The NEWS

[Stan Shebs <shebs@cygnus.com>]

OK, I've pored over the ChangeLogs, and yes, even scanned the 30MB(!)
diff between 4.17 and 4.18 candidate, and this is what I got for
user-visible changes.  If there's anything important I'm missing, now
is the time to speak up; at this point I believe all the release
issues have been dealt with. -s

*** Changes in GDB-4.18:

* New native configurations

HP-UX 10.20					hppa*-*-hpux10.20
HP-UX 11.x					hppa*-*-hpux11.0*
M68K Linux					m68*-*-linux*

* New targets

Fujitsu FR30					fr30-*-elf*
Intel StrongARM					strongarm-*-*
Mitsubishi D30V					d30v-*-*

* OBSOLETE configurations

Gould PowerNode, NP1				np1-*-*, pn-*-*

Configurations that have been declared obsolete will be commented out,
but the code will be left in place.  If there is no activity to revive
these configurations before the next release of GDB, the sources will
be permanently REMOVED.

* ANSI/ISO C

As a compatibility experiment, GDB's source files buildsym.h and
buildsym.c have been converted to pure standard C, no longer
containing any K&R compatibility code.  We believe that all systems in
use today either come with a standard C compiler, or have a GCC port
available.  If this is not true, please report the affected
configuration to bug-gdb@gnu.org immediately.  See the README file for
information about getting a standard C compiler if you don't have one
already.

* Readline 2.2

GDB now uses readline 2.2.

* set extension-language

You can now control the mapping between filename extensions and source
languages by using the `set extension-language' command.  For instance,
you can ask GDB to treat .c files as C++ by saying
	set extension-language .c c++
The command `info extensions' lists all of the recognized extensions
and their associated languages.

* Setting processor type for PowerPC and RS/6000

When GDB is configured for a powerpc*-*-* or an rs6000*-*-* target,
you can use the `set processor' command to specify what variant of the
PowerPC family you are debugging.  The command

	set processor NAME

sets the PowerPC/RS6000 variant to NAME.  GDB knows about the
following PowerPC and RS6000 variants:

  ppc-uisa  PowerPC UISA - a PPC processor as viewed by user-level code
  rs6000    IBM RS6000 ("POWER") architecture, user-level view
  403       IBM PowerPC 403
  403GC     IBM PowerPC 403GC
  505       Motorola PowerPC 505
  860       Motorola PowerPC 860 or 850
  601       Motorola PowerPC 601
  602       Motorola PowerPC 602
  603       Motorola/IBM PowerPC 603 or 603e
  604       Motorola PowerPC 604 or 604e
  750       Motorola/IBM PowerPC 750 or 750

At the moment, this command just tells GDB what to name the
special-purpose processor registers.  Since almost all the affected
registers are inaccessible to user-level programs, this command is
only useful for remote debugging in its present form.

* HP-UX support

Thanks to a major code donation from Hewlett-Packard, GDB now has much
more extensive support for HP-UX.  Added features include shared
library support, kernel threads and hardware watchpoints for 11.00,
support for HP's ANSI C and C++ compilers, and a compatibility mode
for xdb commands.

* Catchpoints

HP's donation includes the new concept of catchpoints, which is a
generalization of the old catch command.  On HP-UX, it is now possible
to catch exec, fork, and vfork, as well as library loading.

This means that the existing catch command has changed; its first
argument now specifies the type of catch to be set up.  See the
output of "help catch" for a list of catchpoint types.

* Debugging across forks

On HP-UX, you can choose which process to debug when a fork() happens
in the inferior.

* TUI

HP has donated a curses-based terminal user interface (TUI).  To get
it, build with --enable-tui.  This interface only works well with HP
configurations, and is not yet recommended for any other config.

* GDB remote protocol additions

A new protocol packet 'X' that writes binary data is now available.
Default behavior is to try 'X', then drop back to 'M' if the stub
fails to respond.  The settable variable `remotebinarydownload'
allows explicit control over the use of 'X'.

For 64-bit targets, the memory packets ('M' and 'm') can now contain a
full 64-bit address.  The command

	set remoteaddresssize 32

can be used to revert to the old behaviour.  For existing remote stubs
the change should not be noticed, as the additional address information
will be discarded.

In order to assist in debugging stubs, you may use the maintenance
command `packet' to send any text string to the stub.  For instance,

	maint packet heythere

sends the packet "$heythere#<checksum>".  Note that it is very easy to
disrupt a debugging session by sending the wrong packet at the wrong
time.

The compare-sections command allows you to compare section data on the
target to what is in the executable file without uploading or
downloading, by comparing CRC checksums.

* Tracing can collect general expressions

You may now collect general expressions at tracepoints.  This requires
further additions to the target-side stub; see tracepoint.c and
doc/agentexpr.texi for further details.

* mask-address variable for Mips

For Mips targets, you may control the zeroing of the upper 32 bits of
a 64-bit address by entering `set mask-address on'.  This is mainly
of interest to users of embedded R4xxx and R5xxx processors.

* Higher serial baud rates

GDB's serial code now allows you to specify baud rates 57600, 115200,
230400, and 460800 baud.  (Note that your host system may not be able
to achieve all of these rates.)

* i960 simulator

The i960 configuration now includes a builtin simulator contributed
by Jim Wilson.