444 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
3445 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
3446 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
3450 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
3451 currently under development at the State University of New York at
3452 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
3453 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
3455 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
3456 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
3457 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
3459 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
3460 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
3464 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
3465 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
3466 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
3467 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
3470 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
3472 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
3473 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
3474 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
3475 examining core files.
3479 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
3482 * New machines supported (host and target)
3484 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
3485 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
3486 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
3488 * New hosts supported (not targets)
3490 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
3492 * New targets supported (not hosts)
3494 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
3495 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
3496 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
3498 * New remote interfaces
3504 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
3508 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
3510 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
3511 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
3512 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
3513 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
3514 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
3515 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
3516 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
3517 stub on the target system.
3519 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
3521 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
3522 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
3523 object file types such as a.out and coff.
3525 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
3526 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
3529 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
3531 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
3532 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
3534 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
3535 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
3536 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
3538 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
3539 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
3540 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
3541 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
3543 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
3544 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
3545 it is already running. Default is ON.
3547 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
3548 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
3549 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
3550 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
3553 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
3554 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
3555 or the value of the environment variable
3558 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
3559 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
3562 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
3563 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
3564 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
3566 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
3567 history expansion will be performed on
3568 command line input. The default is OFF.
3570 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
3571 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
3572 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
3574 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
3575 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
3576 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3579 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
3580 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
3581 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
3584 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
3585 ``set width'' instead.
3587 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
3588 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
3589 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
3590 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
3592 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
3595 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
3598 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
3601 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
3604 * Support for Epoch Environment.
3606 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
3607 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
3608 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
3612 * Support for Shared Libraries
3614 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
3615 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
3616 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
3617 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
3618 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
3619 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
3620 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
3621 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
3623 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
3624 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
3625 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
3627 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
3632 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
3633 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
3634 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
3635 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
3636 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
3637 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
3639 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
3641 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
3643 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3644 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3645 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
3648 * C++ multiple inheritance
3650 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
3653 * C++ exception handling
3655 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
3656 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
3657 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
3660 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
3661 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
3662 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
3664 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
3665 current stack frame.
3668 * Minor command changes
3670 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
3671 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
3672 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
3674 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
3675 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
3676 frames without printing.
3678 * New directory command
3680 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
3681 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
3682 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
3683 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
3684 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
3686 * Configuring GDB for compilation
3688 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
3691 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
3692 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
3693 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
3694 where the program that you are debugging will run.