1 What has changed in GDB?
2 (Organized release by release)
4 *** Changes since GDB 7.2
6 * GDB has a new command: "thread find [REGEXP]".
7 It finds the thread id whose name, target id, or thread extra info
8 matches the given regular expression.
10 * The "catch syscall" command now works on mips*-linux* targets.
12 * The -data-disassemble MI command now supports modes 2 and 3 for
13 dumping the instruction opcodes.
15 * New command line options
17 -data-directory DIR Specify DIR as the "data-directory".
18 This is mostly for testing purposes.
20 * The "maint set python auto-load on|off" command has been renamed to
21 "set auto-load-scripts on|off".
23 * GDB has a new command: "set directories".
24 It is like the "dir" command except that it replaces the
25 source path list instead of augmenting it.
27 * GDB now understands thread names.
29 On GNU/Linux, "info threads" will display the thread name as set by
30 prctl or pthread_setname_np.
32 There is also a new command, "thread name", which can be used to
33 assign a name internally for GDB to display.
36 Initial support for the OpenCL C language (http://www.khronos.org/opencl)
37 has been integrated into GDB.
41 ** New function gdb.lookup_global_symbol looks up a global symbol.
43 ** GDB values in Python are now callable if the value represents a
44 function. For example, if 'some_value' represents a function that
45 takes two integer parameters and returns a value, you can call
46 that function like so:
48 result = some_value (10,20)
50 ** Module gdb.types has been added.
51 It contains a collection of utilities for working with gdb.Types objects:
52 get_basic_type, has_field, make_enum_dict.
54 ** Module gdb.printing has been added.
55 It contains utilities for writing and registering pretty-printers.
56 New classes: PrettyPrinter, SubPrettyPrinter,
57 RegexpCollectionPrettyPrinter.
58 New function: register_pretty_printer.
60 ** New commands "info pretty-printers", "enable pretty-printer" and
61 "disable pretty-printer" have been added.
63 ** gdb.parameter("directories") is now available.
65 ** New function gdb.newest_frame returns the newest frame in the
68 ** The gdb.InferiorThread class has a new "name" attribute. This
69 holds the thread's name.
71 ** Python Support for Inferior events.
72 Python scripts can add observers to be notified of events
73 occurring the in process being debugged.
74 The following events are currently supported:
75 - gdb.events.cont Continue event.
76 - gdb.events.exited Inferior exited event.
77 - gdb.events.stop Signal received, and Breakpoint hit events.
79 ** Python Support for Inferior events.
80 Python scripts can add observers to be notified of events
81 occurring the in process being debugged.
82 The following events are currently supported:
83 - gdb.events.cont Continue event.
84 - gdb.events.exited Inferior exited event.
85 - gdb.events.stop Signal received, and Breakpoint hit events.
89 ** GDB now puts template parameters in scope when debugging in an
90 instantiation. For example, if you have:
92 template<int X> int func (void) { return X; }
94 then if you step into func<5>, "print X" will show "5". This
95 feature requires proper debuginfo support from the compiler; it
98 ** The motion commands "next", "finish", "until", and "advance" now
99 work better when exceptions are thrown. In particular, GDB will
100 no longer lose control of the inferior; instead, the GDB will
101 stop the inferior at the point at which the exception is caught.
102 This functionality requires a change in the exception handling
103 code that was introduced in GCC 4.5.
105 * GDB now follows GCC's rules on accessing volatile objects when
106 reading or writing target state during expression evaluation.
107 One notable difference to prior behavior is that "print x = 0"
108 no longer generates a read of x; the value of the assignment is
109 now always taken directly from the value being assigned.
111 * GDB now has some support for using labels in the program's source in
112 linespecs. For instance, you can use "advance label" to continue
113 execution to a label.
115 * GDB now has support for reading and writing a new .gdb_index
116 section. This section holds a fast index of DWARF debugging
117 information and can be used to greatly speed up GDB startup and
118 operation. See the documentation for `save gdb-index' for details.
120 * The "watch" command now accepts an optional "-location" argument.
121 When used, this causes GDB to watch the memory referred to by the
122 expression. Such a watchpoint is never deleted due to it going out
125 * GDB now supports thread debugging of core dumps on GNU/Linux.
127 GDB now activates thread debugging using the libthread_db library
128 when debugging GNU/Linux core dumps, similarly to when debugging
129 live processes. As a result, when debugging a core dump file, GDB
130 is now able to display pthread_t ids of threads. For example, "info
131 threads" shows the same output as when debugging the process when it
132 was live. In earlier releases, you'd see something like this:
135 * 1 LWP 6780 main () at main.c:10
137 While now you see this:
140 * 1 Thread 0x7f0f5712a700 (LWP 6780) main () at main.c:10
142 It is also now possible to inspect TLS variables when debugging core
145 When debugging a core dump generated on a machine other than the one
146 used to run GDB, you may need to point GDB at the correct
147 libthread_db library with the "set libthread-db-search-path"
148 command. See the user manual for more details on this command.
150 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
152 ** GDBserver is now supported on PowerPC LynxOS (versions 4.x and 5.x),
153 and i686 LynxOS (version 5.x).
155 ** GDBserver is now supported on Blackfin Linux.
157 * New native configurations
159 ia64 HP-UX ia64-*-hpux*
163 Analog Devices, Inc. Blackfin Processor bfin-*
165 * Ada task switching is now supported on sparc-elf targets when
166 debugging a program using the Ravenscar Profile. For more information,
167 see the "Tasking Support when using the Ravenscar Profile" section
168 in the GDB user manual.
170 * Guile support was removed.
172 * New features in the GNU simulator
174 ** The --map-info flag lists all known core mappings.
176 *** Changes in GDB 7.2
178 * Shared library support for remote targets by default
180 When GDB is configured for a generic, non-OS specific target, like
181 for example, --target=arm-eabi or one of the many *-*-elf targets,
182 GDB now queries remote stubs for loaded shared libraries using the
183 `qXfer:libraries:read' packet. Previously, shared library support
184 was always disabled for such configurations.
188 ** Argument Dependent Lookup (ADL)
190 In C++ ADL lookup directs function search to the namespaces of its
191 arguments even if the namespace has not been imported.
201 Here the compiler will search for `foo' in the namespace of 'b'
202 and find A::foo. GDB now supports this. This construct is commonly
203 used in the Standard Template Library for operators.
205 ** Improved User Defined Operator Support
207 In addition to member operators, GDB now supports lookup of operators
208 defined in a namespace and imported with a `using' directive, operators
209 defined in the global scope, operators imported implicitly from an
210 anonymous namespace, and the ADL operators mentioned in the previous
212 GDB now also supports proper overload resolution for all the previously
213 mentioned flavors of operators.
215 ** static const class members
217 Printing of static const class members that are initialized in the
218 class definition has been fixed.
220 * Windows Thread Information Block access.
222 On Windows targets, GDB now supports displaying the Windows Thread
223 Information Block (TIB) structure. This structure is visible either
224 by using the new command `info w32 thread-information-block' or, by
225 dereferencing the new convenience variable named `$_tlb', a
226 thread-specific pointer to the TIB. This feature is also supported
227 when remote debugging using GDBserver.
231 Static tracepoints are calls in the user program into a tracing
232 library. One such library is a port of the LTTng kernel tracer to
233 userspace --- UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer, http://lttng.org/ust).
234 When debugging with GDBserver, GDB now supports combining the GDB
235 tracepoint machinery with such libraries. For example: the user can
236 use GDB to probe a static tracepoint marker (a call from the user
237 program into the tracing library) with the new "strace" command (see
238 "New commands" below). This creates a "static tracepoint" in the
239 breakpoint list, that can be manipulated with the same feature set
240 as fast and regular tracepoints. E.g., collect registers, local and
241 global variables, collect trace state variables, and define
242 tracepoint conditions. In addition, the user can collect extra
243 static tracepoint marker specific data, by collecting the new
244 $_sdata internal variable. When analyzing the trace buffer, you can
245 inspect $_sdata like any other variable available to GDB. For more
246 information, see the "Tracepoints" chapter in GDB user manual. New
247 remote packets have been defined to support static tracepoints, see
248 the "New remote packets" section below.
250 * Better reconstruction of tracepoints after disconnected tracing
252 GDB will attempt to download the original source form of tracepoint
253 definitions when starting a trace run, and then will upload these
254 upon reconnection to the target, resulting in a more accurate
255 reconstruction of the tracepoints that are in use on the target.
259 You can now exercise direct control over the ways that GDB can
260 affect your program. For instance, you can disallow the setting of
261 breakpoints, so that the program can run continuously (assuming
262 non-stop mode). In addition, the "observer" variable is available
263 to switch all of the different controls; in observer mode, GDB
264 cannot affect the target's behavior at all, which is useful for
265 tasks like diagnosing live systems in the field.
267 * The new convenience variable $_thread holds the number of the
274 Return the address of the Windows Thread Information Block of a given thread.
278 In response to several of the tracepoint packets, the target may now
279 also respond with a number of intermediate `qRelocInsn' request
280 packets before the final result packet, to have GDB handle
281 relocating an instruction to execute at a different address. This
282 is particularly useful for stubs that support fast tracepoints. GDB
283 reports support for this feature in the qSupported packet.
287 List static tracepoint markers in the target program.
291 List static tracepoint markers at a given address in the target
294 qXfer:statictrace:read
296 Read the static trace data collected (by a `collect $_sdata'
297 tracepoint action). The remote stub reports support for this packet
298 to gdb's qSupported query.
302 Send the current settings of GDB's permission flags.
306 Send part of the source (textual) form of a tracepoint definition,
307 which includes location, conditional, and action list.
309 * The source command now accepts a -s option to force searching for the
310 script in the source search path even if the script name specifies
313 * New features in the GDB remote stub, GDBserver
315 - GDBserver now support tracepoints (including fast tracepoints, and
316 static tracepoints). The feature is currently supported by the
317 i386-linux and amd64-linux builds. See the "Tracepoints support
318 in gdbserver" section in the manual for more information.
320 GDBserver JIT compiles the tracepoint's conditional agent
321 expression bytecode into native code whenever possible for low
322 overhead dynamic tracepoints conditionals. For such tracepoints,
323 an expression that examines program state is evaluated when the
324 tracepoint is reached, in order to determine whether to capture
325 trace data. If the condition is simple and false, processing the
326 tracepoint finishes very quickly and no data is gathered.
328 GDBserver interfaces with the UST (LTTng Userspace Tracer) library
329 for static tracepoints support.
331 - GDBserver now supports x86_64 Windows 64-bit debugging.
333 * GDB now sends xmlRegisters= in qSupported packet to indicate that
334 it understands register description.
336 * The --batch flag now disables pagination and queries.
338 * X86 general purpose registers
340 GDB now supports reading/writing byte, word and double-word x86
341 general purpose registers directly. This means you can use, say,
342 $ah or $ax to refer, respectively, to the byte register AH and
343 16-bit word register AX that are actually portions of the 32-bit
344 register EAX or 64-bit register RAX.
346 * The `commands' command now accepts a range of breakpoints to modify.
347 A plain `commands' following a command that creates multiple
348 breakpoints affects all the breakpoints set by that command. This
349 applies to breakpoints set by `rbreak', and also applies when a
350 single `break' command creates multiple breakpoints (e.g.,
351 breakpoints on overloaded c++ functions).
353 * The `rbreak' command now accepts a filename specification as part of
354 its argument, limiting the functions selected by the regex to those
355 in the specified file.
357 * Support for remote debugging Windows and SymbianOS shared libraries
358 from Unix hosts has been improved. Non Windows GDB builds now can
359 understand target reported file names that follow MS-DOS based file
360 system semantics, such as file names that include drive letters and
361 use the backslash character as directory separator. This makes it
362 possible to transparently use the "set sysroot" and "set
363 solib-search-path" on Unix hosts to point as host copies of the
364 target's shared libraries. See the new command "set
365 target-file-system-kind" described below, and the "Commands to
366 specify files" section in the user manual for more information.
370 eval template, expressions...
371 Convert the values of one or more expressions under the control
372 of the string template to a command line, and call it.
374 set target-file-system-kind unix|dos-based|auto
375 show target-file-system-kind
376 Set or show the assumed file system kind for target reported file
379 save breakpoints <filename>
380 Save all current breakpoint definitions to a file suitable for use
381 in a later debugging session. To read the saved breakpoint
382 definitions, use the `source' command.
384 `save tracepoints' is a new alias for `save-tracepoints'. The latter
387 info static-tracepoint-markers
388 Display information about static tracepoint markers in the target.
390 strace FN | FILE:LINE | *ADDR | -m MARKER_ID
391 Define a static tracepoint by probing a marker at the given
392 function, line, address, or marker ID.
396 Enable and disable observer mode.
398 set may-write-registers on|off
399 set may-write-memory on|off
400 set may-insert-breakpoints on|off
401 set may-insert-tracepoints on|off
402 set may-insert-fast-tracepoints on|off
403 set may-interrupt on|off
404 Set individual permissions for GDB effects on the target. Note that
405 some of these settings can have undesirable or surprising
406 consequences, particularly when changed in the middle of a session.
407 For instance, disabling the writing of memory can prevent
408 breakpoints from being inserted, cause single-stepping to fail, or
409 even crash your program, if you disable after breakpoints have been
410 inserted. However, GDB should not crash.
412 set record memory-query on|off
413 show record memory-query
414 Control whether to stop the inferior if memory changes caused
415 by an instruction cannot be recorded.
420 The disassemble command now supports "start,+length" form of two arguments.
424 ** GDB now provides a new directory location, called the python directory,
425 where Python scripts written for GDB can be installed. The location
426 of that directory is <data-directory>/python, where <data-directory>
427 is the GDB data directory. For more details, see section `Scripting
428 GDB using Python' in the manual.
430 ** The GDB Python API now has access to breakpoints, symbols, symbol
431 tables, program spaces, inferiors, threads and frame's code blocks.
432 Additionally, GDB Parameters can now be created from the API, and
433 manipulated via set/show in the CLI.
435 ** New functions gdb.target_charset, gdb.target_wide_charset,
436 gdb.progspaces, gdb.current_progspace, and gdb.string_to_argv.
438 ** New exception gdb.GdbError.
440 ** Pretty-printers are now also looked up in the current program space.
442 ** Pretty-printers can now be individually enabled and disabled.
444 ** GDB now looks for names of Python scripts to auto-load in a
445 special section named `.debug_gdb_scripts', in addition to looking
446 for a OBJFILE-gdb.py script when OBJFILE is read by the debugger.
448 * Tracepoint actions were unified with breakpoint commands. In particular,
449 there are no longer differences in "info break" output for breakpoints and
450 tracepoints and the "commands" command can be used for both tracepoints and
455 ARM Symbian arm*-*-symbianelf*
457 * D language support.
458 GDB now supports debugging programs written in the D programming
461 * GDB now supports the extended ptrace interface for PowerPC which is
462 available since Linux kernel version 2.6.34. This automatically enables
463 any hardware breakpoints and additional hardware watchpoints available in
464 the processor. The old ptrace interface exposes just one hardware
465 watchpoint and no hardware breakpoints.
467 * GDB is now able to use the Data Value Compare (DVC) register available on
468 embedded PowerPC processors to implement in hardware simple watchpoint
469 conditions of the form:
471 watch ADDRESS|VARIABLE if ADDRESS|VARIABLE == CONSTANT EXPRESSION
473 This works in native GDB running on Linux kernels with the extended ptrace
474 interface mentioned above.
476 *** Changes in GDB 7.1
482 GDB now supports importing of namespaces in C++. This enables the
483 user to inspect variables from imported namespaces. Support for
484 namepace aliasing has also been added. So, if a namespace is
485 aliased in the current scope (e.g. namepace C=A; ) the user can
486 print variables using the alias (e.g. (gdb) print C::x).
490 All known bugs relating to the printing of virtual base class were
491 fixed. It is now possible to call overloaded static methods using a
496 The C++ cast operators static_cast<>, dynamic_cast<>, const_cast<>,
497 and reinterpret_cast<> are now handled by the C++ expression parser.
501 Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze-*-*
506 Xilinx MicroBlaze microblaze
509 * Multi-program debugging.
511 GDB now has support for multi-program (a.k.a. multi-executable or
512 multi-exec) debugging. This allows for debugging multiple inferiors
513 simultaneously each running a different program under the same GDB
514 session. See "Debugging Multiple Inferiors and Programs" in the
515 manual for more information. This implied some user visible changes
516 in the multi-inferior support. For example, "info inferiors" now
517 lists inferiors that are not running yet or that have exited
518 already. See also "New commands" and "New options" below.
520 * New tracing features
522 GDB's tracepoint facility now includes several new features:
524 ** Trace state variables
526 GDB tracepoints now include support for trace state variables, which
527 are variables managed by the target agent during a tracing
528 experiment. They are useful for tracepoints that trigger each
529 other, so for instance one tracepoint can count hits in a variable,
530 and then a second tracepoint has a condition that is true when the
531 count reaches a particular value. Trace state variables share the
532 $-syntax of GDB convenience variables, and can appear in both
533 tracepoint actions and condition expressions. Use the "tvariable"
534 command to create, and "info tvariables" to view; see "Trace State
535 Variables" in the manual for more detail.
539 GDB now includes an option for defining fast tracepoints, which
540 targets may implement more efficiently, such as by installing a jump
541 into the target agent rather than a trap instruction. The resulting
542 speedup can be by two orders of magnitude or more, although the
543 tradeoff is that some program locations on some target architectures
544 might not allow fast tracepoint installation, for instance if the
545 instruction to be replaced is shorter than the jump. To request a
546 fast tracepoint, use the "ftrace" command, with syntax identical to
547 the regular trace command.
549 ** Disconnected tracing
551 It is now possible to detach GDB from the target while it is running
552 a trace experiment, then reconnect later to see how the experiment
553 is going. In addition, a new variable disconnected-tracing lets you
554 tell the target agent whether to continue running a trace if the
555 connection is lost unexpectedly.
559 GDB now has the ability to save the trace buffer into a file, and
560 then use that file as a target, similarly to you can do with
561 corefiles. You can select trace frames, print data that was
562 collected in them, and use tstatus to display the state of the
563 tracing run at the moment that it was saved. To create a trace
564 file, use "tsave <filename>", and to use it, do "target tfile
567 ** Circular trace buffer
569 You can ask the target agent to handle the trace buffer as a
570 circular buffer, discarding the oldest trace frames to make room for
571 newer ones, by setting circular-trace-buffer to on. This feature may
572 not be available for all target agents.
577 The disassemble command, when invoked with two arguments, now requires
578 the arguments to be comma-separated.
581 The info variables command now displays variable definitions. Files
582 which only declare a variable are not shown.
585 The source command is now capable of sourcing Python scripts.
586 This feature is dependent on the debugger being build with Python
589 Related to this enhancement is also the introduction of a new command
590 "set script-extension" (see below).
592 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
594 record save [<FILENAME>]
595 Save a file (in core file format) containing the process record
596 execution log for replay debugging at a later time.
598 record restore <FILENAME>
599 Restore the process record execution log that was saved at an
600 earlier time, for replay debugging.
602 add-inferior [-copies <N>] [-exec <FILENAME>]
605 clone-inferior [-copies <N>] [ID]
606 Make a new inferior ready to execute the same program another
612 maint info program-spaces
613 List the program spaces loaded into GDB.
615 set remote interrupt-sequence [Ctrl-C | BREAK | BREAK-g]
616 show remote interrupt-sequence
617 Allow the user to select one of ^C, a BREAK signal or BREAK-g
618 as the sequence to the remote target in order to interrupt the execution.
619 Ctrl-C is a default. Some system prefers BREAK which is high level of
620 serial line for some certain time. Linux kernel prefers BREAK-g, a.k.a
621 Magic SysRq g. It is BREAK signal and character 'g'.
623 set remote interrupt-on-connect [on | off]
624 show remote interrupt-on-connect
625 When interrupt-on-connect is ON, gdb sends interrupt-sequence to
626 remote target when gdb connects to it. This is needed when you debug
629 set remotebreak [on | off]
631 Deprecated. Use "set/show remote interrupt-sequence" instead.
633 tvariable $NAME [ = EXP ]
634 Create or modify a trace state variable.
637 List trace state variables and their values.
639 delete tvariable $NAME ...
640 Delete one or more trace state variables.
643 Evaluate the given expressions without collecting anything into the
644 trace buffer. (Valid in tracepoint actions only.)
646 ftrace FN / FILE:LINE / *ADDR
647 Define a fast tracepoint at the given function, line, or address.
649 * New expression syntax
651 GDB now parses the 0b prefix of binary numbers the same way as GCC does.
652 GDB now parses 0b101010 identically with 42.
656 set follow-exec-mode new|same
657 show follow-exec-mode
658 Control whether GDB reuses the same inferior across an exec call or
659 creates a new one. This is useful to be able to restart the old
660 executable after the inferior having done an exec call.
662 set default-collect EXPR, ...
664 Define a list of expressions to be collected at each tracepoint.
665 This is a useful way to ensure essential items are not overlooked,
666 such as registers or a critical global variable.
668 set disconnected-tracing
669 show disconnected-tracing
670 If set to 1, the target is instructed to continue tracing if it
671 loses its connection to GDB. If 0, the target is to stop tracing
674 set circular-trace-buffer
675 show circular-trace-buffer
676 If set to on, the target is instructed to use a circular trace buffer
677 and discard the oldest trace frames instead of stopping the trace due
678 to a full trace buffer. If set to off, the trace stops when the buffer
679 fills up. Some targets may not support this.
681 set script-extension off|soft|strict
682 show script-extension
683 If set to "off", the debugger does not perform any script language
684 recognition, and all sourced files are assumed to be GDB scripts.
685 If set to "soft" (the default), files are sourced according to
686 filename extension, falling back to GDB scripts if the first
688 If set to "strict", files are sourced according to filename extension.
690 set ada trust-PAD-over-XVS on|off
691 show ada trust-PAD-over-XVS
692 If off, activate a workaround against a bug in the debugging information
693 generated by the compiler for PAD types (see gcc/exp_dbug.ads in
694 the GCC sources for more information about the GNAT encoding and
695 PAD types in particular). It is always safe to set this option to
696 off, but this introduces a slight performance penalty. The default
699 * Python API Improvements
701 ** GDB provides the new class gdb.LazyString. This is useful in
702 some pretty-printing cases. The new method gdb.Value.lazy_string
703 provides a simple way to create objects of this type.
705 ** The fields returned by gdb.Type.fields now have an
706 `is_base_class' attribute.
708 ** The new method gdb.Type.range returns the range of an array type.
710 ** The new method gdb.parse_and_eval can be used to parse and
711 evaluate an expression.
716 Define a trace state variable.
719 Get the current value of a trace state variable.
722 Set desired tracing behavior upon disconnection.
725 Set the trace buffer to be linear or circular.
728 Get data about the tracepoints currently in use.
732 Process record now works correctly with hardware watchpoints.
734 Multiple bug fixes have been made to the mips-irix port, making it
735 much more reliable. In particular:
736 - Debugging threaded applications is now possible again. Previously,
737 GDB would hang while starting the program, or while waiting for
738 the program to stop at a breakpoint.
739 - Attaching to a running process no longer hangs.
740 - An error occurring while loading a core file has been fixed.
741 - Changing the value of the PC register now works again. This fixes
742 problems observed when using the "jump" command, or when calling
743 a function from GDB, or even when assigning a new value to $pc.
744 - With the "finish" and "return" commands, the return value for functions
745 returning a small array is now correctly printed.
746 - It is now possible to break on shared library code which gets executed
747 during a shared library init phase (code executed while executing
748 their .init section). Previously, the breakpoint would have no effect.
749 - GDB is now able to backtrace through the signal handler for
750 non-threaded programs.
752 PIE (Position Independent Executable) programs debugging is now supported.
753 This includes debugging execution of PIC (Position Independent Code) shared
754 libraries although for that, it should be possible to run such libraries as an
757 *** Changes in GDB 7.0
759 * GDB now has an interface for JIT compilation. Applications that
760 dynamically generate code can create symbol files in memory and register
761 them with GDB. For users, the feature should work transparently, and
762 for JIT developers, the interface is documented in the GDB manual in the
763 "JIT Compilation Interface" chapter.
765 * Tracepoints may now be conditional. The syntax is as for
766 breakpoints; either an "if" clause appended to the "trace" command,
767 or the "condition" command is available. GDB sends the condition to
768 the target for evaluation using the same bytecode format as is used
769 for tracepoint actions.
771 * The disassemble command now supports: an optional /r modifier, print the
772 raw instructions in hex as well as in symbolic form, and an optional /m
773 modifier to print mixed source+assembly.
775 * Process record and replay
777 In a architecture environment that supports ``process record and
778 replay'', ``process record and replay'' target can record a log of
779 the process execution, and replay it with both forward and reverse
782 * Reverse debugging: GDB now has new commands reverse-continue, reverse-
783 step, reverse-next, reverse-finish, reverse-stepi, reverse-nexti, and
784 set execution-direction {forward|reverse}, for targets that support
787 * GDB now supports hardware watchpoints on MIPS/Linux systems. This
788 feature is available with a native GDB running on kernel version
791 * GDB now has support for multi-byte and wide character sets on the
792 target. Strings whose character type is wchar_t, char16_t, or
793 char32_t are now correctly printed. GDB supports wide- and unicode-
794 literals in C, that is, L'x', L"string", u'x', u"string", U'x', and
795 U"string" syntax. And, GDB allows the "%ls" and "%lc" formats in
796 `printf'. This feature requires iconv to work properly; if your
797 system does not have a working iconv, GDB can use GNU libiconv. See
798 the installation instructions for more information.
800 * GDB now supports automatic retrieval of shared library files from
801 remote targets. To use this feature, specify a system root that begins
802 with the `remote:' prefix, either via the `set sysroot' command or via
803 the `--with-sysroot' configure-time option.
805 * "info sharedlibrary" now takes an optional regex of libraries to show,
806 and it now reports if a shared library has no debugging information.
808 * Commands `set debug-file-directory', `set solib-search-path' and `set args'
809 now complete on file names.
811 * When completing in expressions, gdb will attempt to limit
812 completions to allowable structure or union fields, where appropriate.
813 For instance, consider:
815 # struct example { int f1; double f2; };
816 # struct example variable;
819 If the user types TAB at the end of this command line, the available
820 completions will be "f1" and "f2".
822 * Inlined functions are now supported. They show up in backtraces, and
823 the "step", "next", and "finish" commands handle them automatically.
825 * GDB now supports the token-splicing (##) and stringification (#)
826 operators when expanding macros. It also supports variable-arity
829 * GDB now supports inspecting extra signal information, exported by
830 the new $_siginfo convenience variable. The feature is currently
831 implemented on linux ARM, i386 and amd64.
833 * GDB can now display the VFP floating point registers and NEON vector
834 registers on ARM targets. Both ARM GNU/Linux native GDB and gdbserver
835 can provide these registers (requires Linux 2.6.30 or later). Remote
836 and simulator targets may also provide them.
841 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
844 Turn off `+'/`-' protocol acknowledgments to permit more efficient
845 operation over reliable transport links. Use of this packet is
846 controlled by the `set remote noack-packet' command.
849 Kill the process with the specified process ID. Use this in preference
850 to `k' when multiprocess protocol extensions are supported.
853 Obtains additional operating system information
857 Read or write additional signal information.
859 * Removed remote protocol undocumented extension
861 An undocumented extension to the remote protocol's `S' stop reply
862 packet that permited the stub to pass a process id was removed.
863 Remote servers should use the `T' stop reply packet instead.
865 * GDB now supports multiple function calling conventions according to the
866 DWARF-2 DW_AT_calling_convention function attribute.
868 * The SH target utilizes the aforementioned change to distinguish between gcc
869 and Renesas calling convention. It also adds the new CLI commands
870 `set/show sh calling-convention'.
872 * GDB can now read compressed debug sections, as produced by GNU gold
873 with the --compress-debug-sections=zlib flag.
875 * 64-bit core files are now supported on AIX.
877 * Thread switching is now supported on Tru64.
879 * Watchpoints can now be set on unreadable memory locations, e.g. addresses
880 which will be allocated using malloc later in program execution.
882 * The qXfer:libraries:read remote procotol packet now allows passing a
883 list of section offsets.
885 * On GNU/Linux, GDB can now attach to stopped processes. Several race
886 conditions handling signals delivered during attach or thread creation
887 have also been fixed.
889 * GDB now supports the use of DWARF boolean types for Ada's type Boolean.
890 From the user's standpoint, all unqualified instances of True and False
891 are treated as the standard definitions, regardless of context.
893 * GDB now parses C++ symbol and type names more flexibly. For
896 template<typename T> class C { };
899 GDB will now correctly handle all of:
901 ptype C<char const *>
903 ptype C<const char *>
906 * New features in the GDB remote stub, gdbserver
908 - The "--wrapper" command-line argument tells gdbserver to use a
909 wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
911 - On PowerPC and S/390 targets, it is now possible to use a single
912 gdbserver executable to debug both 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
913 (This requires gdbserver itself to be built as a 64-bit executable.)
915 - gdbserver uses the new noack protocol mode for TCP connections to
916 reduce communications latency, if also supported and enabled in GDB.
918 - Support for the sparc64-linux-gnu target is now included in
921 - The amd64-linux build of gdbserver now supports debugging both
922 32-bit and 64-bit programs.
924 - The i386-linux, amd64-linux, and i386-win32 builds of gdbserver
925 now support hardware watchpoints, and will use them automatically
930 GDB now has support for scripting using Python. Whether this is
931 available is determined at configure time.
933 New GDB commands can now be written in Python.
935 * Ada tasking support
937 Ada tasks can now be inspected in GDB. The following commands have
941 Print the list of Ada tasks.
943 Print detailed information about task number N.
945 Print the task number of the current task.
947 Switch the context of debugging to task number N.
949 * Support for user-defined prefixed commands. The "define" command can
950 add new commands to existing prefixes, e.g. "target".
952 * Multi-inferior, multi-process debugging.
954 GDB now has generalized support for multi-inferior debugging. See
955 "Debugging Multiple Inferiors" in the manual for more information.
956 Although availability still depends on target support, the command
957 set is more uniform now. The GNU/Linux specific multi-forks support
958 has been migrated to this new framework. This implied some user
959 visible changes; see "New commands" and also "Removed commands"
962 * Target descriptions can now describe the target OS ABI. See the
963 "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for more
966 * Target descriptions can now describe "compatible" architectures
967 to indicate that the target can execute applications for a different
968 architecture in addition to those for the main target architecture.
969 See the "Target Description Format" section in the user manual for
972 * Multi-architecture debugging.
974 GDB now includes general supports for debugging applications on
975 hybrid systems that use more than one single processor architecture
976 at the same time. Each such hybrid architecture still requires
977 specific support to be added. The only hybrid architecture supported
978 in this version of GDB is the Cell Broadband Engine.
980 * GDB now supports integrated debugging of Cell/B.E. applications that
981 use both the PPU and SPU architectures. To enable support for hybrid
982 Cell/B.E. debugging, you need to configure GDB to support both the
983 powerpc-linux or powerpc64-linux and the spu-elf targets, using the
984 --enable-targets configure option.
986 * Non-stop mode debugging.
988 For some targets, GDB now supports an optional mode of operation in
989 which you can examine stopped threads while other threads continue
990 to execute freely. This is referred to as non-stop mode, with the
991 old mode referred to as all-stop mode. See the "Non-Stop Mode"
992 section in the user manual for more information.
994 To be able to support remote non-stop debugging, a remote stub needs
995 to implement the non-stop mode remote protocol extensions, as
996 described in the "Remote Non-Stop" section of the user manual. The
997 GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been adjusted to support these
998 extensions on linux targets.
1000 * New commands (for set/show, see "New options" below)
1002 catch syscall [NAME(S) | NUMBER(S)]
1003 Catch system calls. Arguments, which should be names of system
1004 calls or their numbers, mean catch only those syscalls. Without
1005 arguments, every syscall will be caught. When the inferior issues
1006 any of the specified syscalls, GDB will stop and announce the system
1007 call, both when it is called and when its call returns. This
1008 feature is currently available with a native GDB running on the
1009 Linux Kernel, under the following architectures: x86, x86_64,
1010 PowerPC and PowerPC64.
1012 find [/size-char] [/max-count] start-address, end-address|+search-space-size,
1014 Search memory for a sequence of bytes.
1016 maint set python print-stack
1017 maint show python print-stack
1018 Show a stack trace when an error is encountered in a Python script.
1021 Invoke CODE by passing it to the Python interpreter.
1026 These allow macros to be defined, undefined, and listed
1030 Show operating system information about processes.
1033 List the inferiors currently under GDB's control.
1036 Switch focus to inferior number NUM.
1039 Detach from inferior number NUM.
1042 Kill inferior number NUM.
1046 set spu stop-on-load
1047 show spu stop-on-load
1048 Control whether to stop for new SPE threads during Cell/B.E. debugging.
1050 set spu auto-flush-cache
1051 show spu auto-flush-cache
1052 Control whether to automatically flush the software-managed cache
1053 during Cell/B.E. debugging.
1055 set sh calling-convention
1056 show sh calling-convention
1057 Control the calling convention used when calling SH target functions.
1060 show debug timestamp
1061 Control display of timestamps with GDB debugging output.
1063 set disassemble-next-line
1064 show disassemble-next-line
1065 Control display of disassembled source lines or instructions when
1068 set remote noack-packet
1069 show remote noack-packet
1070 Set/show the use of remote protocol QStartNoAckMode packet. See above
1071 under "New remote packets."
1073 set remote query-attached-packet
1074 show remote query-attached-packet
1075 Control use of remote protocol `qAttached' (query-attached) packet.
1077 set remote read-siginfo-object
1078 show remote read-siginfo-object
1079 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:read' (read-siginfo-object)
1082 set remote write-siginfo-object
1083 show remote write-siginfo-object
1084 Control use of remote protocol `qXfer:siginfo:write' (write-siginfo-object)
1087 set remote reverse-continue
1088 show remote reverse-continue
1089 Control use of remote protocol 'bc' (reverse-continue) packet.
1091 set remote reverse-step
1092 show remote reverse-step
1093 Control use of remote protocol 'bs' (reverse-step) packet.
1095 set displaced-stepping
1096 show displaced-stepping
1097 Control displaced stepping mode. Displaced stepping is a way to
1098 single-step over breakpoints without removing them from the debuggee.
1099 Also known as "out-of-line single-stepping".
1102 show debug displaced
1103 Control display of debugging info for displaced stepping.
1105 maint set internal-error
1106 maint show internal-error
1107 Control what GDB does when an internal error is detected.
1109 maint set internal-warning
1110 maint show internal-warning
1111 Control what GDB does when an internal warning is detected.
1116 Use a wrapper program to launch programs for debugging.
1118 set multiple-symbols (all|ask|cancel)
1119 show multiple-symbols
1120 The value of this variable can be changed to adjust the debugger behavior
1121 when an expression or a breakpoint location contains an ambiguous symbol
1122 name (an overloaded function name, for instance).
1124 set breakpoint always-inserted
1125 show breakpoint always-inserted
1126 Keep breakpoints always inserted in the target, as opposed to inserting
1127 them when resuming the target, and removing them when the target stops.
1128 This option can improve debugger performance on slow remote targets.
1130 set arm fallback-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
1131 show arm fallback-mode
1132 set arm force-mode (arm|thumb|auto)
1134 These commands control how ARM GDB determines whether instructions
1135 are ARM or Thumb. The default for both settings is auto, which uses
1136 the current CPSR value for instructions without symbols; previous
1137 versions of GDB behaved as if "set arm fallback-mode arm".
1139 set disable-randomization
1140 show disable-randomization
1141 Standalone programs run with the virtual address space randomization enabled
1142 by default on some platforms. This option keeps the addresses stable across
1143 multiple debugging sessions.
1147 Control whether other threads are stopped or not when some thread hits
1152 Requests that asynchronous execution is enabled in the target, if available.
1153 In this case, it's possible to resume target in the background, and interact
1154 with GDB while the target is running. "show target-async" displays the
1155 current state of asynchronous execution of the target.
1157 set target-wide-charset
1158 show target-wide-charset
1159 The target-wide-charset is the name of the character set that GDB
1160 uses when printing characters whose type is wchar_t.
1162 set tcp auto-retry (on|off)
1164 set tcp connect-timeout
1165 show tcp connect-timeout
1166 These commands allow GDB to retry failed TCP connections to a remote stub
1167 with a specified timeout period; this is useful if the stub is launched
1168 in parallel with GDB but may not be ready to accept connections immediately.
1170 set libthread-db-search-path
1171 show libthread-db-search-path
1172 Control list of directories which GDB will search for appropriate
1175 set schedule-multiple (on|off)
1176 show schedule-multiple
1177 Allow GDB to resume all threads of all processes or only threads of
1178 the current process.
1182 Use more aggressive caching for accesses to the stack. This improves
1183 performance of remote debugging (particularly backtraces) without
1184 affecting correctness.
1186 set interactive-mode (on|off|auto)
1187 show interactive-mode
1188 Control whether GDB runs in interactive mode (on) or not (off).
1189 When in interactive mode, GDB waits for the user to answer all
1190 queries. Otherwise, GDB does not wait and assumes the default
1191 answer. When set to auto (the default), GDB determines which
1192 mode to use based on the stdin settings.
1197 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `info
1198 inferiors' command. To list checkpoints, you can still use the
1199 `info checkpoints' command, which was an alias for the `info forks'
1203 Replaced by the new `inferior' command. To switch between
1204 checkpoints, you can still use the `restart' command, which was an
1205 alias for the `fork' command.
1208 This is removed, since some targets don't have a notion of
1209 processes. To switch between processes, you can still use the
1210 `inferior' command using GDB's own inferior number.
1213 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `kill
1214 inferior' command. To delete a checkpoint, you can still use the
1215 `delete checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `delete
1219 For program forks, this is replaced by the new more generic `detach
1220 inferior' command. To detach a checkpoint, you can still use the
1221 `detach checkpoint' command, which was an alias for the `detach
1224 * New native configurations
1226 x86/x86_64 Darwin i[34567]86-*-darwin*
1228 x86_64 MinGW x86_64-*-mingw*
1232 Lattice Mico32 lm32-*
1233 x86 DICOS i[34567]86-*-dicos*
1234 x86_64 DICOS x86_64-*-dicos*
1237 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports x86 Windows CE
1238 (mingw32ce) debugging.
1244 These commands were actually not implemented on any target.
1246 *** Changes in GDB 6.8
1248 * New native configurations
1250 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*netbsd*
1251 Xtensa GNU/Linux xtensa*-*-linux*
1255 NetBSD/hppa hppa*-*-netbsd*
1256 Xtensa GNU/Lunux xtensa*-*-linux*
1258 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
1260 When the '-p NUMBER' or '--pid NUMBER' options are used, and
1261 attaching to process NUMBER fails, GDB no longer attempts to open a
1262 core file named NUMBER. Attaching to a program using the -c option
1263 is no longer supported. Instead, use the '-p' or '--pid' options.
1265 * GDB can now be built as a native debugger for debugging Windows x86
1266 (mingw32) Portable Executable (PE) programs.
1268 * Pending breakpoints no longer change their number when their address
1271 * GDB now supports breakpoints with multiple locations,
1272 including breakpoints on C++ constructors, inside C++ templates,
1273 and in inlined functions.
1275 * GDB's ability to debug optimized code has been improved. GDB more
1276 accurately identifies function bodies and lexical blocks that occupy
1277 more than one contiguous range of addresses.
1279 * Target descriptions can now describe registers for PowerPC.
1281 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the AltiVec and SPE
1282 registers on PowerPC targets.
1284 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports thread debugging on GNU/Linux
1285 targets even when the libthread_db library is not available.
1287 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports the new file transfer
1288 commands (remote put, remote get, and remote delete).
1290 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports run and attach in
1291 extended-remote mode.
1293 * hppa*64*-*-hpux11* target broken
1294 The debugger is unable to start a program and fails with the following
1295 error: "Error trying to get information about dynamic linker".
1296 The gdb-6.7 release is also affected.
1298 * GDB now supports the --enable-targets= configure option to allow
1299 building a single GDB executable that supports multiple remote
1300 target architectures.
1302 * GDB now supports debugging C and C++ programs which use the
1303 Decimal Floating Point extension. In addition, the PowerPC target
1304 now has a set of pseudo-registers to inspect decimal float values
1305 stored in two consecutive float registers.
1307 * The -break-insert MI command can optionally create pending
1310 * Improved support for debugging Ada
1311 Many improvements to the Ada language support have been made. These
1313 - Better support for Ada2005 interface types
1314 - Improved handling of arrays and slices in general
1315 - Better support for Taft-amendment types
1316 - The '{type} ADDRESS' expression is now allowed on the left hand-side
1318 - Improved command completion in Ada
1321 * GDB on GNU/Linux and HP/UX can now debug through "exec" of a new
1326 set print frame-arguments (all|scalars|none)
1327 show print frame-arguments
1328 The value of this variable can be changed to control which argument
1329 values should be printed by the debugger when displaying a frame.
1334 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
1341 Transfer files to and from a remote target, and delete remote files.
1343 * New remote packets
1350 Open, close, read, write, and delete files on the remote system.
1353 Attach to an existing process on the remote system, in extended-remote
1357 Run a new process on the remote system, in extended-remote mode.
1359 *** Changes in GDB 6.7
1361 * Resolved 101 resource leaks, null pointer dereferences, etc. in gdb,
1362 bfd, libiberty and opcodes, as revealed by static analysis donated by
1363 Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
1365 * When looking up multiply-defined global symbols, GDB will now prefer the
1366 symbol definition in the current shared library if it was built using the
1367 -Bsymbolic linker option.
1369 * When the Text User Interface (TUI) is not configured, GDB will now
1370 recognize the -tui command-line option and print a message that the TUI
1373 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now has lower overhead for high
1374 frequency signals (e.g. SIGALRM) via the QPassSignals packet.
1376 * GDB for MIPS targets now autodetects whether a remote target provides
1377 32-bit or 64-bit register values.
1379 * Support for C++ member pointers has been improved.
1381 * GDB now understands XML target descriptions, which specify the
1382 target's overall architecture. GDB can read a description from
1383 a local file or over the remote serial protocol.
1385 * Vectors of single-byte data use a new integer type which is not
1386 automatically displayed as character or string data.
1388 * The /s format now works with the print command. It displays
1389 arrays of single-byte integers and pointers to single-byte integers
1392 * Target descriptions can now describe target-specific registers,
1393 for architectures which have implemented the support (currently
1394 only ARM, M68K, and MIPS).
1396 * GDB and the GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now support the XScale
1399 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support
1400 ARM Windows CE (mingw32ce) debugging, and GDB Windows CE support
1401 has been rewritten to use the standard GDB remote protocol.
1403 * GDB can now step into C++ functions which are called through thunks.
1405 * GDB for the Cell/B.E. SPU now supports overlay debugging.
1407 * The GDB remote protocol "qOffsets" packet can now honor ELF segment
1408 layout. It also supports a TextSeg= and DataSeg= response when only
1409 segment base addresses (rather than offsets) are available.
1411 * The /i format now outputs any trailing branch delay slot instructions
1412 immediately following the last instruction within the count specified.
1414 * The GDB remote protocol "T" stop reply packet now supports a
1415 "library" response. Combined with the new "qXfer:libraries:read"
1416 packet, this response allows GDB to debug shared libraries on targets
1417 where the operating system manages the list of loaded libraries (e.g.
1418 Windows and SymbianOS).
1420 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, now supports dynamic link libraries
1421 (DLLs) on Windows and Windows CE targets.
1423 * GDB now supports a faster verification that a .debug file matches its binary
1424 according to its build-id signature, if the signature is present.
1430 Enable or disable hardware flow control (RTS/CTS) on the serial port
1431 when debugging using remote targets.
1433 set mem inaccessible-by-default
1434 show mem inaccessible-by-default
1435 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
1436 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
1437 prevents GDB from accessing memory outside the memory map. This
1438 is useful for targets with memory mapped registers or which react
1439 badly to accesses of unmapped address space.
1441 set breakpoint auto-hw
1442 show breakpoint auto-hw
1443 If the target supplies a memory map, for instance via the remote
1444 protocol's "qXfer:memory-map:read" packet, setting this variable
1445 lets GDB use hardware breakpoints automatically for memory regions
1446 where it can not use software breakpoints. This covers both the
1447 "break" command and internal breakpoints used for other commands
1448 including "next" and "finish".
1451 catch exception unhandled
1452 Stop the program execution when Ada exceptions are raised.
1455 Stop the program execution when an Ada assertion failed.
1459 Set an alternate system root for target files. This is a more
1460 general version of "set solib-absolute-prefix", which is now
1461 an alias to "set sysroot".
1464 Provide extended SPU facility status information. This set of
1465 commands is available only when debugging the Cell/B.E. SPU
1468 * New native configurations
1470 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*openbsd*
1473 unset tdesc filename
1475 Use the specified local file as an XML target description, and do
1476 not query the target for its built-in description.
1480 OpenBSD/sh sh*-*-openbsd*
1481 MIPS64 GNU/Linux (gdbserver) mips64-linux-gnu
1482 Toshiba Media Processor mep-elf
1484 * New remote packets
1487 Ignore the specified signals; pass them directly to the debugged program
1488 without stopping other threads or reporting them to GDB.
1490 qXfer:features:read:
1491 Read an XML target description from the target, which describes its
1496 Read or write contents of an spufs file on the target system. These
1497 packets are available only on the Cell/B.E. SPU architecture.
1499 qXfer:libraries:read:
1500 Report the loaded shared libraries. Combined with new "T" packet
1501 response, this packet allows GDB to debug shared libraries on
1502 targets where the operating system manages the list of loaded
1503 libraries (e.g. Windows and SymbianOS).
1507 Support for these obsolete configurations has been removed.
1515 i[34567]86-*-lynxos*
1516 i[34567]86-*-netware*
1517 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v5*
1518 i[34567]86-*-sco3.2v4*
1520 i[34567]86-*-sysv4.2*
1523 i[34567]86-*-unixware2*
1524 i[34567]86-*-unixware*
1533 * Other removed features
1540 Various m68k-only ROM monitors.
1547 Various Renesas ROM monitors and debugging interfaces for SH and
1552 Support for a Macraigor serial interface to on-chip debugging.
1553 GDB does not directly support the newer parallel or USB
1558 A debug information format. The predecessor to DWARF 2 and
1559 DWARF 3, which are still supported.
1561 Support for the HP aCC compiler on HP-UX/PA-RISC
1563 SOM-encapsulated symbolic debugging information, automatic
1564 invocation of pxdb, and the aCC custom C++ ABI. This does not
1565 affect HP-UX for Itanium or GCC for HP-UX/PA-RISC. Code compiled
1566 with aCC can still be debugged on an assembly level.
1568 MIPS ".pdr" sections
1570 A MIPS-specific format used to describe stack frame layout
1571 in debugging information.
1575 GDB could work with an older version of Guile to debug
1576 the interpreter and Scheme programs running in it.
1578 set mips stack-arg-size
1579 set mips saved-gpreg-size
1581 Use "set mips abi" to control parameter passing for MIPS.
1583 *** Changes in GDB 6.6
1588 Cell Broadband Engine SPU spu-elf
1590 * GDB can now be configured as a cross-debugger targeting native Windows
1591 (mingw32) or Cygwin. It can communicate with a remote debugging stub
1592 running on a Windows system over TCP/IP to debug Windows programs.
1594 * The GDB remote stub, gdbserver, has been updated to support Windows and
1595 Cygwin debugging. Both single-threaded and multi-threaded programs are
1598 * The "set trust-readonly-sections" command works again. This command was
1599 broken in GDB 6.3, 6.4, and 6.5.
1601 * The "load" command now supports writing to flash memory, if the remote
1602 stub provides the required support.
1604 * Support for GNU/Linux Thread Local Storage (TLS, per-thread variables) no
1605 longer requires symbolic debug information (e.g. DWARF-2).
1610 unset substitute-path
1611 show substitute-path
1612 Manage a list of substitution rules that GDB uses to rewrite the name
1613 of the directories where the sources are located. This can be useful
1614 for instance when the sources were moved to a different location
1615 between compilation and debugging.
1619 Print each CLI command as it is executed. Each command is prefixed with
1620 a number of `+' symbols representing the nesting depth.
1621 The source command now has a `-v' option to enable the same feature.
1625 The ARM Demon monitor support (RDP protocol, "target rdp").
1627 Kernel Object Display, an embedded debugging feature which only worked with
1628 an obsolete version of Cisco IOS.
1630 The 'set download-write-size' and 'show download-write-size' commands.
1632 * New remote packets
1635 Tell a stub about GDB client features, and request remote target features.
1636 The first feature implemented is PacketSize, which allows the target to
1637 specify the size of packets it can handle - to minimize the number of
1638 packets required and improve performance when connected to a remote
1642 Fetch an OS auxilliary vector from the remote stub. This packet is a
1643 more efficient replacement for qPart:auxv:read.
1645 qXfer:memory-map:read:
1646 Fetch a memory map from the remote stub, including information about
1647 RAM, ROM, and flash memory devices.
1652 Erase and program a flash memory device.
1654 * Removed remote packets
1657 This packet has been replaced by qXfer:auxv:read. Only GDB 6.4 and 6.5
1658 used it, and only gdbserver implemented it.
1660 *** Changes in GDB 6.5
1664 Renesas M32C/M16C m32c-elf
1666 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
1670 init-if-undefined Initialize a convenience variable, but
1671 only if it doesn't already have a value.
1673 The following commands are presently only implemented for native GNU/Linux:
1675 checkpoint Save a snapshot of the program state.
1677 restart <n> Return the program state to a
1678 previously saved state.
1680 info checkpoints List currently saved checkpoints.
1682 delete-checkpoint <n> Delete a previously saved checkpoint.
1684 set|show detach-on-fork Tell gdb whether to detach from a newly
1685 forked process, or to keep debugging it.
1687 info forks List forks of the user program that
1688 are available to be debugged.
1690 fork <n> Switch to debugging one of several
1691 forks of the user program that are
1692 available to be debugged.
1694 delete-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
1695 that are available to be debugged (and
1696 kill the forked process).
1698 detach-fork <n> Delete a fork from the list of forks
1699 that are available to be debugged (and
1700 allow the process to continue).
1704 Morpho Technologies ms2 ms1-elf
1706 * Improved Windows host support
1708 GDB now builds as a cross debugger hosted on i686-mingw32, including
1709 native console support, and remote communications using either
1710 network sockets or serial ports.
1712 * Improved Modula-2 language support
1714 GDB can now print most types in the Modula-2 syntax. This includes:
1715 basic types, set types, record types, enumerated types, range types,
1716 pointer types and ARRAY types. Procedure var parameters are correctly
1717 printed and hexadecimal addresses and character constants are also
1718 written in the Modula-2 syntax. Best results can be obtained by using
1719 GNU Modula-2 together with the -gdwarf-2 command line option.
1723 The ARM rdi-share module.
1725 The Netware NLM debug server.
1727 *** Changes in GDB 6.4
1729 * New native configurations
1731 OpenBSD/arm arm*-*-openbsd*
1732 OpenBSD/mips64 mips64-*-openbsd*
1736 Morpho Technologies ms1 ms1-elf
1738 * New command line options
1740 --batch-silent As for --batch, but totally silent.
1741 --return-child-result The debugger will exist with the same value
1742 the child (debugged) program exited with.
1743 --eval-command COMMAND, -ex COMMAND
1744 Execute a single GDB CLI command. This may be
1745 specified multiple times and in conjunction
1746 with the --command (-x) option.
1748 * Deprecated commands removed
1750 The following commands, that were deprecated in 2000, have been
1754 set|show arm disassembly-flavor set|show arm disassembler
1755 othernames set arm disassembler
1756 set|show remotedebug set|show debug remote
1757 set|show archdebug set|show debug arch
1758 set|show eventdebug set|show debug event
1761 * New BSD user-level threads support
1763 It is now possible to debug programs using the user-level threads
1764 library on OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Currently supported (target)
1767 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1768 FreeBSD/i386 i386-*-freebsd*
1769 OpenBSD/i386 i386-*-openbsd*
1771 Note that the new kernel threads libraries introduced in FreeBSD 5.x
1772 are not yet supported.
1774 * New support for Matsushita MN10300 w/sim added
1775 (Work in progress). mn10300-elf.
1777 * REMOVED configurations and files
1779 VxWorks and the XDR protocol *-*-vxworks
1780 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
1781 National Semiconductor NS32000 ns32k-*-*
1783 * New "set print array-indexes" command
1785 After turning this setting "on", GDB prints the index of each element
1786 when displaying arrays. The default is "off" to preserve the previous
1789 * VAX floating point support
1791 GDB now supports the not-quite-ieee VAX F and D floating point formats.
1793 * User-defined command support
1795 In addition to using $arg0..$arg9 for argument passing, it is now possible
1796 to use $argc to determine now many arguments have been passed. See the
1797 section on user-defined commands in the user manual for more information.
1799 *** Changes in GDB 6.3:
1801 * New command line option
1803 GDB now accepts -l followed by a number to set the timeout for remote
1806 * GDB works with GCC -feliminate-dwarf2-dups
1808 GDB now supports a more compact representation of DWARF-2 debug
1809 information using DW_FORM_ref_addr references. These are produced
1810 by GCC with the option -feliminate-dwarf2-dups and also by some
1811 proprietary compilers. With GCC, you must use GCC 3.3.4 or later
1812 to use -feliminate-dwarf2-dups.
1814 * Internationalization
1816 When supported by the host system, GDB will be built with
1817 internationalization (libintl). The task of marking up the sources is
1818 continued, we're looking forward to our first translation.
1822 Initial support for debugging programs compiled with the GNAT
1823 implementation of the Ada programming language has been integrated
1824 into GDB. In this release, support is limited to expression evaluation.
1826 * New native configurations
1828 GNU/Linux/m32r m32r-*-linux-gnu
1832 GDB's remote protocol now includes support for the 'p' packet. This
1833 packet is used to fetch individual registers from a remote inferior.
1835 * END-OF-LIFE registers[] compatibility module
1837 GDB's internal register infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
1838 The new infrastructure making possible the implementation of key new
1839 features including 32x64 (e.g., 64-bit amd64 GDB debugging a 32-bit
1842 GDB 6.3 will be the last release to include the the registers[]
1843 compatibility module that allowed out-of-date configurations to
1844 continue to work. This change directly impacts the following
1854 powerpc bdm protocol
1856 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
1857 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.4, and REMOVED from GDB 6.5.
1859 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
1861 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
1862 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
1863 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
1864 permanently REMOVED.
1873 *** Changes in GDB 6.2.1:
1875 * MIPS `break main; run' gave an heuristic-fence-post warning
1877 When attempting to run even a simple program, a warning about
1878 heuristic-fence-post being hit would be reported. This problem has
1881 * MIPS IRIX 'long double' crashed GDB
1883 When examining a long double variable, GDB would get a segmentation
1884 fault. The crash has been fixed (but GDB 6.2 cannot correctly examine
1885 IRIX long double values).
1889 A bug in the VAX stack code was causing problems with the "next"
1890 command. This problem has been fixed.
1892 *** Changes in GDB 6.2:
1894 * Fix for ``many threads''
1896 On GNU/Linux systems that use the NPTL threads library, a program
1897 rapidly creating and deleting threads would confuse GDB leading to the
1900 ptrace: No such process.
1901 thread_db_get_info: cannot get thread info: generic error
1903 This problem has been fixed.
1905 * "-async" and "-noasync" options removed.
1907 Support for the broken "-noasync" option has been removed (it caused
1910 * New ``start'' command.
1912 This command runs the program until the begining of the main procedure.
1914 * New BSD Kernel Data Access Library (libkvm) interface
1916 Using ``target kvm'' it is now possible to debug kernel core dumps and
1917 live kernel memory images on various FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD
1918 platforms. Currently supported (native-only) configurations are:
1920 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
1921 FreeBSD/i386 i?86-*-freebsd*
1922 NetBSD/i386 i?86-*-netbsd*
1923 NetBSD/m68k m68*-*-netbsd*
1924 NetBSD/sparc sparc-*-netbsd*
1925 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
1926 OpenBSD/i386 i?86-*-openbsd*
1927 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-openbsd*
1928 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
1930 * Signal trampoline code overhauled
1932 Many generic problems with GDB's signal handling code have been fixed.
1933 These include: backtraces through non-contiguous stacks; recognition
1934 of sa_sigaction signal trampolines; backtrace from a NULL pointer
1935 call; backtrace through a signal trampoline; step into and out of
1936 signal handlers; and single-stepping in the signal trampoline.
1938 Please note that kernel bugs are a limiting factor here. These
1939 features have been shown to work on an s390 GNU/Linux system that
1940 include a 2.6.8-rc1 kernel. Ref PR breakpoints/1702.
1942 * Cygwin support for DWARF 2 added.
1944 * New native configurations
1946 GNU/Linux/hppa hppa*-*-linux*
1947 OpenBSD/hppa hppa*-*-openbsd*
1948 OpenBSD/m68k m68*-*-openbsd*
1949 OpenBSD/m88k m88*-*-openbsd*
1950 OpenBSD/powerpc powerpc-*-openbsd*
1951 NetBSD/vax vax-*-netbsd*
1952 OpenBSD/vax vax-*-openbsd*
1954 * END-OF-LIFE frame compatibility module
1956 GDB's internal frame infrastructure has been completely rewritten.
1957 The new infrastructure making it possible to support key new features
1958 including DWARF 2 Call Frame Information. To aid in the task of
1959 migrating old configurations to this new infrastructure, a
1960 compatibility module, that allowed old configurations to continue to
1961 work, was also included.
1963 GDB 6.2 will be the last release to include this frame compatibility
1964 module. This change directly impacts the following configurations:
1974 Unless there is activity to revive these configurations, they will be
1975 made OBSOLETE in GDB 6.3, and REMOVED from GDB 6.4.
1977 * REMOVED configurations and files
1979 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
1980 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
1981 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
1982 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
1983 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
1984 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
1985 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
1986 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
1987 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
1988 sonymips mips-sony-*
1989 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
1991 *** Changes in GDB 6.1.1:
1993 * TUI (Text-mode User Interface) built-in (also included in GDB 6.1)
1995 The TUI (Text-mode User Interface) is now built as part of a default
1996 GDB configuration. It is enabled by either selecting the TUI with the
1997 command line option "-i=tui" or by running the separate "gdbtui"
1998 program. For more information on the TUI, see the manual "Debugging
2001 * Pending breakpoint support (also included in GDB 6.1)
2003 Support has been added to allow you to specify breakpoints in shared
2004 libraries that have not yet been loaded. If a breakpoint location
2005 cannot be found, and the "breakpoint pending" option is set to auto,
2006 GDB queries you if you wish to make the breakpoint pending on a future
2007 shared-library load. If and when GDB resolves the breakpoint symbol,
2008 the pending breakpoint is removed as one or more regular breakpoints
2011 Pending breakpoints are very useful for GCJ Java debugging.
2013 * Fixed ISO-C build problems
2015 The files bfd/elf-bfd.h, gdb/dictionary.c and gdb/types.c contained
2016 non ISO-C code that stopped them being built using a more strict ISO-C
2017 compiler (e.g., IBM's C compiler).
2019 * Fixed build problem on IRIX 5
2021 Due to header problems with <sys/proc.h>, the file gdb/proc-api.c
2022 wasn't able to compile compile on an IRIX 5 system.
2024 * Added execute permission to gdb/gdbserver/configure
2026 The shell script gdb/testsuite/gdb.stabs/configure lacked execute
2027 permission. This bug would cause configure to fail on a number of
2028 systems (Solaris, IRIX). Ref: server/519.
2030 * Fixed build problem on hpux2.0w-hp-hpux11.00 using the HP ANSI C compiler
2032 Older HPUX ANSI C compilers did not accept variable array sizes. somsolib.c
2033 has been updated to use constant array sizes.
2035 * Fixed a panic in the DWARF Call Frame Info code on Solaris 2.7
2037 GCC 3.3.2, on Solaris 2.7, includes the DW_EH_PE_funcrel encoding in
2038 its generated DWARF Call Frame Info. This encoding was causing GDB to
2039 panic, that panic has been fixed. Ref: gdb/1628.
2041 * Fixed a problem when examining parameters in shared library code.
2043 When examining parameters in optimized shared library code generated
2044 by a mainline GCC, GDB would incorrectly report ``Variable "..." is
2045 not available''. GDB now correctly displays the variable's value.
2047 *** Changes in GDB 6.1:
2049 * Removed --with-mmalloc
2051 Support for the mmalloc memory manager has been removed, as it
2052 conflicted with the internal gdb byte cache.
2054 * Changes in AMD64 configurations
2056 The AMD64 target now includes the %cs and %ss registers. As a result
2057 the AMD64 remote protocol has changed; this affects the floating-point
2058 and SSE registers. If you rely on those registers for your debugging,
2059 you should upgrade gdbserver on the remote side.
2061 * Revised SPARC target
2063 The SPARC target has been completely revised, incorporating the
2064 FreeBSD/sparc64 support that was added for GDB 6.0. As a result
2065 support for LynxOS and SunOS 4 has been dropped. Calling functions
2066 from within GDB on operating systems with a non-executable stack
2067 (Solaris, OpenBSD) now works.
2071 GDB has a new C++ demangler which does a better job on the mangled
2072 names generated by current versions of g++. It also runs faster, so
2073 with this and other changes gdb should now start faster on large C++
2076 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
2078 GDB support for location expressions has been extended to support function
2079 arguments and frame bases. Older versions of GDB could crash when they
2082 * C++ nested types and namespaces
2084 GDB's support for nested types and namespaces in C++ has been
2085 improved, especially if you use the DWARF 2 debugging format. (This
2086 is the default for recent versions of GCC on most platforms.)
2087 Specifically, if you have a class "Inner" defined within a class or
2088 namespace "Outer", then GDB realizes that the class's name is
2089 "Outer::Inner", not simply "Inner". This should greatly reduce the
2090 frequency of complaints about not finding RTTI symbols. In addition,
2091 if you are stopped at inside of a function defined within a namespace,
2092 GDB modifies its name lookup accordingly.
2094 * New native configurations
2096 NetBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-netbsd*
2097 OpenBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-openbsd*
2098 OpenBSD/alpha alpha*-*-openbsd*
2099 OpenBSD/sparc sparc-*-openbsd*
2100 OpenBSD/sparc64 sparc64-*-openbsd*
2102 * New debugging protocols
2104 M32R with SDI protocol m32r-*-elf*
2106 * "set prompt-escape-char" command deleted.
2108 The command "set prompt-escape-char" has been deleted. This command,
2109 and its very obscure effet on GDB's prompt, was never documented,
2110 tested, nor mentioned in the NEWS file.
2112 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2114 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2115 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2116 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2117 permanently REMOVED.
2119 Sun 3, running SunOS 3 m68*-*-sunos3*
2120 Sun 3, running SunOS 4 m68*-*-sunos4*
2121 Sun 2, running SunOS 3 m68000-*-sunos3*
2122 Sun 2, running SunOS 4 m68000-*-sunos4*
2123 Motorola 680x0 running LynxOS m68*-*-lynxos*
2124 AT&T 3b1/Unix pc m68*-att-*
2125 Bull DPX2 (68k, System V release 3) m68*-bull-sysv*
2126 decstation mips-dec-* mips-little-*
2127 riscos mips-*-riscos* mips-*-sysv*
2128 sonymips mips-sony-*
2129 sysv mips*-*-sysv4* (IRIX 5/6 not included)
2131 * REMOVED configurations and files
2133 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
2134 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
2135 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2136 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
2137 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2138 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
2139 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2140 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
2141 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2142 386BSD i[3456]86-*-bsd*
2143 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
2144 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
2145 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
2146 SPARC running LynxOS sparc-*-lynxos*
2147 SPARC running SunOS 4 sparc-*-sunos4*
2148 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2149 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
2151 *** Changes in GDB 6.0:
2155 Support for debugging the Objective-C programming language has been
2156 integrated into GDB.
2158 * New backtrace mechanism (includes DWARF 2 Call Frame Information).
2160 DWARF 2's Call Frame Information makes available compiler generated
2161 information that more exactly describes the program's run-time stack.
2162 By using this information, GDB is able to provide more robust stack
2165 The i386, amd64 (nee, x86-64), Alpha, m68hc11, ia64, and m32r targets
2166 have been updated to use a new backtrace mechanism which includes
2167 DWARF 2 CFI support.
2171 GDB's remote protocol has been extended to include support for hosted
2172 file I/O (where the remote target uses GDB's file system). See GDB's
2173 remote protocol documentation for details.
2175 * All targets using the new architecture framework.
2177 All of GDB's targets have been updated to use the new internal
2178 architecture framework. The way is now open for future GDB releases
2179 to include cross-architecture native debugging support (i386 on amd64,
2182 * GNU/Linux's Thread Local Storage (TLS)
2184 GDB now includes support for for the GNU/Linux implementation of
2185 per-thread variables.
2187 * GNU/Linux's Native POSIX Thread Library (NPTL)
2189 GDB's thread code has been updated to work with either the new
2190 GNU/Linux NPTL thread library or the older "LinuxThreads" library.
2192 * Separate debug info.
2194 GDB, in conjunction with BINUTILS, now supports a mechanism for
2195 automatically loading debug information from a separate file. Instead
2196 of shipping full debug and non-debug versions of system libraries,
2197 system integrators can now instead ship just the stripped libraries
2198 and optional debug files.
2200 * DWARF 2 Location Expressions
2202 DWARF 2 Location Expressions allow the compiler to more completely
2203 describe the location of variables (even in optimized code) to the
2206 GDB now includes preliminary support for location expressions (support
2207 for DW_OP_piece is still missing).
2211 A number of long standing bugs that caused GDB to die while starting a
2212 Java application have been fixed. GDB's Java support is now
2213 considered "useable".
2215 * GNU/Linux support for fork, vfork, and exec.
2217 The "catch fork", "catch exec", "catch vfork", and "set follow-fork-mode"
2218 commands are now implemented for GNU/Linux. They require a 2.5.x or later
2221 * GDB supports logging output to a file
2223 There are two new commands, "set logging" and "show logging", which can be
2224 used to capture GDB's output to a file.
2226 * The meaning of "detach" has changed for gdbserver
2228 The "detach" command will now resume the application, as documented. To
2229 disconnect from gdbserver and leave it stopped, use the new "disconnect"
2232 * d10v, m68hc11 `regs' command deprecated
2234 The `info registers' command has been updated so that it displays the
2235 registers using a format identical to the old `regs' command.
2239 A new command, "maint set profile on/off", has been added. This command can
2240 be used to enable or disable profiling while running GDB, to profile a
2241 session or a set of commands. In addition there is a new configure switch,
2242 "--enable-profiling", which will cause GDB to be compiled with profiling
2243 data, for more informative profiling results.
2245 * Default MI syntax changed to "mi2".
2247 The default MI (machine interface) syntax, enabled by the command line
2248 option "-i=mi", has been changed to "mi2". The previous MI syntax,
2249 "mi1", can be enabled by specifying the option "-i=mi1".
2251 Support for the original "mi0" syntax (included in GDB 5.0) has been
2254 Fix for gdb/192: removed extraneous space when displaying frame level.
2255 Fix for gdb/672: update changelist is now output in mi list format.
2256 Fix for gdb/702: a -var-assign that updates the value now shows up
2257 in a subsequent -var-update.
2259 * New native configurations.
2261 FreeBSD/amd64 x86_64-*-freebsd*
2263 * Multi-arched targets.
2265 HP/PA HPUX11 hppa*-*-hpux*
2266 Renesas M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
2268 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2270 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2271 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2272 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2273 permanently REMOVED.
2275 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
2276 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
2277 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
2278 HP/PA running BSD hppa*-*-bsd*
2279 HP/PA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
2280 HP/PA Pro target hppa*-*-pro*
2281 PMAX (MIPS) running Mach 3.0 mips*-*-mach3*
2282 Sequent family i[3456]86-sequent-sysv4*
2283 i[3456]86-sequent-sysv*
2284 i[3456]86-sequent-bsd*
2285 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
2286 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
2288 * REMOVED configurations and files
2291 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2292 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
2293 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
2294 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
2295 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
2296 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
2298 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
2299 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
2300 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
2301 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
2302 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2303 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
2305 * MIPS $fp behavior changed
2307 The convenience variable $fp, for the MIPS, now consistently returns
2308 the address of the current frame's base. Previously, depending on the
2309 context, $fp could refer to either $sp or the current frame's base
2310 address. See ``8.10 Registers'' in the manual ``Debugging with GDB:
2311 The GNU Source-Level Debugger''.
2313 *** Changes in GDB 5.3:
2315 * GNU/Linux shared library multi-threaded performance improved.
2317 When debugging a multi-threaded application on GNU/Linux, GDB now uses
2318 `/proc', in preference to `ptrace' for memory reads. This may result
2319 in an improvement in the start-up time of multi-threaded, shared
2320 library applications when run under GDB. One GDB user writes: ``loads
2321 shared libs like mad''.
2323 * ``gdbserver'' now supports multi-threaded applications on some targets
2325 Support for debugging multi-threaded applications which use
2326 the GNU/Linux LinuxThreads package has been added for
2327 arm*-*-linux*-gnu*, i[3456]86-*-linux*-gnu*, mips*-*-linux*-gnu*,
2328 powerpc*-*-linux*-gnu*, and sh*-*-linux*-gnu*.
2330 * GDB now supports C/C++ preprocessor macros.
2332 GDB now expands preprocessor macro invocations in C/C++ expressions,
2333 and provides various commands for showing macro definitions and how
2336 The new command `macro expand EXPRESSION' expands any macro
2337 invocations in expression, and shows the result.
2339 The new command `show macro MACRO-NAME' shows the definition of the
2340 macro named MACRO-NAME, and where it was defined.
2342 Most compilers don't include information about macros in the debugging
2343 information by default. In GCC 3.1, for example, you need to compile
2344 your program with the options `-gdwarf-2 -g3'. If the macro
2345 information is present in the executable, GDB will read it.
2347 * Multi-arched targets.
2349 DEC Alpha (partial) alpha*-*-*
2350 DEC VAX (partial) vax-*-*
2352 National Semiconductor NS32000 (partial) ns32k-*-*
2353 Motorola 68000 (partial) m68k-*-*
2354 Motorola MCORE mcore-*-*
2358 Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat frv*-*-*
2361 * New native configurations
2363 Alpha NetBSD alpha*-*-netbsd*
2364 SH NetBSD sh*-*-netbsdelf*
2365 MIPS NetBSD mips*-*-netbsd*
2366 UltraSPARC NetBSD sparc64-*-netbsd*
2368 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2370 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2371 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2372 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2373 permanently REMOVED.
2375 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
2376 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
2377 IBM AIX PS/2 i[3456]86-*-aix
2378 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
2379 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
2380 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
2381 i386 running Mach 3.0 i[3456]86-*-mach3*
2382 i386 running Mach i[3456]86-*-mach*
2383 i386 running OSF/1 i[3456]86-*osf1mk*
2384 HP/Apollo 68k Family m68*-apollo*-sysv*,
2386 m68*-hp-bsd*, m68*-hp-hpux*
2387 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
2389 * OBSOLETE languages
2391 CHILL, a Pascal like language used by telecommunications companies.
2393 * REMOVED configurations and files
2395 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
2396 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2397 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2398 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2399 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2401 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
2403 * New command "set max-user-call-depth <nnn>"
2405 This command allows the user to limit the call depth of user-defined
2406 commands. The default is 1024.
2408 * Changes in FreeBSD/i386 native debugging.
2410 Support for the "generate-core-file" has been added.
2412 * New commands "dump", "append", and "restore".
2414 These commands allow data to be copied from target memory
2415 to a bfd-format or binary file (dump and append), and back
2416 from a file into memory (restore).
2418 * Improved "next/step" support on multi-processor Alpha Tru64.
2420 The previous single-step mechanism could cause unpredictable problems,
2421 including the random appearance of SIGSEGV or SIGTRAP signals. The use
2422 of a software single-step mechanism prevents this.
2424 *** Changes in GDB 5.2.1:
2432 gdb/182: gdb/323: gdb/237: On alpha, gdb was reporting:
2433 mdebugread.c:2443: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_data not initialized
2434 Fix, by Joel Brobecker imported from mainline.
2436 gdb/439: gdb/291: On some ELF object files, gdb was reporting:
2437 dwarf2read.c:1072: gdb-internal-error: sect_index_text not initialize
2438 Fix, by Fred Fish, imported from mainline.
2440 Dwarf2 .debug_frame & .eh_frame handler improved in many ways.
2441 Surprisingly enough, it works now.
2442 By Michal Ludvig, imported from mainline.
2444 i386 hardware watchpoint support:
2445 avoid misses on second run for some targets.
2446 By Pierre Muller, imported from mainline.
2448 *** Changes in GDB 5.2:
2450 * New command "set trust-readonly-sections on[off]".
2452 This command is a hint that tells gdb that read-only sections
2453 really are read-only (ie. that their contents will not change).
2454 In this mode, gdb will go to the object file rather than the
2455 target to read memory from read-only sections (such as ".text").
2456 This can be a significant performance improvement on some
2457 (notably embedded) targets.
2459 * New command "generate-core-file" (or "gcore").
2461 This new gdb command allows the user to drop a core file of the child
2462 process state at any time. So far it's been implemented only for
2463 GNU/Linux and Solaris, but should be relatively easily ported to other
2464 hosts. Argument is core file name (defaults to core.<pid>).
2466 * New command line option
2468 GDB now accepts --pid or -p followed by a process id.
2470 * Change in command line behavior -- corefiles vs. process ids.
2472 There is a subtle behavior in the way in which GDB handles
2473 command line arguments. The first non-flag argument is always
2474 a program to debug, but the second non-flag argument may either
2475 be a corefile or a process id. Previously, GDB would attempt to
2476 open the second argument as a corefile, and if that failed, would
2477 issue a superfluous error message and then attempt to attach it as
2478 a process. Now, if the second argument begins with a non-digit,
2479 it will be treated as a corefile. If it begins with a digit,
2480 GDB will attempt to attach it as a process, and if no such process
2481 is found, will then attempt to open it as a corefile.
2483 * Changes in ARM configurations.
2485 Multi-arch support is enabled for all ARM configurations. The ARM/NetBSD
2486 configuration is fully multi-arch.
2488 * New native configurations
2490 ARM NetBSD arm*-*-netbsd*
2491 x86 OpenBSD i[3456]86-*-openbsd*
2492 AMD x86-64 running GNU/Linux x86_64-*-linux-*
2493 Sparc64 running FreeBSD sparc64-*-freebsd*
2497 Sanyo XStormy16 xstormy16-elf
2499 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2501 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2502 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2503 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2504 permanently REMOVED.
2506 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi, udi29k
2507 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
2508 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
2509 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
2510 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
2512 testsuite/gdb.hp/gdb.threads-hp/ directory
2514 * REMOVED configurations and files
2516 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2518 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2519 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2520 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
2521 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
2522 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
2523 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
2524 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
2525 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
2526 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
2527 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
2528 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host and target N/A host, powerpc-*-macos*
2530 * Changes to command line processing
2532 The new `--args' feature can be used to specify command-line arguments
2533 for the inferior from gdb's command line.
2535 * Changes to key bindings
2537 There is a new `operate-and-get-next' function bound to `C-o'.
2539 *** Changes in GDB 5.1.1
2541 Fix compile problem on DJGPP.
2543 Fix a problem with floating-point registers on the i386 being
2546 Fix to stop GDB crashing on .debug_str debug info.
2548 Numerous documentation fixes.
2550 Numerous testsuite fixes.
2552 *** Changes in GDB 5.1:
2554 * New native configurations
2556 Alpha FreeBSD alpha*-*-freebsd*
2557 x86 FreeBSD 3.x and 4.x i[3456]86*-freebsd[34]*
2558 MIPS GNU/Linux mips*-*-linux*
2559 MIPS SGI Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
2560 ia64 AIX ia64-*-aix*
2561 s390 and s390x GNU/Linux {s390,s390x}-*-linux*
2565 Motorola 68HC11 and 68HC12 m68hc11-elf
2567 UltraSparc running GNU/Linux sparc64-*-linux*
2569 * OBSOLETE configurations and files
2571 x86 FreeBSD before 2.2 i[3456]86*-freebsd{1,2.[01]}*,
2572 Harris/CXUX m88k m88*-harris-cxux*
2573 Most ns32k hosts and targets ns32k-*-mach3* ns32k-umax-*
2574 ns32k-utek-sysv* ns32k-utek-*
2575 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2577 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1 a29k-nyu-sym1 a29k-*-kern*
2578 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
2579 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
2580 PowerPC Netware powerpc-*-netware*
2581 SunOS 4.0.Xi on i386 i[3456]86-*-sunos*
2582 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x m68*-sony-sysv news
2583 ISI Optimum V (3.05) under 4.3bsd. m68*-isi-*
2584 Apple Macintosh (MPW) host N/A
2586 stuff.c (Program to stuff files into a specially prepared space in kdb)
2587 kdb-start.c (Main loop for the standalone kernel debugger)
2589 Configurations that have been declared obsolete in this release have
2590 been commented out. Unless there is activity to revive these
2591 configurations, the next release of GDB will have their sources
2592 permanently REMOVED.
2594 * REMOVED configurations and files
2596 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
2597 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
2599 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
2603 * GDB has been converted to ISO C.
2605 GDB's source code has been converted to ISO C. In particular, the
2606 sources are fully protoized, and rely on standard headers being
2611 * "info symbol" works on platforms which use COFF, ECOFF, XCOFF, and NLM.
2613 * The MI enabled by default.
2615 The new machine oriented interface (MI) introduced in GDB 5.0 has been
2616 revised and enabled by default. Packages which use GDB as a debugging
2617 engine behind a UI or another front end are encouraged to switch to
2618 using the GDB/MI interface, instead of the old annotations interface
2619 which is now deprecated.
2621 * Support for debugging Pascal programs.
2623 GDB now includes support for debugging Pascal programs. The following
2624 main features are supported:
2626 - Pascal-specific data types such as sets;
2628 - automatic recognition of Pascal sources based on file-name
2631 - Pascal-style display of data types, variables, and functions;
2633 - a Pascal expression parser.
2635 However, some important features are not yet supported.
2637 - Pascal string operations are not supported at all;
2639 - there are some problems with boolean types;
2641 - Pascal type hexadecimal constants are not supported
2642 because they conflict with the internal variables format;
2644 - support for Pascal objects and classes is not full yet;
2646 - unlike Pascal, GDB is case-sensitive for symbol names.
2648 * Changes in completion.
2650 Commands such as `shell', `run' and `set args', which pass arguments
2651 to inferior programs, now complete on file names, similar to what
2652 users expect at the shell prompt.
2654 Commands which accept locations, such as `disassemble', `print',
2655 `breakpoint', `until', etc. now complete on filenames as well as
2656 program symbols. Thus, if you type "break foob TAB", and the source
2657 files linked into the programs include `foobar.c', that file name will
2658 be one of the candidates for completion. However, file names are not
2659 considered for completion after you typed a colon that delimits a file
2660 name from a name of a function in that file, as in "break foo.c:bar".
2662 `set demangle-style' completes on available demangling styles.
2664 * New platform-independent commands:
2666 It is now possible to define a post-hook for a command as well as a
2667 hook that runs before the command. For more details, see the
2668 documentation of `hookpost' in the GDB manual.
2670 * Changes in GNU/Linux native debugging.
2672 Support for debugging multi-threaded programs has been completely
2673 revised for all platforms except m68k and sparc. You can now debug as
2674 many threads as your system allows you to have.
2676 Attach/detach is supported for multi-threaded programs.
2678 Support for SSE registers was added for x86. This doesn't work for
2679 multi-threaded programs though.
2681 * Changes in MIPS configurations.
2683 Multi-arch support is enabled for all MIPS configurations.
2685 GDB can now be built as native debugger on SGI Irix 6.x systems for
2686 debugging n32 executables. (Debugging 64-bit executables is not yet
2689 * Unified support for hardware watchpoints in all x86 configurations.
2691 Most (if not all) native x86 configurations support hardware-assisted
2692 breakpoints and watchpoints in a unified manner. This support
2693 implements debug register sharing between watchpoints, which allows to
2694 put a virtually infinite number of watchpoints on the same address,
2695 and also supports watching regions up to 16 bytes with several debug
2698 The new maintenance command `maintenance show-debug-regs' toggles
2699 debugging print-outs in functions that insert, remove, and test
2700 watchpoints and hardware breakpoints.
2702 * Changes in the DJGPP native configuration.
2704 New command ``info dos sysinfo'' displays assorted information about
2705 the CPU, OS, memory, and DPMI server.
2707 New commands ``info dos gdt'', ``info dos ldt'', and ``info dos idt''
2708 display information about segment descriptors stored in GDT, LDT, and
2711 New commands ``info dos pde'' and ``info dos pte'' display entries
2712 from Page Directory and Page Tables (for now works with CWSDPMI only).
2713 New command ``info dos address-pte'' displays the Page Table entry for
2714 a given linear address.
2716 GDB can now pass command lines longer than 126 characters to the
2717 program being debugged (requires an update to the libdbg.a library
2718 which is part of the DJGPP development kit).
2720 DWARF2 debug info is now supported.
2722 It is now possible to `step' and `next' through calls to `longjmp'.
2724 * Changes in documentation.
2726 All GDB documentation was converted to GFDL, the GNU Free
2727 Documentation License.
2729 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
2732 TUI, the Text-mode User Interface, is now documented in the manual.
2734 Tracepoints-related commands are now fully documented in the GDB
2737 The "GDB Internals" manual now has an index. It also includes
2738 documentation of `ui_out' functions, GDB coding standards, x86
2739 hardware watchpoints, and memory region attributes.
2741 * GDB's version number moved to ``version.in''
2743 The Makefile variable VERSION has been replaced by the file
2744 ``version.in''. People creating GDB distributions should update the
2745 contents of this file.
2749 GUD support is now a standard part of the EMACS distribution.
2751 *** Changes in GDB 5.0:
2753 * Improved support for debugging FP programs on x86 targets
2755 Unified and much-improved support for debugging floating-point
2756 programs on all x86 targets. In particular, ``info float'' now
2757 displays the FP registers in the same format on all x86 targets, with
2758 greater level of detail.
2760 * Improvements and bugfixes in hardware-assisted watchpoints
2762 It is now possible to watch array elements, struct members, and
2763 bitfields with hardware-assisted watchpoints. Data-read watchpoints
2764 on x86 targets no longer erroneously trigger when the address is
2767 * Improvements in the native DJGPP version of GDB
2769 The distribution now includes all the scripts and auxiliary files
2770 necessary to build the native DJGPP version on MS-DOS/MS-Windows
2771 machines ``out of the box''.
2773 The DJGPP version can now debug programs that use signals. It is
2774 possible to catch signals that happened in the debuggee, deliver
2775 signals to it, interrupt it with Ctrl-C, etc. (Previously, a signal
2776 would kill the program being debugged.) Programs that hook hardware
2777 interrupts (keyboard, timer, etc.) can also be debugged.
2779 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that redirect their
2780 standard handles or switch them to raw (as opposed to cooked) mode, or
2781 even close them. The command ``run < foo > bar'' works as expected,
2782 and ``info terminal'' reports useful information about the debuggee's
2783 terminal, including raw/cooked mode, redirection, etc.
2785 The DJGPP version now uses termios functions for console I/O, which
2786 enables debugging graphics programs. Interrupting GDB with Ctrl-C
2789 DOS-style file names with drive letters are now fully supported by
2792 It is now possible to debug DJGPP programs that switch their working
2793 directory. It is also possible to rerun the debuggee any number of
2794 times without restarting GDB; thus, you can use the same setup,
2795 breakpoints, etc. for many debugging sessions.
2797 * New native configurations
2799 ARM GNU/Linux arm*-*-linux*
2800 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
2804 Motorola MCore mcore-*-*
2805 x86 VxWorks i[3456]86-*-vxworks*
2806 PowerPC VxWorks powerpc-*-vxworks*
2807 TI TMS320C80 tic80-*-*
2809 * OBSOLETE configurations
2811 Altos 3068 m68*-altos-*
2812 Convex c1-*-*, c2-*-*
2814 ARM RISCix arm-*-* (as host)
2817 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
2818 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
2819 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
2820 be permanently REMOVED.
2822 * Gould support removed
2824 Support for the Gould PowerNode and NP1 has been removed.
2826 * New features for SVR4
2828 On SVR4 native platforms (such as Solaris), if you attach to a process
2829 without first loading a symbol file, GDB will now attempt to locate and
2830 load symbols from the running process's executable file.
2832 * Many C++ enhancements
2834 C++ support has been greatly improved. Overload resolution now works properly
2835 in almost all cases. RTTI support is on the way.
2837 * Remote targets can connect to a sub-program
2839 A popen(3) style serial-device has been added. This device starts a
2840 sub-process (such as a stand-alone simulator) and then communicates
2841 with that. The sub-program to run is specified using the syntax
2842 ``|<program> <args>'' vis:
2844 (gdb) set remotedebug 1
2845 (gdb) target extended-remote |mn10300-elf-sim program-args
2847 * MIPS 64 remote protocol
2849 A long standing bug in the mips64 remote protocol where by GDB
2850 expected certain 32 bit registers (ex SR) to be transfered as 32
2851 instead of 64 bits has been fixed.
2853 The command ``set remote-mips64-transfers-32bit-regs on'' has been
2854 added to provide backward compatibility with older versions of GDB.
2856 * ``set remotebinarydownload'' replaced by ``set remote X-packet''
2858 The command ``set remotebinarydownload'' command has been replaced by
2859 ``set remote X-packet''. Other commands in ``set remote'' family
2860 include ``set remote P-packet''.
2862 * Breakpoint commands accept ranges.
2864 The breakpoint commands ``enable'', ``disable'', and ``delete'' now
2865 accept a range of breakpoints, e.g. ``5-7''. The tracepoint command
2866 ``tracepoint passcount'' also accepts a range of tracepoints.
2868 * ``apropos'' command added.
2870 The ``apropos'' command searches through command names and
2871 documentation strings, printing out matches, making it much easier to
2872 try to find a command that does what you are looking for.
2876 A new machine oriented interface (MI) has been added to GDB. This
2877 interface is designed for debug environments running GDB as a separate
2878 process. This is part of the long term libGDB project. See the
2879 "GDB/MI" chapter of the GDB manual for further information. It can be
2880 enabled by configuring with:
2882 .../configure --enable-gdbmi
2884 *** Changes in GDB-4.18:
2886 * New native configurations
2888 HP-UX 10.20 hppa*-*-hpux10.20
2889 HP-UX 11.x hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
2890 M68K GNU/Linux m68*-*-linux*
2894 Fujitsu FR30 fr30-*-elf*
2895 Intel StrongARM strongarm-*-*
2896 Mitsubishi D30V d30v-*-*
2898 * OBSOLETE configurations
2900 Gould PowerNode, NP1 np1-*-*, pn-*-*
2902 Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
2903 but the code will be left in place. If there is no activity to revive
2904 these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
2905 be permanently REMOVED.
2909 As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
2910 buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
2911 containing any K&R compatibility code. We believe that all systems in
2912 use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
2913 available. If this is not true, please report the affected
2914 configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately. See the README file for
2915 information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
2920 GDB now uses readline 2.2.
2922 * set extension-language
2924 You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
2925 languages by using the `set extension-language' command. For instance,
2926 you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
2927 set extension-language .c c++
2928 The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
2929 and their associated languages.
2931 * Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000
2933 When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
2934 you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
2935 PowerPC family you are debugging. The command
2939 sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME. GDB knows about the
2940 following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:
2942 ppc-uisa PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
2943 rs6000 IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
2945 403GC IBM PowerPC 403GC
2946 505 Motorola PowerPC 505
2947 860 Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
2948 601 Motorola PowerPC 601
2949 602 Motorola PowerPC 602
2950 603 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
2951 604 Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
2952 750 Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750
2954 At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
2955 special-purpose processor registers. Since almost all the affected
2956 registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
2957 only useful for remote debugging in its present form.
2961 Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
2962 more extensive support for HP-UX. Added features include shared
2963 library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
2964 support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
2965 for xdb and dbx commands.
2969 HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
2970 generalization of the old catch command. On HP-UX, it is now possible
2971 to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.
2973 This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
2974 argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up. See the
2975 output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.
2977 * Debugging across forks
2979 On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
2984 HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI). To get
2985 it, build with --enable-tui. Although this can be enabled for any
2986 configuration, at present it only works for native HP debugging.
2988 * GDB remote protocol additions
2990 A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
2991 Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
2992 fails to respond. The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
2993 allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.
2995 For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
2996 full 64-bit address. The command
2998 set remoteaddresssize 32
3000 can be used to revert to the old behaviour. For existing remote stubs
3001 the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
3004 In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
3005 command `packet' to send any text string to the stub. For instance,
3007 maint packet heythere
3009 sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>". Note that it is very easy to
3010 disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
3013 The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
3014 target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
3015 downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.
3017 * Tracing can collect general expressions
3019 You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints. This requires
3020 further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
3021 doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.
3023 * mask-address variable for Mips
3025 For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
3026 a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'. This is mainly
3027 of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.
3029 * Higher serial baud rates
3031 GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
3032 230400, and 460800 baud. (Note that your host system may not be able
3033 to achieve all of these rates.)
3037 The i960 configuration now includes an initial implementation of a
3038 builtin simulator, contributed by Jim Wilson.
3041 *** Changes in GDB-4.17:
3043 * New native configurations
3045 Alpha GNU/Linux alpha*-*-linux*
3046 Unixware 2.x i[3456]86-unixware2*
3047 Irix 6.x mips*-sgi-irix6*
3048 PowerPC GNU/Linux powerpc-*-linux*
3049 PowerPC Solaris powerpcle-*-solaris*
3050 Sparc GNU/Linux sparc-*-linux*
3051 Motorola sysV68 R3V7.1 m68k-motorola-sysv
3055 Argonaut Risc Chip (ARC) arc-*-*
3056 Hitachi H8/300S h8300*-*-*
3057 Matsushita MN10200 w/simulator mn10200-*-*
3058 Matsushita MN10300 w/simulator mn10300-*-*
3059 MIPS NEC VR4100 mips64*vr4100*{,el}-*-elf*
3060 MIPS NEC VR5000 mips64*vr5000*{,el}-*-elf*
3061 MIPS Toshiba TX39 mips64*tx39*{,el}-*-elf*
3062 Mitsubishi D10V w/simulator d10v-*-*
3063 Mitsubishi M32R/D w/simulator m32r-*-elf*
3064 Tsqware Sparclet sparclet-*-*
3065 NEC V850 w/simulator v850-*-*
3067 * New debugging protocols
3069 ARM with RDI protocol arm*-*-*
3070 M68K with dBUG monitor m68*-*-{aout,coff,elf}
3071 DDB and LSI variants of PMON protocol mips*-*-*
3072 PowerPC with DINK32 monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
3073 PowerPC with SDS protocol powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
3074 Macraigor OCD (Wiggler) devices powerpc{,le}-*-eabi
3078 All configurations can now understand and use the DWARF 2 debugging
3079 format. The choice is automatic, if the symbol file contains DWARF 2
3084 GDB now includes basic Java language support. This support is
3085 only useful with Java compilers that produce native machine code.
3087 * solib-absolute-prefix and solib-search-path
3089 For SunOS and SVR4 shared libraries, you may now set the prefix for
3090 loading absolute shared library symbol files, and the search path for
3091 locating non-absolute shared library symbol files.
3093 * Live range splitting
3095 GDB can now effectively debug code for which GCC has performed live
3096 range splitting as part of its optimization. See gdb/doc/LRS for
3097 more details on the expected format of the stabs information.
3101 GDB's support for the GNU Hurd, including thread debugging, has been
3102 updated to work with current versions of the Hurd.
3106 GDB's ARM target configuration now handles the ARM7T (Thumb) 16-bit
3107 instruction set. ARM GDB automatically detects when Thumb
3108 instructions are in use, and adjusts disassembly and backtracing
3113 GDB's MIPS target configurations now handle the MIP16 16-bit
3118 GDB now includes support for overlays; if an executable has been
3119 linked such that multiple sections are based at the same address, GDB
3120 will decide which section to use for symbolic info. You can choose to
3121 control the decision manually, using overlay commands, or implement
3122 additional target-side support and use "overlay load-target" to bring
3123 in the overlay mapping. Do "help overlay" for more detail.
3127 The command "info symbol <address>" displays information about
3128 the symbol at the specified address.
3132 The standard remote protocol now includes an extension that allows
3133 asynchronous collection and display of trace data. This requires
3134 extensive support in the target-side debugging stub. Tracing mode
3135 includes a new interaction mode in GDB and new commands: see the
3136 file tracepoint.c for more details.
3140 Configurations for embedded MIPS now include a simulator contributed
3141 by Cygnus Solutions. The simulator supports the instruction sets
3142 of most MIPS variants.
3146 Sparc configurations may now include the ERC32 simulator contributed
3147 by the European Space Agency. The simulator is not built into
3148 Sparc targets by default; configure with --enable-sim to include it.
3152 For target configurations that may include multiple variants of a
3153 basic architecture (such as MIPS and SH), you may now set the
3154 architecture explicitly. "set arch" sets, "info arch" lists
3155 the possible architectures.
3157 *** Changes in GDB-4.16:
3159 * New native configurations
3161 Windows 95, x86 Windows NT i[345]86-*-cygwin32
3162 M68K NetBSD m68k-*-netbsd*
3163 PowerPC AIX 4.x powerpc-*-aix*
3164 PowerPC MacOS powerpc-*-macos*
3165 PowerPC Windows NT powerpcle-*-cygwin32
3166 RS/6000 AIX 4.x rs6000-*-aix4*
3170 ARM with RDP protocol arm-*-*
3171 I960 with MON960 i960-*-coff
3172 MIPS VxWorks mips*-*-vxworks*
3173 MIPS VR4300 with PMON mips64*vr4300{,el}-*-elf*
3174 PowerPC with PPCBUG monitor powerpc{,le}-*-eabi*
3176 Matra Sparclet sparclet-*-*
3180 The powerpc-eabi configuration now includes the PSIM simulator,
3181 contributed by Andrew Cagney, with assistance from Mike Meissner.
3182 PSIM is a very elaborate model of the PowerPC, including not only
3183 basic instruction set execution, but also details of execution unit
3184 performance and I/O hardware. See sim/ppc/README for more details.
3188 GDB now works with Solaris 2.5.
3190 * Windows 95/NT native
3192 GDB will now work as a native debugger on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
3193 To build it from source, you must use the "gnu-win32" environment,
3194 which uses a DLL to emulate enough of Unix to run the GNU tools.
3195 Further information, binaries, and sources are available at
3196 ftp.cygnus.com, under pub/gnu-win32.
3198 * dont-repeat command
3200 If a user-defined command includes the command `dont-repeat', then the
3201 command will not be repeated if the user just types return. This is
3202 useful if the command is time-consuming to run, so that accidental
3203 extra keystrokes don't run the same command many times.
3205 * Send break instead of ^C
3207 The standard remote protocol now includes an option to send a break
3208 rather than a ^C to the target in order to interrupt it. By default,
3209 GDB will send ^C; to send a break, set the variable `remotebreak' to 1.
3211 * Remote protocol timeout
3213 The standard remote protocol includes a new variable `remotetimeout'
3214 that allows you to set the number of seconds before GDB gives up trying
3215 to read from the target. The default value is 2.
3217 * Automatic tracking of dynamic object loading (HPUX and Solaris only)
3219 By default GDB will automatically keep track of objects as they are
3220 loaded and unloaded by the dynamic linker. By using the command `set
3221 stop-on-solib-events 1' you can arrange for GDB to stop the inferior
3222 when shared library events occur, thus allowing you to set breakpoints
3223 in shared libraries which are explicitly loaded by the inferior.
3225 Note this feature does not work on hpux8. On hpux9 you must link
3226 /usr/lib/end.o into your program. This feature should work
3227 automatically on hpux10.
3229 * Irix 5.x hardware watchpoint support
3231 Irix 5 configurations now support the use of hardware watchpoints.
3233 * Mips protocol "SYN garbage limit"
3235 When debugging a Mips target using the `target mips' protocol, you
3236 may set the number of characters that GDB will ignore by setting
3237 the `syn-garbage-limit'. A value of -1 means that GDB will ignore
3238 every character. The default value is 1050.
3240 * Recording and replaying remote debug sessions
3242 If you set `remotelogfile' to the name of a file, gdb will write to it
3243 a recording of a remote debug session. This recording may then be
3244 replayed back to gdb using "gdbreplay". See gdbserver/README for
3245 details. This is useful when you have a problem with GDB while doing
3246 remote debugging; you can make a recording of the session and send it
3247 to someone else, who can then recreate the problem.
3249 * Speedups for remote debugging
3251 GDB includes speedups for downloading and stepping MIPS systems using
3252 the IDT monitor, fast downloads to the Hitachi SH E7000 emulator,
3253 and more efficient S-record downloading.
3255 * Memory use reductions and statistics collection
3257 GDB now uses less memory and reports statistics about memory usage.
3258 Try the `maint print statistics' command, for example.
3260 *** Changes in GDB-4.15:
3262 * Psymtabs for XCOFF
3264 The symbol reader for AIX GDB now uses partial symbol tables. This
3265 can greatly improve startup time, especially for large executables.
3267 * Remote targets use caching
3269 Remote targets now use a data cache to speed up communication with the
3270 remote side. The data cache could lead to incorrect results because
3271 it doesn't know about volatile variables, thus making it impossible to
3272 debug targets which use memory mapped I/O devices. `set remotecache
3273 off' turns the the data cache off.
3275 * Remote targets may have threads
3277 The standard remote protocol now includes support for multiple threads
3278 in the target system, using new protocol commands 'H' and 'T'. See
3279 gdb/remote.c for details.
3283 If GDB is configured with `--enable-netrom', then it will include
3284 support for the NetROM ROM emulator from XLNT Designs. The NetROM
3285 acts as though it is a bank of ROM on the target board, but you can
3286 write into it over the network. GDB's support consists only of
3287 support for fast loading into the emulated ROM; to debug, you must use
3288 another protocol, such as standard remote protocol. The usual
3289 sequence is something like
3291 target nrom <netrom-hostname>
3293 target remote <netrom-hostname>:1235
3297 GDB now includes support for the Apple Macintosh, as a host only. It
3298 may be run as either an MPW tool or as a standalone application, and
3299 it can debug through the serial port. All the usual GDB commands are
3300 available, but to the target command, you must supply "serial" as the
3301 device type instead of "/dev/ttyXX". See mpw-README in the main
3302 directory for more information on how to build. The MPW configuration
3303 scripts */mpw-config.in support only a few targets, and only the
3304 mips-idt-ecoff target has been tested.
3308 GDB configuration now uses autoconf. This is not user-visible,
3309 but does simplify configuration and building.
3313 GDB now supports hpux10.
3315 *** Changes in GDB-4.14:
3317 * New native configurations
3319 x86 FreeBSD i[345]86-*-freebsd
3320 x86 NetBSD i[345]86-*-netbsd
3321 NS32k NetBSD ns32k-*-netbsd
3322 Sparc NetBSD sparc-*-netbsd
3326 A29K VxWorks a29k-*-vxworks
3327 HP PA PRO embedded (WinBond W89K & Oki OP50N) hppa*-*-pro*
3328 CPU32 EST-300 emulator m68*-*-est*
3329 PowerPC ELF powerpc-*-elf
3332 * Alpha OSF/1 support for procfs
3334 GDB now supports procfs under OSF/1-2.x and higher, which makes it
3335 possible to attach to running processes. As the mounting of the /proc
3336 filesystem is optional on the Alpha, GDB automatically determines
3337 the availability of /proc during startup. This can lead to problems
3338 if /proc is unmounted after GDB has been started.
3340 * Arguments to user-defined commands
3342 User commands may accept up to 10 arguments separated by whitespace.
3343 Arguments are accessed within the user command via $arg0..$arg9. A
3346 print $arg0 + $arg1 + $arg2
3348 To execute the command use:
3351 Defines the command "adder" which prints the sum of its three arguments.
3352 Note the arguments are text substitutions, so they may reference variables,
3353 use complex expressions, or even perform inferior function calls.
3355 * New `if' and `while' commands
3357 This makes it possible to write more sophisticated user-defined
3358 commands. Both commands take a single argument, which is the
3359 expression to evaluate, and must be followed by the commands to
3360 execute, one per line, if the expression is nonzero, the list being
3361 terminated by the word `end'. The `if' command list may include an
3362 `else' word, which causes the following commands to be executed only
3363 if the expression is zero.
3365 * Fortran source language mode
3367 GDB now includes partial support for Fortran 77. It will recognize
3368 Fortran programs and can evaluate a subset of Fortran expressions, but
3369 variables and functions may not be handled correctly. GDB will work
3370 with G77, but does not yet know much about symbols emitted by other
3373 * Better HPUX support
3375 Most debugging facilities now work on dynamic executables for HPPAs
3376 running hpux9 or later. You can attach to running dynamically linked
3377 processes, but by default the dynamic libraries will be read-only, so
3378 for instance you won't be able to put breakpoints in them. To change
3379 that behavior do the following before running the program:
3385 This will cause the libraries to be mapped private and read-write.
3386 To revert to the normal behavior, do this:
3392 You cannot set breakpoints or examine data in the library until after
3393 the library is loaded if the function/data symbols do not have
3396 GDB can now also read debug symbols produced by the HP C compiler on
3397 HPPAs (sorry, no C++, Fortran or 68k support).
3399 * Target byte order now dynamically selectable
3401 You can choose which byte order to use with a target system, via the
3402 commands "set endian big" and "set endian little", and you can see the
3403 current setting by using "show endian". You can also give the command
3404 "set endian auto", in which case GDB will use the byte order
3405 associated with the executable. Currently, only embedded MIPS
3406 configurations support dynamic selection of target byte order.
3408 * New DOS host serial code
3410 This version uses DPMI interrupts to handle buffered I/O, so you
3411 no longer need to run asynctsr when debugging boards connected to
3414 *** Changes in GDB-4.13:
3416 * New "complete" command
3418 This lists all the possible completions for the rest of the line, if it
3419 were to be given as a command itself. This is intended for use by emacs.
3421 * Trailing space optional in prompt
3423 "set prompt" no longer adds a space for you after the prompt you set. This
3424 allows you to set a prompt which ends in a space or one that does not.
3426 * Breakpoint hit counts
3428 "info break" now displays a count of the number of times the breakpoint
3429 has been hit. This is especially useful in conjunction with "ignore"; you
3430 can ignore a large number of breakpoint hits, look at the breakpoint info
3431 to see how many times the breakpoint was hit, then run again, ignoring one
3432 less than that number, and this will get you quickly to the last hit of
3435 * Ability to stop printing at NULL character
3437 "set print null-stop" will cause GDB to stop printing the characters of
3438 an array when the first NULL is encountered. This is useful when large
3439 arrays actually contain only short strings.
3441 * Shared library breakpoints
3443 In SunOS 4.x, SVR4, and Alpha OSF/1 configurations, you can now set
3444 breakpoints in shared libraries before the executable is run.
3446 * Hardware watchpoints
3448 There is a new hardware breakpoint for the watch command for sparclite
3449 targets. See gdb/sparclite/hw_breakpoint.note.
3451 Hardware watchpoints are also now supported under GNU/Linux.
3455 Annotations have been added. These are for use with graphical interfaces,
3456 and are still experimental. Currently only gdba.el uses these.
3458 * Improved Irix 5 support
3460 GDB now works properly with Irix 5.2.
3462 * Improved HPPA support
3464 GDB now works properly with the latest GCC and GAS.
3466 * New native configurations
3468 Sequent PTX4 i[34]86-sequent-ptx4
3469 HPPA running OSF/1 hppa*-*-osf*
3470 Atari TT running SVR4 m68*-*-sysv4*
3471 RS/6000 LynxOS rs6000-*-lynxos*
3475 OS/9000 i[34]86-*-os9k
3476 MIPS R4000 mips64*{,el}-*-{ecoff,elf}
3479 * Hitachi SH7000 and E7000-PC ICE support
3481 There is now support for communicating with the Hitachi E7000-PC ICE.
3482 This is available automatically when GDB is configured for the SH.
3486 As usual, a variety of small fixes and improvements, both generic
3487 and configuration-specific. See the ChangeLog for more detail.
3489 *** Changes in GDB-4.12:
3491 * Irix 5 is now supported
3495 GDB-4.12 on the HPPA has a number of changes which make it unable
3496 to debug the output from the currently released versions of GCC and
3497 GAS (GCC 2.5.8 and GAS-2.2 or PAGAS-1.36). Until the next major release
3498 of GCC and GAS, versions of these tools designed to work with GDB-4.12
3499 can be retrieved via anonymous ftp from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist.
3502 *** Changes in GDB-4.11:
3504 * User visible changes:
3508 The "set remotedebug" option is now consistent between the mips remote
3509 target, remote targets using the gdb-specific protocol, UDI (AMD's
3510 debug protocol for the 29k) and the 88k bug monitor. It is now an
3511 integer specifying a debug level (normally 0 or 1, but 2 means more
3512 debugging info for the mips target).
3514 * DEC Alpha native support
3516 GDB now works on the DEC Alpha. GCC 2.4.5 does not produce usable
3517 debug info, but GDB works fairly well with the DEC compiler and should
3518 work with a future GCC release. See the README file for a few
3519 Alpha-specific notes.
3521 * Preliminary thread implementation
3523 GDB now has preliminary thread support for both SGI/Irix and LynxOS.
3525 * LynxOS native and target support for 386
3527 This release has been hosted on LynxOS 2.2, and also can be configured
3528 to remotely debug programs running under LynxOS (see gdb/gdbserver/README
3531 * Improvements in C++ mangling/demangling.
3533 This release has much better g++ debugging, specifically in name
3534 mangling/demangling, virtual function calls, print virtual table,
3535 call methods, ...etc.
3537 *** Changes in GDB-4.10:
3539 * User visible changes:
3541 Remote debugging using the GDB-specific (`target remote') protocol now
3542 supports the `load' command. This is only useful if you have some
3543 other way of getting the stub to the target system, and you can put it
3544 somewhere in memory where it won't get clobbered by the download.
3546 Filename completion now works.
3548 When run under emacs mode, the "info line" command now causes the
3549 arrow to point to the line specified. Also, "info line" prints
3550 addresses in symbolic form (as well as hex).
3552 All vxworks based targets now support a user settable option, called
3553 vxworks-timeout. This option represents the number of seconds gdb
3554 should wait for responses to rpc's. You might want to use this if
3555 your vxworks target is, perhaps, a slow software simulator or happens
3556 to be on the far side of a thin network line.
3560 This release contains support for using a DEC alpha as a GDB host for
3561 cross debugging. Native alpha debugging is not supported yet.
3564 *** Changes in GDB-4.9:
3568 This is the first GDB release which is accompanied by a matching testsuite.
3569 The testsuite requires installation of dejagnu, which should be available
3570 via ftp from most sites that carry GNU software.
3574 'Cfront' style demangling has had its name changed to 'ARM' style, to
3575 emphasize that it was written from the specifications in the C++ Annotated
3576 Reference Manual, not necessarily to be compatible with AT&T cfront. Despite
3577 disclaimers, it still generated too much confusion with users attempting to
3578 use gdb with AT&T cfront.
3582 GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library.
3583 So far, the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the
3584 Hitachi H8/300, H8/500 and Super-H.
3586 * New targets supported
3588 H8/300 simulator h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
3589 H8/500 simulator h8500-hitachi-hms or h8500hms
3590 SH simulator sh-hitachi-hms or sh
3591 Z8000 simulator z8k-zilog-none or z8ksim
3592 IDT MIPS board over serial line mips-idt-ecoff
3594 Cross-debugging to GO32 targets is supported. It requires a custom
3595 version of the i386-stub.c module which is integrated with the
3596 GO32 memory extender.
3598 * New remote protocols
3600 MIPS remote debugging protocol.
3602 * New source languages supported
3604 This version includes preliminary support for Chill, a Pascal like language
3605 used by telecommunications companies. Chill support is also being integrated
3606 into the GNU compiler, but we don't know when it will be publically available.
3609 *** Changes in GDB-4.8:
3611 * HP Precision Architecture supported
3613 GDB now supports HP PA-RISC machines running HPUX. A preliminary
3614 version of this support was available as a set of patches from the
3615 University of Utah. GDB does not support debugging of programs
3616 compiled with the HP compiler, because HP will not document their file
3617 format. Instead, you must use GCC (version 2.3.2 or later) and PA-GAS
3618 (as available from jaguar.cs.utah.edu:/dist/pa-gas.u4.tar.Z).
3620 Many problems in the preliminary version have been fixed.
3622 * Faster and better demangling
3624 We have improved template demangling and fixed numerous bugs in the GNU style
3625 demangler. It can now handle type modifiers such as `static' or `const'. Wide
3626 character types (wchar_t) are now supported. Demangling of each symbol is now
3627 only done once, and is cached when the symbol table for a file is read in.
3628 This results in a small increase in memory usage for C programs, a moderate
3629 increase in memory usage for C++ programs, and a fantastic speedup in
3632 `Cfront' style demangling still doesn't work with AT&T cfront. It was written
3633 from the specifications in the Annotated Reference Manual, which AT&T's
3634 compiler does not actually implement.
3636 * G++ multiple inheritance compiler problem
3638 In the 2.3.2 release of gcc/g++, how the compiler resolves multiple
3639 inheritance lattices was reworked to properly discover ambiguities. We
3640 recently found an example which causes this new algorithm to fail in a
3641 very subtle way, producing bad debug information for those classes.
3642 The file 'gcc.patch' (in this directory) can be applied to gcc to
3643 circumvent the problem. A future GCC release will contain a complete
3646 The previous G++ debug info problem (mentioned below for the gdb-4.7
3647 release) is fixed in gcc version 2.3.2.
3649 * Improved configure script
3651 The `configure' script will now attempt to guess your system type if
3652 you don't supply a host system type. The old scheme of supplying a
3653 host system triplet is preferable over using this. All the magic is
3654 done in the new `config.guess' script. Examine it for details.
3656 We have also brought our configure script much more in line with the FSF's
3657 version. It now supports the --with-xxx options. In particular,
3658 `--with-minimal-bfd' can be used to make the GDB binary image smaller.
3659 The resulting GDB will not be able to read arbitrary object file formats --
3660 only the format ``expected'' to be used on the configured target system.
3661 We hope to make this the default in a future release.
3663 * Documentation improvements
3665 There's new internal documentation on how to modify GDB, and how to
3666 produce clean changes to the code. We implore people to read it
3667 before submitting changes.
3669 The GDB manual uses new, sexy Texinfo conditionals, rather than arcane
3670 M4 macros. The new texinfo.tex is provided in this release. Pre-built
3671 `info' files are also provided. To build `info' files from scratch,
3672 you will need the latest `makeinfo' release, which will be available in
3673 a future texinfo-X.Y release.
3675 *NOTE* The new texinfo.tex can cause old versions of TeX to hang.
3676 We're not sure exactly which versions have this problem, but it has
3677 been seen in 3.0. We highly recommend upgrading to TeX version 3.141
3678 or better. If that isn't possible, there is a patch in
3679 `texinfo/tex3patch' that will modify `texinfo/texinfo.tex' to work
3680 around this problem.
3684 GDB now supports array constants that can be used in expressions typed in by
3685 the user. The syntax is `{element, element, ...}'. Ie: you can now type
3686 `print {1, 2, 3}', and it will build up an array in memory malloc'd in
3689 The new directory `gdb/sparclite' contains a program that demonstrates
3690 how the sparc-stub.c remote stub runs on a Fujitsu SPARClite processor.
3692 * New native hosts supported
3694 HP/PA-RISC under HPUX using GNU tools hppa1.1-hp-hpux
3695 386 CPUs running SCO Unix 3.2v4 i386-unknown-sco3.2v4
3697 * New targets supported
3699 AMD 29k family via UDI a29k-amd-udi or udi29k
3701 * New file formats supported
3703 BFD now supports reading HP/PA-RISC executables (SOM file format?),
3704 HPUX core files, and SCO 3.2v2 core files.
3708 Attaching to processes now works again; thanks for the many bug reports.
3710 We have also stomped on a bunch of core dumps caused by
3711 printf_filtered("%s") problems.
3713 We eliminated a copyright problem on the rpc and ptrace header files
3714 for VxWorks, which was discovered at the last minute during the 4.7
3715 release. You should now be able to build a VxWorks GDB.
3717 You can now interrupt gdb while an attached process is running. This
3718 will cause the attached process to stop, and give control back to GDB.
3720 We fixed problems caused by using too many file descriptors
3721 for reading symbols from object files and libraries. This was
3722 especially a problem for programs that used many (~100) shared
3725 The `step' command now only enters a subroutine if there is line number
3726 information for the subroutine. Otherwise it acts like the `next'
3727 command. Previously, `step' would enter subroutines if there was
3728 any debugging information about the routine. This avoids problems
3729 when using `cc -g1' on MIPS machines.
3731 * Internal improvements
3733 GDB's internal interfaces have been improved to make it easier to support
3734 debugging of multiple languages in the future.
3736 GDB now uses a common structure for symbol information internally.
3737 Minimal symbols (derived from linkage symbols in object files), partial
3738 symbols (from a quick scan of debug information), and full symbols
3739 contain a common subset of information, making it easier to write
3740 shared code that handles any of them.
3742 * New command line options
3744 We now accept --silent as an alias for --quiet.
3748 The memory-mapped-malloc library is now licensed under the GNU Library
3749 General Public License.
3751 *** Changes in GDB-4.7:
3753 * Host/native/target split
3755 GDB has had some major internal surgery to untangle the support for
3756 hosts and remote targets. Now, when you configure GDB for a remote
3757 target, it will no longer load in all of the support for debugging
3758 local programs on the host. When fully completed and tested, this will
3759 ensure that arbitrary host/target combinations are possible.
3761 The primary conceptual shift is to separate the non-portable code in
3762 GDB into three categories. Host specific code is required any time GDB
3763 is compiled on that host, regardless of the target. Target specific
3764 code relates to the peculiarities of the target, but can be compiled on
3765 any host. Native specific code is everything else: it can only be
3766 built when the host and target are the same system. Child process
3767 handling and core file support are two common `native' examples.
3769 GDB's use of /proc for controlling Unix child processes is now cleaner.
3770 It has been split out into a single module under the `target_ops' vector,
3771 plus two native-dependent functions for each system that uses /proc.
3773 * New hosts supported
3775 HP/Apollo 68k (under the BSD domain) m68k-apollo-bsd or apollo68bsd
3776 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
3777 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or i386sco
3779 * New targets supported
3781 Fujitsu SPARClite sparclite-fujitsu-none or sparclite
3782 68030 and CPU32 m68030-*-*, m68332-*-*
3784 * New native hosts supported
3786 386 CPUs running various BSD ports i386-unknown-bsd or 386bsd
3787 (386bsd is not well tested yet)
3788 386 CPUs running SCO Unix i386-unknown-scosysv322 or sco
3790 * New file formats supported
3792 BFD now supports COFF files for the Zilog Z8000 microprocessor. It
3793 supports reading of `a.out.adobe' object files, which are an a.out
3794 format extended with minimal information about multiple sections.
3798 `show copying' is the same as the old `info copying'.
3799 `show warranty' is the same as `info warrantee'.
3800 These were renamed for consistency. The old commands continue to work.
3802 `info handle' is a new alias for `info signals'.
3804 You can now define pre-command hooks, which attach arbitrary command
3805 scripts to any command. The commands in the hook will be executed
3806 prior to the user's command. You can also create a hook which will be
3807 executed whenever the program stops. See gdb.texinfo.
3811 We now deal with Cfront style name mangling, and can even extract type
3812 info from mangled symbols. GDB can automatically figure out which
3813 symbol mangling style your C++ compiler uses.
3815 Calling of methods and virtual functions has been improved as well.
3819 The crash that occured when debugging Sun Ansi-C compiled binaries is
3820 fixed. This was due to mishandling of the extra N_SO stabs output
3823 We also finally got Ultrix 4.2 running in house, and fixed core file
3824 support, with help from a dozen people on the net.
3826 John M. Farrell discovered that the reason that single-stepping was so
3827 slow on all of the Mips based platforms (primarily SGI and DEC) was
3828 that we were trying to demangle and lookup a symbol used for internal
3829 purposes on every instruction that was being stepped through. Changing
3830 the name of that symbol so that it couldn't be mistaken for a C++
3831 mangled symbol sped things up a great deal.
3833 Rich Pixley sped up symbol lookups in general by getting much smarter
3834 about when C++ symbol mangling is necessary. This should make symbol
3835 completion (TAB on the command line) much faster. It's not as fast as
3836 we'd like, but it's significantly faster than gdb-4.6.
3840 A new user controllable variable 'call_scratch_address' can
3841 specify the location of a scratch area to be used when GDB
3842 calls a function in the target. This is necessary because the
3843 usual method of putting the scratch area on the stack does not work
3844 in systems that have separate instruction and data spaces.
3846 We integrated changes to support the 29k UDI (Universal Debugger
3847 Interface), but discovered at the last minute that we didn't have all
3848 of the appropriate copyright paperwork. We are working with AMD to
3849 resolve this, and hope to have it available soon.
3853 We have sped up the remote serial line protocol, especially for targets
3854 with lots of registers. It now supports a new `expedited status' ('T')
3855 message which can be used in place of the existing 'S' status message.
3856 This allows the remote stub to send only the registers that GDB
3857 needs to make a quick decision about single-stepping or conditional
3858 breakpoints, eliminating the need to fetch the entire register set for
3859 each instruction being stepped through.
3861 The GDB remote serial protocol now implements a write-through cache for
3862 registers, only re-reading the registers if the target has run.
3864 There is also a new remote serial stub for SPARC processors. You can
3865 find it in gdb-4.7/gdb/sparc-stub.c. This was written to support the
3866 Fujitsu SPARClite processor, but will run on any stand-alone SPARC
3867 processor with a serial port.
3871 Configure.in files have become much easier to read and modify. A new
3872 `table driven' format makes it more obvious what configurations are
3873 supported, and what files each one uses.
3877 There is a new opcodes library which will eventually contain all of the
3878 disassembly routines and opcode tables. At present, it only contains
3879 Sparc and Z8000 routines. This will allow the assembler, debugger, and
3880 disassembler (binutils/objdump) to share these routines.
3882 The libiberty library is now copylefted under the GNU Library General
3883 Public License. This allows more liberal use, and was done so libg++
3884 can use it. This makes no difference to GDB, since the Library License
3885 grants all the rights from the General Public License.
3889 The file gdb-4.7/gdb/doc/stabs.texinfo is a (relatively) complete
3890 reference to the stabs symbol info used by the debugger. It is (as far
3891 as we know) the only published document on this fascinating topic. We
3892 encourage you to read it, compare it to the stabs information on your
3893 system, and send improvements on the document in general (to
3894 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu).
3896 And, of course, many bugs have been fixed.
3899 *** Changes in GDB-4.6:
3901 * Better support for C++ function names
3903 GDB now accepts as input the "demangled form" of C++ overloaded function
3904 names and member function names, and can do command completion on such names
3905 (using TAB, TAB-TAB, and ESC-?). The names have to be quoted with a pair of
3906 single quotes. Examples are 'func (int, long)' and 'obj::operator==(obj&)'.
3907 Make use of command completion, it is your friend.
3909 GDB also now accepts a variety of C++ mangled symbol formats. They are
3910 the GNU g++ style, the Cfront (ARM) style, and the Lucid (lcc) style.
3911 You can tell GDB which format to use by doing a 'set demangle-style {gnu,
3912 lucid, cfront, auto}'. 'gnu' is the default. Do a 'set demangle-style foo'
3913 for the list of formats.
3915 * G++ symbol mangling problem
3917 Recent versions of gcc have a bug in how they emit debugging information for
3918 C++ methods (when using dbx-style stabs). The file 'gcc.patch' (in this
3919 directory) can be applied to gcc to fix the problem. Alternatively, if you
3920 can't fix gcc, you can #define GCC_MANGLE_BUG when compling gdb/symtab.c. The
3921 usual symptom is difficulty with setting breakpoints on methods. GDB complains
3922 about the method being non-existent. (We believe that version 2.2.2 of GCC has
3925 * New 'maintenance' command
3927 All of the commands related to hacking GDB internals have been moved out of
3928 the main command set, and now live behind the 'maintenance' command. This
3929 can also be abbreviated as 'mt'. The following changes were made:
3931 dump-me -> maintenance dump-me
3932 info all-breakpoints -> maintenance info breakpoints
3933 printmsyms -> maintenance print msyms
3934 printobjfiles -> maintenance print objfiles
3935 printpsyms -> maintenance print psymbols
3936 printsyms -> maintenance print symbols
3938 The following commands are new:
3940 maintenance demangle Call internal GDB demangler routine to
3941 demangle a C++ link name and prints the result.
3942 maintenance print type Print a type chain for a given symbol
3944 * Change to .gdbinit file processing
3946 We now read the $HOME/.gdbinit file before processing the argv arguments
3947 (e.g. reading symbol files or core files). This allows global parameters to
3948 be set, which will apply during the symbol reading. The ./.gdbinit is still
3949 read after argv processing.
3951 * New hosts supported
3953 Solaris-2.0 !!! sparc-sun-solaris2 or sun4sol2
3955 GNU/Linux support i386-unknown-linux or linux
3957 We are also including code to support the HP/PA running BSD and HPUX. This
3958 is almost guaranteed not to work, as we didn't have time to test or build it
3959 for this release. We are including it so that the more adventurous (or
3960 masochistic) of you can play with it. We also had major problems with the
3961 fact that the compiler that we got from HP doesn't support the -g option.
3964 * New targets supported
3966 Hitachi H8/300 h8300-hitachi-hms or h8300hms
3968 * More smarts about finding #include files
3970 GDB now remembers the compilation directory for all include files, and for
3971 all files from which C is generated (like yacc and lex sources). This
3972 greatly improves GDB's ability to find yacc/lex sources, and include files,
3973 especially if you are debugging your program from a directory different from
3974 the one that contains your sources.
3976 We also fixed a bug which caused difficulty with listing and setting
3977 breakpoints in include files which contain C code. (In the past, you had to
3978 try twice in order to list an include file that you hadn't looked at before.)
3980 * Interesting infernals change
3982 GDB now deals with arbitrary numbers of sections, where the symbols for each
3983 section must be relocated relative to that section's landing place in the
3984 target's address space. This work was needed to support ELF with embedded
3985 stabs used by Solaris-2.0.
3987 * Bug fixes (of course!)
3989 There have been loads of fixes for the following things:
3990 mips, rs6000, 29k/udi, m68k, g++, type handling, elf/dwarf, m88k,
3991 i960, stabs, DOS(GO32), procfs, etc...
3993 See the ChangeLog for details.
3995 *** Changes in GDB-4.5:
3997 * New machines supported (host and target)
3999 IBM RS6000 running AIX rs6000-ibm-aix or rs6000
4001 SGI Irix-4.x mips-sgi-irix4 or iris4
4003 * New malloc package
4005 GDB now uses a new memory manager called mmalloc, based on gmalloc.
4006 Mmalloc is capable of handling mutiple heaps of memory. It is also
4007 capable of saving a heap to a file, and then mapping it back in later.
4008 This can be used to greatly speedup the startup of GDB by using a
4009 pre-parsed symbol table which lives in a mmalloc managed heap. For
4010 more details, please read mmalloc/mmalloc.texi.
4014 The 'info proc' command (SVR4 only) has been enhanced quite a bit. See
4015 'help info proc' for details.
4017 * MIPS ecoff symbol table format
4019 The code that reads MIPS symbol table format is now supported on all hosts.
4020 Thanks to MIPS for releasing the sym.h and symconst.h files to make this
4023 * File name changes for MS-DOS
4025 Many files in the config directories have been renamed to make it easier to
4026 support GDB on MS-DOSe systems (which have very restrictive file name
4027 conventions :-( ). MS-DOSe host support (under DJ Delorie's GO32
4028 environment) is close to working but has some remaining problems. Note
4029 that debugging of DOS programs is not supported, due to limitations
4030 in the ``operating system'', but it can be used to host cross-debugging.
4032 * Cross byte order fixes
4034 Many fixes have been made to support cross debugging of Sparc and MIPS
4035 targets from hosts whose byte order differs.
4037 * New -mapped and -readnow options
4039 If memory-mapped files are available on your system through the 'mmap'
4040 system call, you can use the -mapped option on the `file' or
4041 `symbol-file' commands to cause GDB to write the symbols from your
4042 program into a reusable file. If the program you are debugging is
4043 called `/path/fred', the mapped symbol file will be `./fred.syms'.
4044 Future GDB debugging sessions will notice the presence of this file,
4045 and will quickly map in symbol information from it, rather than reading
4046 the symbol table from the executable program. Using the '-mapped'
4047 option in a GDB `file' or `symbol-file' command has the same effect as
4048 starting GDB with the '-mapped' command-line option.
4050 You can cause GDB to read the entire symbol table immediately by using
4051 the '-readnow' option with any of the commands that load symbol table
4052 information (or on the GDB command line). This makes the command
4053 slower, but makes future operations faster.
4055 The -mapped and -readnow options are typically combined in order to
4056 build a `fred.syms' file that contains complete symbol information.
4057 A simple GDB invocation to do nothing but build a `.syms' file for future
4060 gdb -batch -nx -mapped -readnow programname
4062 The `.syms' file is specific to the host machine on which GDB is run.
4063 It holds an exact image of GDB's internal symbol table. It cannot be
4064 shared across multiple host platforms.
4066 * longjmp() handling
4068 GDB is now capable of stepping and nexting over longjmp(), _longjmp(), and
4069 siglongjmp() without losing control. This feature has not yet been ported to
4070 all systems. It currently works on many 386 platforms, all MIPS-based
4071 platforms (SGI, DECstation, etc), and Sun3/4.
4075 Preliminary work has been put in to support the new Solaris OS from Sun. At
4076 this time, it can control and debug processes, but it is not capable of
4081 As always, many many bug fixes. The major areas were with g++, and mipsread.
4082 People using the MIPS-based platforms should experience fewer mysterious
4083 crashes and trashed symbol tables.
4085 *** Changes in GDB-4.4:
4087 * New machines supported (host and target)
4089 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
4091 BSD Reno on Vax vax-dec-bsd
4092 Ultrix on Vax vax-dec-ultrix
4094 * New machines supported (target)
4096 AMD 29000 embedded, using EBMON a29k-none-none
4100 GDB continues to improve its handling of C++. `References' work better.
4101 The demangler has also been improved, and now deals with symbols mangled as
4102 per the Annotated C++ Reference Guide.
4104 GDB also now handles `stabs' symbol information embedded in MIPS
4105 `ecoff' symbol tables. Since the ecoff format was not easily
4106 extensible to handle new languages such as C++, this appeared to be a
4107 good way to put C++ debugging info into MIPS binaries. This option
4108 will be supported in the GNU C compiler, version 2, when it is
4111 * New features for SVR4
4113 GDB now handles SVR4 shared libraries, in the same fashion as SunOS
4114 shared libraries. Debugging dynamically linked programs should present
4115 only minor differences from debugging statically linked programs.
4117 The `info proc' command will print out information about any process
4118 on an SVR4 system (including the one you are debugging). At the moment,
4119 it prints the address mappings of the process.
4121 If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please send mail to
4122 bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were reqired (if any).
4124 * Better dynamic linking support in SunOS
4126 Reading symbols from shared libraries which contain debugging symbols
4127 now works properly. However, there remain issues such as automatic
4128 skipping of `transfer vector' code during function calls, which
4129 make it harder to debug code in a shared library, than to debug the
4130 same code linked statically.
4134 GDB is now using the latest `getopt' routines from the FSF. This
4135 version accepts the -- prefix for options with long names. GDB will
4136 continue to accept the old forms (-option and +option) as well.
4137 Various single letter abbreviations for options have been explicity
4138 added to the option table so that they won't get overshadowed in the
4139 future by other options that begin with the same letter.
4143 The `cleanup_undefined_types' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
4144 Many assorted bugs have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
4145 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
4148 *** Changes in GDB-4.3:
4150 * New machines supported (host and target)
4152 Amiga 3000 running Amix m68k-cbm-svr4 or amix
4153 NCR 3000 386 running SVR4 i386-ncr-svr4 or ncr3000
4154 Motorola Delta 88000 running Sys V m88k-motorola-sysv or delta88
4156 * Almost SCO Unix support
4158 We had hoped to support:
4159 SCO Unix on i386 IBM PC clones i386-sco-sysv or i386sco
4160 (except for core file support), but we discovered very late in the release
4161 that it has problems with process groups that render gdb unusable. Sorry
4162 about that. I encourage people to fix it and post the fixes.
4164 * Preliminary ELF and DWARF support
4166 GDB can read ELF object files on System V Release 4, and can handle
4167 debugging records for C, in DWARF format, in ELF files. This support
4168 is preliminary. If you bring up GDB on another SVR4 system, please
4169 send mail to bug-gdb@prep.ai.mit.edu to let us know what changes were
4174 GDB now uses the latest `readline' library. One user-visible change
4175 is that two tabs will list possible command completions, which previously
4176 required typing M-? (meta-question mark, or ESC ?).
4180 The `stepi' bug that many of you noticed has been squashed.
4181 Many bugs in C++ have been handled. Many more remain to be handled.
4182 See the various ChangeLog files (primarily in gdb and bfd) for details.
4184 * State of the MIPS world (in case you wondered):
4186 GDB can understand the symbol tables emitted by the compilers
4187 supplied by most vendors of MIPS-based machines, including DEC. These
4188 symbol tables are in a format that essentially nobody else uses.
4190 Some versions of gcc come with an assembler post-processor called
4191 mips-tfile. This program is required if you want to do source-level
4192 debugging of gcc-compiled programs. I believe FSF does not ship
4193 mips-tfile with gcc version 1, but it will eventually come with gcc
4196 Debugging of g++ output remains a problem. g++ version 1.xx does not
4197 really support it at all. (If you're lucky, you should be able to get
4198 line numbers and stack traces to work, but no parameters or local
4199 variables.) With some work it should be possible to improve the
4202 When gcc version 2 is released, you will have somewhat better luck.
4203 However, even then you will get confusing results for inheritance and
4206 We will eventually provide full debugging of g++ output on
4207 DECstations. This will probably involve some kind of stabs-in-ecoff
4208 encapulation, but the details have not been worked out yet.
4211 *** Changes in GDB-4.2:
4213 * Improved configuration
4215 Only one copy of `configure' exists now, and it is not self-modifying.
4216 Porting BFD is simpler.
4220 The `step' and `next' commands now only stop at the first instruction
4221 of a source line. This prevents the multiple stops that used to occur
4222 in switch statements, for-loops, etc. `Step' continues to stop if a
4223 function that has debugging information is called within the line.
4227 Lots of small bugs fixed. More remain.
4229 * New host supported (not target)
4231 Intel 386 PC clone running Mach i386-none-mach
4234 *** Changes in GDB-4.1:
4236 * Multiple source language support
4238 GDB now has internal scaffolding to handle several source languages.
4239 It determines the type of each source file from its filename extension,
4240 and will switch expression parsing and number formatting to match the
4241 language of the function in the currently selected stack frame.
4242 You can also specifically set the language to be used, with
4243 `set language c' or `set language modula-2'.
4247 GDB now has preliminary support for the GNU Modula-2 compiler,
4248 currently under development at the State University of New York at
4249 Buffalo. Development of both GDB and the GNU Modula-2 compiler will
4250 continue through the fall of 1991 and into 1992.
4252 Other Modula-2 compilers are currently not supported, and attempting to
4253 debug programs compiled with them will likely result in an error as the
4254 symbol table is read. Feel free to work on it, though!
4256 There are hooks in GDB for strict type checking and range checking,
4257 in the `Modula-2 philosophy', but they do not currently work.
4261 GDB can now write to executable and core files (e.g. patch
4262 a variable's value). You must turn this switch on, specify
4263 the file ("exec foo" or "core foo"), *then* modify it, e.g.
4264 by assigning a new value to a variable. Modifications take
4267 * Automatic SunOS shared library reading
4269 When you run your program, GDB automatically determines where its
4270 shared libraries (if any) have been loaded, and reads their symbols.
4271 The `share' command is no longer needed. This also works when
4272 examining core files.
4276 You can specify the number of lines that the `list' command shows.
4279 * New machines supported (host and target)
4281 SGI Iris (MIPS) running Irix V3: mips-sgi-irix or iris
4282 Sony NEWS (68K) running NEWSOS 3.x: m68k-sony-sysv or news
4283 Ultracomputer (29K) running Sym1: a29k-nyu-sym1 or ultra3
4285 * New hosts supported (not targets)
4287 IBM RT/PC: romp-ibm-aix or rtpc
4289 * New targets supported (not hosts)
4291 AMD 29000 embedded with COFF a29k-none-coff
4292 AMD 29000 embedded with a.out a29k-none-aout
4293 Ultracomputer remote kernel debug a29k-nyu-kern
4295 * New remote interfaces
4301 *** Changes in GDB-4.0:
4305 Wide output is wrapped at good places to make the output more readable.
4307 Gdb now supports cross-debugging from a host machine of one type to a
4308 target machine of another type. Communication with the target system
4309 is over serial lines. The ``target'' command handles connecting to the
4310 remote system; the ``load'' command will download a program into the
4311 remote system. Serial stubs for the m68k and i386 are provided. Gdb
4312 also supports debugging of realtime processes running under VxWorks,
4313 using SunRPC Remote Procedure Calls over TCP/IP to talk to a debugger
4314 stub on the target system.
4316 New CPUs supported include the AMD 29000 and Intel 960.
4318 GDB now reads object files and symbol tables via a ``binary file''
4319 library, which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple
4320 object file types such as a.out and coff.
4322 There is now a GDB reference card in "doc/refcard.tex". (Make targets
4323 refcard.dvi and refcard.ps are available to format it).
4326 * Control-Variable user interface simplified
4328 All variables that control the operation of the debugger can be set
4329 by the ``set'' command, and displayed by the ``show'' command.
4331 For example, ``set prompt new-gdb=>'' will change your prompt to new-gdb=>.
4332 ``Show prompt'' produces the response:
4333 Gdb's prompt is new-gdb=>.
4335 What follows are the NEW set commands. The command ``help set'' will
4336 print a complete list of old and new set commands. ``help set FOO''
4337 will give a longer description of the variable FOO. ``show'' will show
4338 all of the variable descriptions and their current settings.
4340 confirm on/off: Enables warning questions for operations that are
4341 hard to recover from, e.g. rerunning the program while
4342 it is already running. Default is ON.
4344 editing on/off: Enables EMACS style command line editing
4345 of input. Previous lines can be recalled with
4346 control-P, the current line can be edited with control-B,
4347 you can search for commands with control-R, etc.
4350 history filename NAME: NAME is where the gdb command history
4351 will be stored. The default is .gdb_history,
4352 or the value of the environment variable
4355 history size N: The size, in commands, of the command history. The
4356 default is 256, or the value of the environment variable
4359 history save on/off: If this value is set to ON, the history file will
4360 be saved after exiting gdb. If set to OFF, the
4361 file will not be saved. The default is OFF.
4363 history expansion on/off: If this value is set to ON, then csh-like
4364 history expansion will be performed on
4365 command line input. The default is OFF.
4367 radix N: Sets the default radix for input and output. It can be set
4368 to 8, 10, or 16. Note that the argument to "radix" is interpreted
4369 in the current radix, so "set radix 10" is always a no-op.
4371 height N: This integer value is the number of lines on a page. Default
4372 is 24, the current `stty rows'' setting, or the ``li#''
4373 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
4376 width N: This integer value is the number of characters on a line.
4377 Default is 80, the current `stty cols'' setting, or the ``co#''
4378 setting from the termcap entry matching the environment
4381 Note: ``set screensize'' is obsolete. Use ``set height'' and
4382 ``set width'' instead.
4384 print address on/off: Print memory addresses in various command displays,
4385 such as stack traces and structure values. Gdb looks
4386 more ``symbolic'' if you turn this off; it looks more
4387 ``machine level'' with it on. Default is ON.
4389 print array on/off: Prettyprint arrays. New convenient format! Default
4392 print demangle on/off: Print C++ symbols in "source" form if on,
4395 print asm-demangle on/off: Same, for assembler level printouts
4398 print vtbl on/off: Prettyprint C++ virtual function tables. Default is OFF.
4401 * Support for Epoch Environment.
4403 The epoch environment is a version of Emacs v18 with windowing. One
4404 new command, ``inspect'', is identical to ``print'', except that if you
4405 are running in the epoch environment, the value is printed in its own
4409 * Support for Shared Libraries
4411 GDB can now debug programs and core files that use SunOS shared libraries.
4412 Symbols from a shared library cannot be referenced
4413 before the shared library has been linked with the program (this
4414 happens after you type ``run'' and before the function main() is entered).
4415 At any time after this linking (including when examining core files
4416 from dynamically linked programs), gdb reads the symbols from each
4417 shared library when you type the ``sharedlibrary'' command.
4418 It can be abbreviated ``share''.
4420 sharedlibrary REGEXP: Load shared object library symbols for files
4421 matching a unix regular expression. No argument
4422 indicates to load symbols for all shared libraries.
4424 info sharedlibrary: Status of loaded shared libraries.
4429 A watchpoint stops execution of a program whenever the value of an
4430 expression changes. Checking for this slows down execution
4431 tremendously whenever you are in the scope of the expression, but is
4432 quite useful for catching tough ``bit-spreader'' or pointer misuse
4433 problems. Some machines such as the 386 have hardware for doing this
4434 more quickly, and future versions of gdb will use this hardware.
4436 watch EXP: Set a watchpoint (breakpoint) for an expression.
4438 info watchpoints: Information about your watchpoints.
4440 delete N: Deletes watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4441 disable N: Temporarily turns off watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4442 enable N: Re-enables watchpoint number N (same as breakpoints).
4445 * C++ multiple inheritance
4447 When used with a GCC version 2 compiler, GDB supports multiple inheritance
4450 * C++ exception handling
4452 Gdb now supports limited C++ exception handling. Besides the existing
4453 ability to breakpoint on an exception handler, gdb can breakpoint on
4454 the raising of an exception (before the stack is peeled back to the
4457 catch FOO: If there is a FOO exception handler in the dynamic scope,
4458 set a breakpoint to catch exceptions which may be raised there.
4459 Multiple exceptions (``catch foo bar baz'') may be caught.
4461 info catch: Lists all exceptions which may be caught in the
4462 current stack frame.
4465 * Minor command changes
4467 The command ``call func (arg, arg, ...)'' now acts like the print
4468 command, except it does not print or save a value if the function's result
4469 is void. This is similar to dbx usage.
4471 The ``up'' and ``down'' commands now always print the frame they end up
4472 at; ``up-silently'' and `down-silently'' can be used in scripts to change
4473 frames without printing.
4475 * New directory command
4477 'dir' now adds directories to the FRONT of the source search path.
4478 The path starts off empty. Source files that contain debug information
4479 about the directory in which they were compiled can be found even
4480 with an empty path; Sun CC and GCC include this information. If GDB can't
4481 find your source file in the current directory, type "dir .".
4483 * Configuring GDB for compilation
4485 For normal use, type ``./configure host''. See README or gdb.texinfo
4488 GDB now handles cross debugging. If you are remotely debugging between
4489 two different machines, type ``./configure host -target=targ''.
4490 Host is the machine where GDB will run; targ is the machine
4491 where the program that you are debugging will run.