GNU Binutils




  GNU Binutils



The GNU Binutils are a collection of binary tools.  The main ones are:

ld - the GNU linker.
as - the GNU assembler.

But they also include:

addr2line - Converts addresses into filenames and line numbers.
ar - A utility for creating, modifying and extracting from archives.
c++filt - Filter to demangle encoded C++ symbols.
gprof - Displays profiling information.
nlmconv - Converts object code into an NLM.
nm - Lists symbols from object files.
objcopy - Copys and translates object files.
objdump - Displays information from object files.
ranlib - Generates an index to the contents of an archive.
readelf - Displays information from any ELF format object file.
size - Lists the section sizes of an object or archive file.
strings - Lists printable strings from files.
strip - Discards symbols.
windres - A compiler for Windows resource files.


Most of these programs use BFD, the Binary File Descriptor
library, to do low-level manipulation.  Many of them also use the
opcodes library to assemble and disassemble machine
instructions.

The binutils have been ported to most major Unix variants as well as
Wintel systems, and their main reason for existence is to give the
GNU system
(and
 GNU/Linux)
the facility to compile and link programs.

Obtaining binutils


The latest release of GNU binutils is 2.13.  The various NEWS files
(binutils,
 gas, and
 ld)
have details of what has changed in this release.


See the SOFTWARE
page for information on obtaining releases of GNU binutils
and other GNU software.


If you plan to do active work on the binutils, you can access the
development source tree by anonymous CVS:

  
  cvs -z 9 -d :pserver:anoncvs@sources.redhat.com:/cvs/src login
  {enter "anoncvs" as the password}
  cvs -z 9 -d :pserver:anoncvs@sources.redhat.com:/cvs/src co binutils


Alternatively, you can use
  
the cvsweb interface, or the source snapshots, available as
bzipped tar files via anonymous FTP from 
  
  ftp://sources.redhat.com/pub/binutils/snapshots.

Mailing lists

There are three binutils mailing lists:


   
       bug-binutils@gnu.org
       
       For reporting bugs.
       
       
   
       binutils@sources.redhat.com
       
       For discussing binutils issues.
       

   binutils-cvs
       
       A read-only mailing list containing the notes
       from checkins to the binutils CVS repository.
       
       

Their archives can be found at:

 bug-binutils
 binutils
 binutils-cvs


You can use this form to subscribe to the mailing lists:



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   binutils
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You may wish to browse the old mail archives of the 
  gas2
and
  bfd
mailing lists.  These were the discussion lists for binutils until May
1999.  Please do not send mail to them any longer.


Documentation
The 
documentation for binutils 2.12 is on-line.



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Updated:

Last modified: Tue May 14 20:15:28 EDT 2002