binutils 2.9.1.0.4 is released.

[hjl@lucon.org (H.J. Lu)]

You can also get diffs for binutils 2.8.1.0.23 as well as binutils
2.9.1 from the public ftp sites.

-- 
H.J. Lu (hjl@gnu.org)
---
This is the beta release of binutils 2.9.1.0.4 for Linux, which is based
on binutils 2.9.1 plus Linux/ARM support and some x86 assembler changes.

There was some problem on Linux/alpha. The binaries generated by the
new binituls may not run correctly on Linux/alpha. It turned out it was
a bug in the alpha dynamic linker in glibc 2.0.6. The current glibc 2.1
and glibc 2.0.7 should be ok.

This release should work on linux/x86/alpha. There are some ELF bug
fixes. But I don't know if it fixes all the bugs reported on
linux/sparc, Linux/MIPS and linux/PPC. I'd like to hear reports on them.
I'd like to release it to public soon. Please test it as much as you
can.

Please report any bugs related to binutils 2.9.1.0.4 to hjl@lucon.org.

Changes from binutils 2.9.1.0.3:

1. Update from official binutils 2.9.1.

Changes from binutils 2.9.1.0.2:

1. Fix x86 16-bit jump.
2. Fix the x86 default address mode checking for push/lcall/ljmp.
3. Change the x86 JumpAbsolute bit mismatch to warning.

Changes from binutils 2.9.1.0.1:

1. The "pushw $1" x86 gas bug is fixed.

Changes from binutils 2.9.0.3:

1. Update from binutils 2.9.1.
2. Martynas Kunigelis <kunimart@pit.ktu.lt>'s 16-bit gas code was
   added.
3. More x86 gas bug are fixed. Previously, gas would silently turn

	call sys_call_table(,%eax,4)
   into
	call *sys_call_table(,%eax,4)

   Now, it is flagged as an error. There are asm codes like that in
   the Linux kernel. They should be fixed.

   Also "jmpl 1b" works again and "push $4096" works now.

There are so many x86 changes. Please test it as much as you can on
x86.
4. Some ARM/ELF gas changes.

Changes from binutils 2.9.0.2:

1. For the ELF linker bug, fall back to NULL when matching the shared
   library name for the needed shared library.

Changes from binutils 2.9.0.1:

1. An x86 assembler bug, which dropped the explicit opcode operand
   size prefix by my x86 assembler changes, is fixed.

Changes from binutils 2.8.1.0.30:

1. Update from the binutils 2.9.
2. An x86 assembler/disassembler bug related to popa/pusha is fixed.
3. An ELF linker bug which loads the incompatible needed shared library
   is fixed.

Changes from binutils 2.8.1.0.29:

1. Update from the binutils gas-980408.

Changes from binutils 2.8.1.0.28:

1. Update from the binutils gas-980404.

Changes from binutils 2.8.1.0.27:

1. Update from the binutils gas-980331.

Changes from binutils 2.8.1.0.26:

1. For x86, don't emit operand size prefix if there is no ambiguity.
2. Add "xlatb" for x86.

Changes from binutils 2.8.1.0.25:

1. Update from the binutils gas-980327.
2. There are some major x86 assembler changes with operand size suffix.
   Some x86 assembler performence bugs are fixed. The Linux kernel and
   applications may run faster when assembled the new x86 assembler on
   x86. Please double check them on x86. gcc/egcs should be fine. But
   the Linux kernel does have some invalid x86 assembly code. In
   arch/i386/lib/locks.S, there was

	btl     %dl, SYMBOL_NAME(smp_invalidate_needed)

   It is not valid. The register should be either 16-bit or 32-bit.
   8-bit is not allowed. If you have any x86 assembler problem, please
   let me know.

Changes from binutils 2.8.1.0.24:

1. Update from the binutils gas-980325.
2. Change the x86 assembler error from as_bad to as_warn.
3. Fix the address for x86's lgdt/lidt.
4. Add 'S' to ar to disable symbol-table generation. Maybe used by
   glibc build to speed up archive update.

Changes from binutils 2.8.1.0.23:

1. Update from the binutils gas-980320.
2. Fix an x86 assembler bug.
3. Fix a Sparc/ELF bfd bug.

IMPORTANT:
The .plt format that the Alpha was using was not thread safe.  So I 
changed it.  The new format is *not* binary compatible with the old,
thus you must use glibc 2.0.4 to get an ld.so that can understand it.

Note that the new ld.so knows how to deal with the old .plt format, so
old libraries will still work, but they should be relinked eventually
for performance reasons.

The file list:

1. binutils-2.9.1.0.4.tar.gz. Source code.
2. binutils-2.9.1.0.3-2.9.1.0.4.diff.gz. Patch against the previous
   beta source code.
3. binutils-2.9.1.0.4-libc5.x86.tar.gz. Precompiled Linux/x86 binaries
   for libc 5.
4. binutils-2.9.1.0.4-glibc.x86.tar.gz. Precompiled Linux/x86 binaries
   for libc 6 (glibc 2.0.5c or above).

The primary ftp sites for the compiler/C library:

1. ftp://tsx-11.mit.edu/pub/linux/packages/GCC
2. ftp://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/GCC

The beta directory is in private/tofu under the GCC directory.
 
Most of my stuff can also be found at

   ftp://ftp.yggdrasil.com/private/hjl
   ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/devel/gcc

To install the binary package, please follow the procedure very closely.
Please backup/save all the files you are instructed to delete and you
should do
 
	gzip -dc binutils-2.9.1.0.4-libc5.x86.tar.gz | tar tvvf -
or
	gzip -dc binutils-2.9.1.0.4-glibc.x86.tar.gz | tar tvvf -
or
	gzip -dc binutils-2.9.1.0.4-alpha.tar.gz | tar tvvf -
 
to see what is in there.
 
Please do back up before you remove things.

To install for libc 5, PLEASE DO
 
1. su root
2. cd /
3. rm -f /usr/bin/encaps /usr/bin/nm
4. gzip -dc binutils-2.9.1.0.4-libc5.x86.tar.gz | tar xvvf -
5. ldconfig
 
To install for libc 6 (glibc 2.0.5c or above), PLEASE DO
 
1. su root
2. cd /
3. rm -f /usr/bin/encaps /usr/bin/nm
4. gzip -dc binutils-2.9.1.0.4-glibc.x86.tar.gz | tar xvvf -
5. ldconfig
 
Now you have the new gas/binutils under /usr/bin and
/usr/ix86-linuxaout/bin. You have to use
 
/usr/ix86-linuxaout/bin/as
 
and
 
/usr/ix86-linuxaout/bin/ld -m i386linux
 
if you want to use a.out as and ld directly.
 
I have changed the target names for Linux/x86 and Linux/x86 (a.out)
to ix86-linux and ix86-linuxaout respectively. The precompiled
binaries are installed under /usr/ix86-linux and /usr/ix86-linuxaout.
You should make appropriate symbolic links if you have a different
name for the Linux/x86 target, like i586-unknown-linux.

If you have an old linux library in the a.out format and you cannot
obtain the newer version in the ELF format for whatever reason, you
can try "objcopy --remove-leading-char" on the a.out library and see
if it can link with your code in ELF. For Sybase client libraries,
I did

# cd sybase/lib
# for f in *.a
do
  objcopy --remove-leading-char $f
done

It seems to compile/link fine with libc 5.4.2x. But I don't know
if it really works or not. The resulting binaries should work
if the libc ABI used by the old library is unchanged in the new
libc.

According to Bruce Milner <Bruce.Milner@genetics.utah.edu>:

Just a quick note about your example using objcopy for
sybase. The sybase a.out libraries "are" dependent on a changed
feature of the libc ABI.
 
The ctype macros changed to a byte order independent format
(little endian). In order to use the sybase libraries, one needs to
rename the the ctype table variables in the sybase library files
and link in an old version of the libc's "C-ctype.o ctype-info.o"
files.

thain@sunquest.sunquest.com put a ELF'ized version of these
libraries on 

ftp://mudshark.sunquest.com/pub/ctlib-linux-elf


Thanks.


H.J. Lu
hjl@lucon.org
05/05/98