fd14d71ce92772928bb2963cb492222c3b360972
[binutils-gdb.git] / binutils / NEWS
1 -*- text -*-
2
3 * Add --output option to the "ar" program. This option can be used to specify
4 the output directory when extracting members from an archive.
5
6 Changes in 2.33:
7
8 * Add --source-comment[=<txt>] option to objdump which if present,
9 provides a prefix to source code lines displayed in a disassembly.
10
11 * Add --set-section-alignment <section-name>=<align> option to objcopy to allow
12 the changing of section alignments.
13
14 * Add --verilog-data-width option to objcopy for verilog targets to control
15 width of data elements in verilog hex format.
16
17 * Add support for the Armv8.1-M Mainline and M-profile Vector Extension (MVE)
18 instructions.
19
20 * The separate debug info file options of readelf (--debug-dump=links
21 and --debug-dump=follow) and objdump (--dwarf=links and
22 --dwarf=follow-links) will now display and/or follow multiple links if
23 more than one are present in a file. (This usually happens when gcc's
24 -gsplit-dwarf option is used).
25
26 In addition objdump's --dwarf=follow-links now also affects its other
27 display options, so that for example, when combined with --syms it will
28 cause the symbol tables in any linked debug info files to also be
29 displayed. In addition when combined with --disassemble the --dwarf=
30 follow-links option will ensure that any symbol tables in the linked
31 files are read and used when disassembling code in the main file.
32
33 * Add support for dumping types encoded in the Compact Type Format
34 to objdump and readelf.
35
36 Changes in 2.32:
37
38 * The addr2line, c++filt, nm and objdump tools now have a limit on the
39 maximum amount of recursion that is allowed whilst demangling strings.
40 The value for this limit is defined by the DEMANGLE_RECRUSE_LIMIT
41 constant declared in the include/demangle.h header file. At the time
42 of writing this constant has the value of 2048.
43
44 The --no-recurse-limit option can be used to remove the limit, restoring
45 the behaviour of earlier versions of these tools. This may be needed in
46 order to dmangle truly complicated names, but it also leaves the tools
47 vulnerable to stack exhaustion from maliciously constructed mangled names.
48
49 * Objdump's --disassemble option can now take a parameter, specifying the
50 starting symbol for disassembly. Disassembly will continue from this
51 symbol up to the next symbol or the end of the function.
52
53 * The MIPS port now supports the Loongson 2K1000 processor which implements
54 the MIPS64r2 ISA, the Loongson-mmi ASE, Loongson-cam ASE, Loongson-ext ASE,
55 Loongson-ext2 ASE and MSA ASE instructions. Add -march=gs264e option for
56 Loongson 2K1000 processor.
57
58 * The MIPS port now supports the Loongson 3A2000/3A3000 processor which
59 implements the MIPS64r2 ISA, the Loongson-mmi ASE, Loongson-cam ASE,
60 Loongson-ext ASE and Loongson-ext2 ASE instructions. Add -march=gs464e
61 option for Loongson 3A2000/3A3000 processor.
62
63 * The MIPS port now supports the Loongson 3A1000 processor, aka Loongson3a,
64 which implements the MIPS64r2 ISA, the Loongson-mmi ASE, Loongson-cam ASE
65 and Loongson-ext ASE instructions. Add -march=gs464 option for Loongson
66 3A1000 processor, The -march=loongson3a is an alias of -march=gs464 for
67 compatibility.
68
69 * The size tool now has a new output format '--format=GNU' or '-G'. The
70 results are displayed in a similar manor to the default berkeley layout,
71 except read-only data is counted in the data column, not the text column.
72 Additionally the total is only included once.
73
74 Changes in 2.31:
75
76 * Add support for disassembling netronome Flow Processor (NFP) firmware files.
77
78 * The AArch64 port now supports showing disassembly notes which are emitted
79 when inconsistencies are found with the instruction that may result in the
80 instruction being invalid. These can be turned on with the option -M notes
81 to objdump.
82
83 * The AArch64 port now emits warnings when a combination of an instruction and
84 a named register could be invalid.
85
86 * Added O modifier to ar to display member offsets inside an archive
87
88 Changes in 2.30:
89
90 * Add --debug-dump=links option to readelf and --dwarf=links option to objdump
91 which displays the contents of any .gnu_debuglink or .gnu_debugaltlink
92 sections.
93
94 Add a --debug-dump=follow-links option to readelf and a --dwarf=follow-links
95 option to objdump which causes indirect links into separate debug info files
96 to be followed when dumping other DWARF sections.
97
98 Changes in 2.29:
99
100 * The MIPS port now supports microMIPS eXtended Physical Addressing (XPA)
101 instructions for assembly and disassembly.
102
103 * The MIPS port now supports the microMIPS Release 5 ISA for assembly and
104 disassembly.
105
106 * The MIPS port now supports the Imagination interAptiv MR2 processor,
107 which implements the MIPS32r3 ISA, the MIPS16e2 ASE as well as a couple
108 of implementation-specific regular MIPS and MIPS16e2 ASE instructions.
109
110 * The SPARC port now supports the SPARC M8 processor, which implements the
111 Oracle SPARC Architecture 2017.
112
113 * The MIPS port now supports the MIPS16e2 ASE for assembly and disassembly.
114
115 * Add support for ELF SHF_GNU_MBIND and PT_GNU_MBIND_XXX.
116
117 * Add support for the wasm32 ELF conversion of the WebAssembly file format.
118
119 * Add --inlines option to objdump, which extends the --line-numbers option
120 so that inlined functions will display their nesting information.
121
122 * Add --merge-notes options to objcopy to reduce the size of notes in
123 a binary file by merging and deleting redundant notes.
124
125 * Add support for locating separate debug info files using the build-id
126 method, where the separate file has a name based upon the build-id of
127 the original file.
128
129 Changes in 2.28:
130
131 * This version of binutils fixes a problem with PowerPC VLE 16A and 16D
132 relocations which were functionally swapped, for example,
133 R_PPC_VLE_HA16A performed like R_PPC_VLE_HA16D while R_PPC_VLE_HA16D
134 performed like R_PPC_VLE_HA16A. This could have been fixed by
135 renumbering relocations, which would keep object files created by an
136 older version of gas compatible with a newer ld. However, that would
137 require an ABI update, affecting other assemblers and linkers that
138 create and process the relocations correctly. It is recommended that
139 all VLE object files be recompiled, but ld can modify the relocations
140 if --vle-reloc-fixup is passed to ld. If the new ld command-line
141 option is not used, ld will ld warn on finding relocations inconsistent
142 with the instructions being relocated.
143
144 * The nm program has a new command-line option (--with-version-strings)
145 which will display a symbol's version information, if any, after the
146 symbol's name.
147
148 * The ARC port of objdump now accepts a -M option to specify the extra
149 instruction class(es) that should be disassembled.
150
151 * The --remove-section option for objcopy and strip now accepts section
152 patterns starting with an exclamation point to indicate a non-matching
153 section. A non-matching section is removed from the set of sections
154 matched by an earlier --remove-section pattern.
155
156 * The --only-section option for objcopy now accepts section patterns
157 starting with an exclamation point to indicate a non-matching section.
158 A non-matching section is removed from the set of sections matched by
159 an earlier --only-section pattern.
160
161 * New --remove-relocations=SECTIONPATTERN option for objcopy and strip.
162 This option can be used to remove sections containing relocations.
163 The SECTIONPATTERN is the section to which the relocations apply, not
164 the relocation section itself.
165
166 Changes in 2.27:
167
168 * Add a configure option, --enable-64-bit-archive, to force use of a
169 64-bit format when creating an archive symbol index.
170
171 * Add --elf-stt-common= option to objcopy for ELF targets to control
172 whether to convert common symbols to the STT_COMMON type.
173
174 Changes in 2.26:
175
176 * Add option to objcopy to insert new symbols into a file:
177 --add-symbol <name>=[<section>:]<value>[,<flags>]
178
179 * Add support for the ARC EM/HS, and ARC600/700 architectures.
180
181 * Extend objcopy --compress-debug-sections option to support
182 --compress-debug-sections=[none|zlib|zlib-gnu|zlib-gabi] for ELF
183 targets.
184
185 * Add --update-section option to objcopy.
186
187 * Add --output-separator option to strings.
188
189 Changes in 2.25:
190
191 * Add --data option to strings to only print strings in loadable, initialized
192 data sections. Change the default behaviour to be --all, but add a new
193 configure time option of --disable-default-strings-all to restore the old
194 default behaviour.
195
196 * Add --include-all-whitespace to strings.
197
198 * Add --dump-section option to objcopy.
199
200 * Add support for the Andes NDS32.
201
202 Changes in 2.24:
203
204 * Objcopy now supports wildcard characters in command-line options that take
205 section names.
206
207 * Add support for Altera Nios II.
208
209 Changes in 2.23:
210
211 * Add support for the VLE extension to the PowerPC architecture.
212
213 * Add support for x64 Windows target of the delayed-load-library.
214
215 * Add support for the Renesas RL78 architecture.
216
217 Changes in 2.22:
218
219 * Add support for displaying the contents of .debug.macro sections.
220
221 * Add --preprocessor-arg option to windres to specify additional options
222 passed to preprocessor.
223
224 * Add --dwarf-start and --dwarf-end to readelf and objdump. These are used by
225 the new Emacs mode, see dwarf-mode.el.
226
227 * Add support for the Tilera TILEPro and TILE-Gx architectures.
228
229 changes in 2.21:
230
231 * Add --interleave-width option to objcopy to allowing copying a range of
232 bytes from the input to the output with the --interleave option.
233
234 * Add support for the TMS320C6000 (TI C6X) processor family.
235
236 * Readelf can now display ARM unwind tables (.ARM.exidx / .ARM.extab) using
237 the -u / --unwind option.
238
239 * Add --dyn-syms to readelf to dump dynamic symbol table.
240
241 * A new tool - elfedit - has been added to directly manipulate ELF format
242 binaries.
243
244 * Add to dlltool .def file feature of aliasing PE internal symbol name by
245 '== <ID>' option.
246
247 * Add a new command-line option -a / --addresses to addr2line to display the
248 address before function name or source filename.
249
250 * Add a new command-line option -p / --pretty-print to addr2line to have
251 a more human readable output.
252
253 * The hppa/som targets can now be compiled on any host.
254
255 Changes in 2.20:
256
257 * Add support for delay importing to dlltool. Use the --output-delaylib <file>
258 switch to create a delay-import library. The resulting app will load the dll
259 as soon as the first function is called. It will link to __delayLoadHelper2()
260 from the static delayimp library, which will import LoadLibraryA and
261 GetProcAddress from kernel32.
262
263 * Add a new command-line option, --insn-width=WIDTH, to objdump to specify
264 number of bytes to be displayed on a single line when disassembling
265 instructions.
266
267 * Readelf can now display the relocated contents of a section as a sequence
268 of bytes via the --relocated-dump=<name|number> command-line option.
269
270 * The gprof program has been given a new command-line option:
271 --external-symbols-table=<filename> which reads in symbols from a specified
272 file.
273
274 * The plugin target has been added to bfd. It can load the same shared objects
275 used by gold and uses them to provide basic support for new file formats.
276
277 * The verilog memory hex dump file format is now supported as an output format
278 for objcopy.
279
280 * Add --file-alignment, --heap, --image-base, --section-alignment,
281 --stack and --subsystem command-line options to objcopy, which will
282 set PE optional header.
283
284 * Option --dwarf/-W of objdump is now as flexible as readelf --debug-dump/-w.
285
286 * --as-needed now links in a dynamic library if it satisfies undefined
287 symbols in regular objects, or in other dynamic libraries. In the
288 latter case the library is not linked if it is found in a DT_NEEDED
289 entry of one of the libraries already linked.
290
291 * Added --prefix=PREFIX and --prefix-strip=LEVEL switches to objdump to
292 add absolute paths for -S.
293
294 * Add new option --use-nul-prefixed-import-tables to dlltool to allow fall-
295 back to old import table generation with null element prefix.
296
297 * Added --identify-strict switch to cause --identify <implib> to
298 report an error when the import library is associated with
299 multiple DLLs.
300
301 * Added --identify <implib> option to dlltool, which determines the
302 name of the DLL associated with the specified <implib>.
303
304 * Support for PowerPC booke64 instructions has been removed. The assembler no
305 longer accepts -mbooke32 or -mbooke64 and the disassembler no longer accepts
306 -Mbooke32 or -Mbooke64. Instead, -mbooke and -Mbooke should be used.
307
308 Changes in 2.19:
309
310 * Added -wL switch to dump decoded contents of .debug_line.
311
312 * Added support for "thin" archives which contain pathnames pointing to
313 object files rather than the files themselves and which contain a
314 flattened symbol index for all objects, and archives, which have been
315 added to the archive.
316
317 * Added -F switch to objdump to include file offsets in the disassembly.
318
319 * Added -c switch to readelf to allow string dumps of archive symbol index.
320
321 * Support for SSE5 has been added to the i386 port.
322
323 * Added -p switch to readelf to allow string dumps of sections.
324
325 Changes in 2.18:
326
327 * Resolved 37 coding problems in bfd including static array overruns, null
328 pointer dereferences and use of a malloc buffer after it has been freed, as
329 revealed by static analysis donated by Coverity, Inc. (http://scan.coverity.com).
330
331 * The binutils sources are now released under version 3 of the GNU General
332 Public License.
333
334 * A new tool "windmc" has been added for some targets. This is a message
335 compiler which attempts to be compatible with the MS version.
336
337 * Add codepage support to the windres tool. It now supports many new
338 resource types (e.g. MANIFEST, TOOLBAR, etc). The output generation
339 for binary files is done now via bfd itself. The endianess problems
340 for different hosts are solved. Dumps of .res files can now be
341 re-compiled by windres without lossing resources or compilation errors.
342 Some problems on dialog resource translations are corrected.
343
344 * Add --extract-symbol command-line option to objcopy, which will
345 strip everything out of an ordinary object file or executable except
346 for its symbol table. Files containing just symbols can be useful
347 to some OSes.
348
349 Changes in 2.17:
350
351 * Add "-x NAME" to readelf in addition to "-x NUMBER".
352
353 * Add -i and -t switches to cxxfilt. -i disables the display of implementation
354 specific extra demangling information (if any) and -t disables the demangling
355 of types.
356
357 * Add support for the "@<file>" syntax to the command lines of all tools, so
358 that extra switches can be read from <file>.
359
360 * Add "-W/--dwarf" to objdump to display the contents of the DWARF
361 debug sections.
362
363 * Add "-t/--section-details" to readelf to display section details.
364 "-N/--full-section-name" is deprecated.
365
366 * powerpc-linux ld now supports a variant form of PLT and GOT for the security
367 conscious. This form will automatically be chosen when ld detects that all
368 code in regular object files was generated by gcc -msecure-plt. The old PLT
369 and GOT may be forced by a new ld option, --bss-plt.
370
371 * Add "-i/--inlines" to addr2line to print enclosing scope information
372 for inlined function chains, back to first non-inlined function.
373
374 * Add "-N/--full-section-name" to readelf to display full section name.
375
376 * Add "-M entry:<addr>" switch to objdump to specify a function entry address
377 when disassembling VAX binaries.
378
379 * Add "--globalize-symbol <name>" and "--globalize-symbols <filename>" switches
380 to objcopy to convert local symbols into global symbols.
381
382 * gprof now allows input files to have histogram records for
383 several memory ranges, provided those ranges are disjoint.
384
385 Changes in 2.16:
386
387 * Add "-g/--section-groups" to readelf to display section groups.
388
389 * objcopy recognizes two new options --strip-unneeded-symbol and
390 --strip-unneeded-symbols, namely for use together with the wildcard
391 matching the original --strip-symbol/--strip-symbols provided, but
392 retaining any symbols matching but needed by relocations.
393
394 * readelf can now display address ranges from .debug_range sections. This
395 happens automatically when a DW_AT_range attribute is encountered. The
396 command-line switch --debug-dump=Ranges (or -wR) can also be used to display
397 the contents of the .debug_range section.
398
399 * nm and objdump now have a switch "--special-syms" to enable the displaying of
400 symbols which the target considers to be special. By default these symbols
401 are no longer displayed. Currently the only special symbols are the Mapping
402 symbols used by the ARM port to mark transitions between text and data and
403 between ARM and THUMB code.
404
405 * dlltool has a switch "--ext-prefix-alias <prefix>" to generate additional
406 import and export symbols with <preifx> prepended to them.
407
408 Changes in 2.15:
409
410 * objcopy for MIPS targets now accepts "-M no-aliases" as an option to the
411 disassembler to print the "raw" mips instruction mnemonic instead of some
412 pseudo instruction name. I.E. print "daddu" or "or" instead of "move",
413 "sll" instead of "nop", etc.
414
415 * objcopy and strip can now take wildcard patterns in symbol names specified on
416 the command line provided that the --wildcard switch is used to enable them.
417
418 * readelf can now parse archives.
419
420 * objdump now accepts --debugging-tags to print the debug information in a
421 format compatible with ctags tool.
422
423 * objcopy and strip now accept --only-keep-debug to create a file containing
424 those sections that would be stripped out by --strip-debug. The idea is that
425 this can be used in conjunction with the --add-gnu-debuglink switch to create
426 a two part program distribution - one a stripped executable and the other the
427 debugging info.
428
429 * objcopy now accepts --add-gnu-debuglink=<file> to insert a .gnu_debuglink
430 section into a (presumably stripped) executable. This allows the debug
431 information for the file to be held in a separate file.
432
433 * BFD marks the sections .comment and .note as 'n' in the BSD/POSIX
434 single-character representation. This can be checked by running nm
435 with the -a switch.
436
437 Changes in 2.14:
438
439 * Added --info switch to objcopy and strip.
440
441 * Support for Vitesse IQ2000 added by Red Hat.
442
443 * Added 'S' encoding to strings to allow the display of 8-bit characters.
444
445 * Added --prefix-symbols=<text>, --prefix-sections=<text> and
446 --prefix-alloc-sections=<text> to objcopy.
447
448 * readelf can handle the extensions to the DWARF2 spec used by the Unified
449 Parallel C compiler.
450
451 * BFD no longer declares a "boolean" type, to avoid clashes with other
452 headers that declare the same. Users of BFD should replace boolean,
453 false and true, with int, 0 and 1, or define their own boolean type.
454
455 * Support for IP2K added by Denis Chertykov.
456
457 Changes in 2.13:
458
459 * Support for the Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat. Models for FR400
460 and FR500 included.
461
462 Changes in version 2.12:
463
464 * Support for Don Knuth's MMIX, by Hans-Peter Nilsson.
465
466 * size: Add --totals to display summary of sizes (Berkeley format only).
467
468 * readelf: Add --wide option to not break section header or segment listing
469 lines to fit into 80 columns.
470
471 * strings: Add --encoding to display wide character strings. By Markus Kuhn.
472
473 * objcopy: Add --rename-section to change section names.
474
475 * readelf: Support added for DWARF 2.1 extensions. Support added for
476 displaying the contents of .debug.macinfo sections.
477
478 * New command-line switches added to objcopy to allow symbols to be kept as
479 global symbols, and also to specify files containing lists of such symbols.
480 by Honda Hiroki.
481
482 * Support for OpenRISC by Johan Rydberg.
483
484 * New command-line switch to objcopy --alt-machine-code which creates a binary
485 with an alternate machine code if one is defined in the architecture
486 description. Only supported for ELF targets. By Alexandre Oliva.
487
488 * New command-line switch to objcopy -B (or --binary-architecture) which sets
489 the architecture of the output file to the given argument. This option only
490 makes sense, if the input target is binary. Otherwise it is ignored.
491 By Stefan Geuken.
492
493 * Support for PDP-11 by Lars Brinkhoff.
494
495 Changes in binutils 2.11:
496
497 * Add support for ARM v5t and v5te architectures and Intel's XScale ARM
498 extenstions.
499
500 * Add --srec-len and --srec-forceS3 command-line switch to objcopy.
501 By Luciano Gemme.
502
503 * Support for the MIPS32, by Anders Norlander.
504
505 * Support for the i860, by Jason Eckhardt.
506
507 * Support for CRIS (Axis Communications ETRAX series).
508
509 Changes in binutils 2.10:
510
511 * Support for 64-bit ELF on HPPA.
512
513 * New command-line switch to objdump --file-start-context which shows the
514 entire file contents up to the source line first encountered for a given
515 file.
516
517 * New command-line switch to objdump -M (or --disassembler-options) which takes
518 a parameter which can then be interpreted on a per-target basis by the
519 disassembler. Used by ARM targets to select register name sets, ISA, APCS or
520 raw verions.
521
522 * objdump support for -mi386:intel which causes disassembly to be displayed
523 with intel syntax.
524
525 * New program: readelf. This displays the contents of ELF format files,
526 regardless of target machine.
527
528 * objcopy now takes --change-section-lma, --change-section-vma, and
529 --change-section-address options. The old --adjust-section-vma option is
530 equivalent to --change-section-address. The other --adjust-* options are now
531 renamed to --change-*, although --adjust-* continues to work.
532
533 * objcopy has a --redefine-sym option that lets you rename symbols.
534
535 * objcopy now takes a -j/--only-section option to copy only the specified
536 sections.
537
538 * dlltool now supports the IMPORTS command.
539
540 * dlltool now takes --export-all-symbols, --no-export-all-symbols,
541 --exclude-symbols, and --no-default-excludes options.
542
543 Changes in binutils 2.9:
544
545 * Added windres program, which can be used to manipulate resources in WIN32
546 files as used on Windows 95 and Windows NT.
547
548 * The objcopy --gap-fill and --pad-to options operate on the LMA rather than
549 the VMA of the sections.
550
551 * Added S modifier to ar to not build a symbol table.
552
553 Changes in binutils 2.8:
554
555 * The objdump disassembly format has been changed, and hopefully improved. Use
556 the new --prefix-addresses option to get the old format. There are also new
557 --disassemble-zeroes and --no-show-raw-insn options which affect disassembler
558 output.
559
560 * Formats may now be specified as configuration triplets. For example,
561 objdump -b i386-pc-linux. The triplets are not passed through config.sub,
562 so they must be in canonical form.
563
564 * Added new addr2line program. This uses the debugging information to convert
565 an address into a file name and line number within a program.
566
567 * Added --change-leading-char argument to objcopy.
568
569 * Added --weaken argument to objcopy.
570
571 * objdump --dynamic-reloc now works on ELF executables and shared libraries.
572
573 * Added --adjust-vma option to objdump.
574
575 * Added -C/--demangle option to objdump.
576
577 * Added -p/--preserve-dates option to strip and objcopy.
578
579 Changes in binutils 2.7:
580
581 * Added --enable-shared and --enable-commonbfdlib options to configure.
582
583 * Added --debugging argument to objdump and objcopy.
584
585 * Added --defined-only argument to nm.
586
587 * Added --remove-leading-char argument to objcopy.
588
589 * The objdump --line-numbers option is now meaningful with --reloc.
590
591 * Added --line-numbers option to nm.
592
593 * Added --endian/-EB/-EL option to objdump.
594
595 * Added support for Alpha OpenVMS/AXP.
596
597 Changes in binutils 2.6:
598
599 * Added -N/--strip-symbol and -K/--keep-symbol arguments to strip and objcopy.
600
601 * Added several arguments to objcopy to provide some control over how the new
602 file is laid out in memory. Also added binary output format to BFD to permit
603 generating plain binary files.
604
605 * Added --start-address and --stop-address options to objdump.
606
607 * ar and ranlib now work on AIX. The tools are now built by default on AIX.
608
609 Changes in binutils 2.5:
610
611 * Changed objdump -dr to dump the relocs interspersed with the assembly
612 listing, for a more useful listing of relocatable files.
613
614 * Changed objdump -d/--disassemble to only disassemble SEC_CODE sections.
615 Added -D/--disassemble-all option to disassemble all sections.
616
617 * Added --size-sort option to nm.
618
619 * strip and objcopy should now be able to handle dynamically linked ELF
620 executables.
621
622 Changes in binutils 2.4:
623
624 * Support for HP-PA (by Jeff Law), i386 Mach (by David Mackenzie), RS/6000 and
625 PowerPC (except ar and ranlib; by Ian Taylor).
626
627 * Support for Irix 5.
628
629 * Programs `strip' and `objcopy' will not attempt to write dynamically linked
630 ELF output files, since BFD currently can't create them properly.
631
632 Changes in binutils 2.3:
633
634 * A new --stabs argument has been added to objdump to dump stabs sections in
635 ELF and COFF files.
636
637 * A new program, nlmconv, has been added. It can convert object files into
638 Novell NetWare Loadable Modules.
639
640 * The strings program has been added.
641
642 Changes in binutils 2.2:
643
644 * The 'copy' program has been renamed to 'objcopy', for consistency with
645 'objdump', and because 'copy' might more plausibly be used as a synonym for
646 'cp'.
647
648 * The new stand-alone program c++filt is a filter that converts encoded
649 (mangled) C++ assembly-level identifiers to user-level names. (Note: This
650 may get moved to the gcc distribution.)
651
652 * nm -o on an archive now prefixes each line with the archive name, matching
653 the output from BSD nm.
654
655 * ar (and ld) can now read (but not write) BSD4.4-style archives.
656
657 * New support for H8500, Z8000, and the Hitach SH.
658
659 * Dis-assembler interface changed to allow sharing with gdb.
660
661 * There is new Elf code, but it is not yet ready for general use.
662
663 * There is the beginnings of a test suite.
664
665 Changes in binutils 2.1:
666
667 * There is now support for writing ECOFF files, so ld and the other utilities
668 should work on Risc/Ultrix and Irix. Please let us know how well this works.
669
670 * ar now automatically creates a symbol table (a __.SYMDEF member, in the BSD
671 version), if there are any object files in the archive. So running ranlib is
672 now redundant (unless the non-standard q command is used). This is required
673 for Posix.2 conformance.
674
675 * The archive-reading code now reads both BSD-style and SYSV-style archives
676 independently of the selected target format. This is to encourage people to
677 switch to SYSV-format, which has a number of advantages.
678
679 * The strip and copy programs now have options to remove debug-symbols only
680 and/or local symbols only. They now also support long options.
681
682 \f
683 Copyright (C) 2012-2019 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
684
685 Copying and distribution of this file, with or without modification,
686 are permitted in any medium without royalty provided the copyright
687 notice and this notice are preserved.
688
689 Local variables:
690 fill-column: 79
691 End: