gcc-8-source 8-20180414-1ubuntu2 / usr / src / gcc-8 / debian / NEWS.gcc

This file contains information about GCC releases which has been generated
automatically from the online release notes.  It covers releases of GCC
(and the former EGCS project) since EGCS 1.0, on the line of development
that led to GCC 3. For information on GCC 2.8.1 and older releases of GCC 2,
see ONEWS.

======================================================================
http://gcc.gnu.org/gcc-7/index.html

                              GCC 7 Release Series
                        Changes, New Features, and Fixes

  This page is a brief summary of some of the huge number of improvements
  in GCC 7. For more information, see the "Porting to GCC 7" page and the
  full GCC documentation.

Caveats

    * GCC now uses LRA (a new local register allocator) by default for new
      targets.
    * The non-standard C++0x type traits has_trivial_default_constructor,
      has_trivial_copy_constructor and has_trivial_copy_assign have been
      removed.
    * The libstdc++ Profile Mode has been deprecated and will be removed in a
      future version.
    * The Cilk+ extensions to the C and C++ languages have been deprecated.

General Optimizer Improvements

    * GCC 7 can determine the return value or range of return values of some
      calls to the sprintf family of functions and make it available to other
      optimization passes. Some calls to the snprintf function with a zero size
      argument can be folded into constants. This optimization is included in
      -O1 and can be selectively controlled by the -fprintf-return-value option.
    * A new store merging pass has been added. It merges constant stores to
      adjacent memory locations into fewer, wider, stores. It is enabled by the
      -fstore-merging option and at the -O2 optimization level or higher (and
      -Os).
    * A new code hoisting optimization has been added to the partial redundancy
      elimination pass. It attempts to move evaluation of expressions executed
      on all paths to the function exit as early as possible, which helps
      primarily for code size, but can be useful for speed of generated code as
      well. It is enabled by the -fcode-hoisting option and at the -O2
      optimization level or higher (and -Os).
    * A new interprocedural bitwise constant propagation optimization has been
      added, which propagates knowledge about which bits of variables are known
      to be zero (including pointer alignment information) across the call
      graph. It is enabled by the -fipa-bit-cp option if -fipa-cp is enabled as
      well, and is enabled at the -O2 optimization level and higher (and -Os).
      This optimization supersedes interprocedural alignment propagation of GCC
      6, and therefore the option -fipa-cp-alignment is now deprecated and
      ignored.
    * A new interprocedural value range propagation optimization has been
      added, which propagates integral ranges that variable values can be
      proven to be within across the call graph. It is enabled by the -fipa-vrp
      option and at the -O2 optimization level and higher (and -Os).
    * A new loop splitting optimization pass has been added. It splits certain
      loops if they contain a condition that is always true on one side of the
      iteration space and always false on the other into two loops where each
      of the new two loops iterates just on one of the sides of the iteration
      space and the condition does not need to be checked inside of the loop.
      It is enabled by the -fsplit-loops option and at the -O3 optimization
      level or higher.
    * The shrink-wrapping optimization can now separate portions of prologues
      and epilogues to improve performance if some of the work done
      traditionally by prologues and epilogues is not needed on certain paths.
      This is controlled by the -fshrink-wrap-separate option, enabled by
      default. It requires target support, which is currently only implemented
      in the PowerPC and AArch64 ports.
    * AddressSanitizer gained a new sanitization option, -fsanitize-address-
      use-after-scope, which enables sanitization of variables whose address is
      taken and used after a scope where the variable is defined:
 
           int
           main (int argc, char **argv)
           {
             char *ptr;
               {
                 char my_char;
                 ptr = &my_char;
               }

             *ptr = 123;
             return *ptr;
           }

           ==28882==ERROR: AddressSanitizer: stack-use-after-scope on address 0x7fffb8dba990 at pc 0x0000004006d5 bp 0x7fffb8dba960 sp 0x7fffb8dba958
           WRITE of size 1 at 0x7fffb8dba990 thread T0
               #0 0x4006d4 in main /tmp/use-after-scope-1.c:10
               #1 0x7f9c71943290 in __libc_start_main (/lib64/libc.so.6+0x20290)
               #2 0x400739 in _start (/tmp/a.out+0x400739)

           Address 0x7fffb8dba990 is located in stack of thread T0 at offset 32 in frame
               #0 0x40067f in main /tmp/use-after-scope-1.c:3

             This frame has 1 object(s):
               [32, 33) 'my_char' <== Memory access at offset 32 is inside this variable

      The option is enabled by default with -fsanitize=address and disabled by
      default with -fsanitize=kernel-address. Compared to the LLVM compiler,
      where the option already exists, the implementation in the GCC compiler
      has couple of improvements and advantages:
          o A complex usage of gotos and case labels are properly handled and
            should not report any false positive or false negatives.
          o C++ temporaries are sanitized.
          o Sanitization can handle invalid memory stores that are optimized
            out by the LLVM compiler when using an optimization level.
    * The -fsanitize=signed-integer-overflow suboption of the UndefinedBehavior
      Sanitizer now diagnoses arithmetic overflows even on arithmetic
      operations with generic vectors.
    * Version 5 of the DWARF debugging information standard is supported
      through the -gdwarf-5 option. The DWARF version 4 debugging information
      remains the default until debugging information consumers are adjusted.

New Languages and Language specific improvements

 OpenACC support in C, C++, and Fortran continues to be maintained and
improved. See the OpenACC and Offloading wiki pages for further information.

Ada
    * On mainstream native platforms, Ada programs no longer require the stack
      to be made executable in order to run properly.

BRIG (HSAIL)

Support for processing BRIG 1.0 files was added in this release. BRIG is a
binary format for HSAIL (Heterogeneous System Architecture Intermediate
Language). The BRIG frontend can be used for implementing HSAIL "finalizers"
(compilation of HSAIL to a native ISA) for gcc-supported targets. An
implementation of an HSAIL runtime library, libhsail-rt is also included.

C family

    * New command-line options have been added for the C and C++ compilers:
          o -Wimplicit-fallthrough warns when a switch case falls through. This
            warning has five different levels. The compiler is able to parse a
            wide range of fallthrough comments, depending on the level. It also
            handles control-flow statements, such as ifs. It's possible to
            suppres the warning by either adding a fallthrough comment, or by
            using a null statement: __attribute__ ((fallthrough)); (C, C++), or
            [[fallthrough]]; (C++17), or [[gnu::fallthrough]]; (C++11/C++14).
            This warning is enabled by -Wextra.
          o -Wpointer-compare warns when a pointer is compared with a zero
            character constant. Such code is now invalid in C++11 and GCC
            rejects it. This warning is enabled by default.
          o -Wduplicated-branches warns when an if-else has identical branches.
          o -Wrestrict warns when an argument passed to a restrict-qualified
            parameter aliases with another argument.
          o -Wmemset-elt-size warns for memset calls, when the first argument
            references an array, and the third argument is a number equal to
            the number of elements of the array, but not the size of the array.
            This warning is enabled by -Wall.
          o -Wint-in-bool-context warns about suspicious uses of integer values
            where boolean values are expected. This warning is enabled by -
            Wall.
          o -Wswitch-unreachable warns when a switch statement has statements
            between the controlling expression and the first case label which
            will never be executed. This warning is enabled by default.
          o -Wexpansion-to-defined warns when defined is used outside #if. This
            warning is enabled by -Wextra or -Wpedantic.
          o -Wregister warns about uses of the register storage specifier. In
            C++17 this keyword has been removed and for C++17 this is a
            pedantic warning enabled by default. The warning is not emitted for
            the GNU Explicit Register Variables extension.
          o -Wvla-larger-than=N warns about unbounded uses of variable-length
            arrays, and about bounded uses of variable-length arrays whose
            bound can be larger than N bytes.
          o -Wduplicate-decl-specifier warns when a declaration has duplicate
            const, volatile, restrict or _Atomic specifier. This warning is
            enabled by -Wall.
    * GCC 6's C and C++ frontends were able to offer suggestions for misspelled
      field names:
           spellcheck-fields.cc:52:13: error: 'struct s' has no member named 'colour'; did you mean 'color'?
              return ptr->colour;
                          ^~~~~~
      GCC 7 greatly expands the scope of these suggestions. Firstly, it adds
      fix-it hints to such suggestions:
           spellcheck-fields.cc:52:13: error: 'struct s' has no member named 'colour'; did you mean 'color'?
              return ptr->colour;
                          ^~~~~~
                          color
      The suggestions now cover many other things, such as misspelled function
      names:
           spellcheck-identifiers.c:11:3: warning: implicit declaration of function 'gtk_widget_showall'; did you mean
           'gtk_widget_show_all'? [-Wimplicit-function-declaration]
              gtk_widget_showall (w);
              ^~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
              gtk_widget_show_all
      misspelled macro names and enum values:
           spellcheck-identifiers.cc:85:11: error: 'MAX_ITEM' undeclared here (not in a function); did you mean 'MAX_ITEMS'?
            int array[MAX_ITEM];
                      ^~~~~~~~
                      MAX_ITEMS
      misspelled type names:
           spellcheck-typenames.c:7:14: error: unknown type name 'singed'; did you mean 'signed'?
            void test (singed char e);
                       ^~~~~~
                       signed
      and, in the C frontend, named initializers:
           test.c:7:20: error: 'struct s' has no member named 'colour'; did you mean 'color'?
            struct s test = { .colour = 3 };
                               ^~~~~~
                               color
    * The preprocessor can now offer suggestions for misspelled directives,
      e.g.:
           test.c:5:2: error:invalid preprocessing directive #endfi; did you mean #endif?
            #endfi
             ^~~~~
             endif
    * Warnings about format strings now underline the pertinent part of the
      string, and can offer suggested fixes. In some cases, the pertinent
      argument is underlined.
           test.c:51:29: warning: format '%s' expects argument of type 'char *', but argument 3 has type 'int' [-Wformat=]
              printf ("foo: %d  bar: %s baz: %d", 100, i + j, 102);
                                     ~^                ~~~~~
                                     %d
    * The new -Wdangling-else command-line option has been split out of
      -Wparentheses and warns about dangling else.
    * The -Wshadow warning has been split into three variants. -Wshadow=global
      warns for any shadowing. This is the default when using -Wshadow without
      any argument. -Wshadow=local only warns for a local variable shadowing
      another local variable or parameter. -Wshadow=compatible-local only warns
      for a local variable shadowing another local variable or parameter whose
      type is compatible (in C++ compatible means that the type of the
      shadowing variable can be converted to that of the shadowed variable).
      The following example shows the different kinds of shadow warnings:

           enum operation { add, count };
           struct container { int nr; };

           int
           container_count (struct container c, int count)
           {
             int r = 0;
             for (int count = 0; count > 0; count--)
               {
                 struct container count = c;
                 r += count.nr;
               }
             return r;
           }

      -Wshadow=compatible-local will warn for the parameter being shadowed with
      the same type:
           warn-test.c:8:12: warning: declaration of 'count' shadows a parameter [-Wshadow=compatible-local]
              for (int count = 0; count > 0; count--)
                       ^~~~~
           warn-test.c:5:42: note: shadowed declaration is here
            container_count (struct container c, int count)
                                                     ^~~~~
      -Wshadow=local will warn for the above and for the shadowed declaration
      with incompatible type:
           warn-test.c:10:24: warning: declaration of 'count' shadows a previous local [-Wshadow=local]
                  struct container count = c;
                                   ^~~~~
           warn-test.c:8:12: note: shadowed declaration is here
              for (int count = 0; count > 0; count--)
                       ^~~~~
      -Wshadow=global will warn for all of the above and the shadowing of the
      global declaration:
           warn-test.c:5:42: warning: declaration of 'count' shadows a global declaration [-Wshadow]
            container_count (struct container c, int count)
                                                     ^~~~~
           warn-test.c:1:23: note: shadowed declaration is here
            enum operation { add, count };
                                  ^~~~~
    * GCC 7 contains a number of enhancements that help detect buffer overflow
      and other forms of invalid memory accesses.
          o The -Walloc-size-larger-than=size option detects calls to standard
            and user-defined memory allocation functions decorated with
            attribute alloc_size whose argument exceeds the specified size
            (PTRDIFF_MAX by default). The option also detects arithmetic
            overflow in the computation of the size in two-argument allocation
            functions like calloc where the total size is the product of the
            two arguments. Since calls with an excessive size cannot succeed
            they are typically the result of programming errors. Such bugs have
            been known to be the source of security vulnerabilities and a
            target of exploits. -Walloc-size-larger-than=PTRDIFF_MAX is
            included in -Wall.
            For example, the following call to malloc incorrectly tries to
            avoid passing a negative argument to the function and instead ends
            up unconditionally invoking it with an argument less than or equal
            to zero. Since after conversion to the type of the argument of the
            function (size_t) a negative argument results in a value in excess
            of the maximum PTRDIFF_MAX the call is diagnosed.

                 void* f (int n)
                 {
                   return malloc (n > 0 ? 0 : n);
                 }

                 warning: argument 1 range [2147483648, 4294967295] exceeds maximum object size 2147483647 [-Walloc-size-larger-than=]

          o The -Walloc-zero option detects calls to standard and user-defined
            memory allocation functions decorated with attribute alloc_size
            with a zero argument. -Walloc-zero is not included in either -Wall
            or -Wextra and must be explicitly enabled.
          o The -Walloca option detects all calls to the alloca function in the
            program. -Walloca is not included in either -Wall or -Wextra and
            must be explicitly enabled.
          o The -Walloca-larger-than=size option detects calls to the alloca
            function whose argument either may exceed the specified size, or
            that is not known to be sufficiently constrained to avoid exceeding
            it. -Walloca-larger-than is not included in either -Wall or -Wextra
            and must be explicitly enabled.
            For example, compiling the following snippet with -Walloca-larger-
            than=1024 results in a warning because even though the code appears
            to call alloca only with sizes of 1kb and less, since n is signed,
            a negative value would result in a call to the function well in
            excess of the limit.

                 void f (int n)
                 {
                   char *d;
                   if (n < 1025)
                     d = alloca (n);
                   else
                     d = malloc (n);
                   …
                 }

                 warning: argument to 'alloca may be too large due to  conversion from 'int' to 'long unsigned int' [-Walloca-larger-than=]

            In contrast, a call to alloca that isn't bounded at all such as in
            the following function will elicit the warning below regardless of
            the size argument to the option.

                 void f (size_t n)
                 {
                   char *d = alloca (n);
                   ...
                 }

                 warning: unbounded use of 'alloca' [-Walloca-larger-than=]

          o The -Wformat-overflow=level option detects certain and likely
            buffer overflow in calls to the sprintf family of formatted output
            functions. Although the option is enabled even without optimization
            it works best with -O2 and higher.
            For example, in the following snippet the call to sprintf is
            diagnosed because even though its output has been constrained using
            the modulo operation it could result in as many as three bytes if
            mday were negative. The solution is to either allocate a larger
            buffer or make sure the argument is not negative, for example by
            changing mday's type to unsigned or by making the type of the
            second operand of the modulo expression unsigned: 100U.

                 void* f (int mday)
                 {
                   char *buf = malloc (3);
                   sprintf (buf, "%02i", mday % 100);
                   return buf;
                 }

                 warning: 'sprintf may write a terminating nul past the end of the destination [-Wformat-overflow=]
                 note: 'sprintf' output between 3 and 4 bytes into a destination of size 3

          o The -Wformat-truncation=level option detects certain and likely
            output truncation in calls to the snprintf family of formatted
            output functions. -Wformat-truncation=1 is included in -Wall and
            enabled without optimization but works best with -O2 and higher.
            For example, the following function attempts to format an integer
            between 0 and 255 in hexadecimal, including the 0x prefix, into a
            buffer of four charactars. But since the function must always
            terminate output by the null character ('\0') such a buffer is only
            big enough to fit just one digit plus the prefix. Therefore the
            snprintf call is diagnosed. To avoid the warning either use a
            bigger buffer or handle the function's return value which indicates
            whether or not its output has been truncated.

                 void f (unsigned x)
                 {
                   char d[4];
                   snprintf (d, sizeof d, "%#02x", x & 0xff);
                   …
                 }

                 warning: 'snprintf' output may be truncated before the last format character [-Wformat-truncation=]
                 note: 'snprintf' output between 3 and 5 bytes into a destination of size 4

          o The -Wnonnull option has been enhanced to detect a broader set of
            cases of passing null pointers to functions that expect a non-null
            argument (those decorated with attribute nonnull). By taking
            advantage of optimizations the option can detect many more cases of
            the problem than in prior GCC versions.
          o The -Wstringop-overflow=type option detects buffer overflow in
            calls to string handling functions like memcpy and strcpy. The
            option relies on Object_Size_Checking and has an effect similar to
            defining the _FORTIFY_SOURCE macro. -Wstringop-overflow=2 is
            enabled by default.
            For example, in the following snippet, because the call to strncat
            specifies a maximum that allows the function to write past the end
            of the destination, it is diagnosed. To correct the problem and
            avoid the overflow the function should be called with a size of at
            most sizeof d - strlen(d) - 1.

                 void f (const char *fname)
                 {
                   char d[8];
                   strncpy (d, "/tmp/", sizeof d);
                   strncat (d, fname, sizeof d);
                   ...
                 }

                 warning: specified bound 8 equals the size of the destination [-Wstringop-overflow=]

    * The <limits.h> header provided by GCC defines macros such as INT_WIDTH
      for the width in bits of integer types, if
      __STDC_WANT_IEC_60559_BFP_EXT__ is defined before the header is included.
      The <stdint.h> header defines such macros as SIZE_WIDTH and INTMAX_WIDTH
      for the width of some standard typedef names for integer types, again if
      __STDC_WANT_IEC_60559_BFP_EXT__ is defined before the header is included;
      note that GCC's implementation of this header is only used for
      freestanding compilations, not hosted compilations, on most systems.
      These macros come from ISO/IEC TS 18661-1:2014.
    * The <float.h> header provided by GCC defines the macro CR_DECIMAL_DIG,
      from ISO/IEC TS 18661-1:2014, if __STDC_WANT_IEC_60559_BFP_EXT__ is
      defined before the header is included. This represents the number of
      decimal digits for which conversions between decimal character strings
      and binary formats, in both directions, are correctly rounded, and
      currently has the value of UINTMAX_MAX on all systems, reflecting that
      GCC's compile-time conversions are correctly rounded for any number of
      digits.
    * New __builtin_add_overflow_p, __builtin_sub_overflow_p,
      __builtin_mul_overflow_p built-in functions have been added. These work
      similarly to their siblings without the _p suffix, but do not actually
      store the result of the arithmetics anywhere, just return whether the
      operation would overflow. Calls to these built-ins with integer constant
      arguments evaluate to integer constants expressions.
      For example, in the following, c is assigned the result of a * b only if
      the multiplication does not overflow, otherwise it is assigned the value
      zero. The multiplication is performed at compile-time and without
      triggering a -Woverflow warning.

           enum {
             a = 12345678,
             b = 87654321,
             c = __builtin_mul_overflow_p (a, b, a) ? 0 : a * b
           };

C

    * The C front end now supports type names _FloatN for floating-point types
      with IEEE interchange formats and _FloatNx for floating-point types with
      IEEE extended formats. These type names come from ISO/IEC TS 18661-3:
      2015.
      The set of types supported depends on the target for which GCC is
      configured. Most targets support _Float32, _Float32x and _Float64.
      _Float128 is supported on targets where IEEE binary128 encoding was
      already supported as long double or __float128. _Float64x is supported on
      targets where a type with either binary128 or Intel extended precision
      format is available.
      Constants with these types are supported using suffixes fN, FN, fNx and
      FNx (e.g., 1.2f128 or 2.3F64x). Macros such as FLT128_MAX are defined in
      <float.h> if __STDC_WANT_IEC_60559_TYPES_EXT__ is defined before it is
      included.
      These new types are always distinct from each other and from float,
      double and long double, even if they have the same encoding. Complex
      types such as _Complex _Float128 are also supported.
      Type-generic built-in functions such as __builtin_isinf support the new
      types, and the following type-specific built-in functions have versions
      (suffixed fN or fNx) for the new types: __builtin_copysign,
      __builtin_fabs, __builtin_huge_val, __builtin_inf, __builtin_nan,
      __builtin_nans.
    * Compilation with -fopenmp is now compatible with the C11 _Atomic keyword.

C++

    * The C++ front end has experimental support for all of the current C++17
      draft with the -std=c++1z or -std=gnu++1z flags, including if constexpr,
      class template argument deduction, auto template parameters, and
      structured bindings. For a full list of new features, see the_C++_status
      page.
    * C++17 support for new of over-aligned types can be enabled in other modes
      with the -faligned-new flag.
    * The C++17 evaluation order requirements can be selected in other modes
      with the -fstrong-eval-order flag, or disabled in C++17 mode with -fno-
      strong-eval-order.
    * The default semantics of inherited constructors has changed in all modes,
      following P0136. Essentially, overload resolution happens as if calling
      the inherited constructor directly, and the compiler fills in
      construction of the other bases and members as needed. Most uses should
      not need any changes. The old behavior can be restored with -fno-new-
      inheriting-ctors, or -fabi-version less than 11.
    * The resolution of DR 150 on matching of template template parameters,
      allowing default template arguments to make a template match a parameter,
      is currently enabled by default in C++17 mode only. The default can be
      overridden with -f{no-,}new-ttp-matching.
    * The C++ front end will now provide fix-it hints for some missing
      semicolons, allowing for automatic fixes by IDEs:

           test.cc:4:11: error: expected ';' after class definition
            class a {}
                      ^
                      ;
    * -Waligned-new has been added to the C++ front end. It warns about new of
      type with extended alignment without -faligned-new.

Runtime Library (libstdc++)

    * The type of exception thrown by iostreams, std::ios_base::failure, now
      uses the cxx11_ABI.
    * Experimental support for C++17, including the following new features:
          o std::string_view;
          o std::any, std::optional, and std::variant;
          o std::invoke, std::is_invocable, std::is_nothrow_invocable, and
            invoke_result;
          o std::is_swappable, and std::is_nothrow_swappable;
          o std::apply, and std::make_from_tuple;
          o std::void_t, std::bool_constant, std::conjunction, std::
            disjunction, and std::negation;
          o Variable templates for type traits;
          o Mathematical Special Functions;
          o std::chrono::floor, std::chrono::ceil, std::chrono::round, and
            std::chrono::abs;
          o std::clamp, std::gcd, std::lcm, 3-dimensional std::hypot;
          o std::scoped_lock, std::shared_mutex, std::atomic<T>::
            is_always_lock_free;
          o std::sample, std::default_searcher, std::boyer_moore_searcher and
            std::boyer_moore_horspool_searcher;
          o Extraction and re-insertion of map and set nodes, try_emplace
            members for maps, and functions for accessing containers std::size,
            std::empty, and std::data;
          o std::shared_ptr support for arrays, std::shared_ptr<T>::weak_type,
            std::enable_shared_from_this<T>::weak_from_this(), and std::
            owner_less<void>;
          o std::byte;
          o std::as_const, std::not_fn, std::has_unique_object_representations,
            constexpr std::addressof.
      Thanks to Daniel Krügler, Tim Shen, Edward Smith-Rowland, and Ville
      Voutilainen for work on the C++17 support.
    * A new power-of-two rehashing policy for use with the _Hashtable
      internals, thanks to François Dumont.

Fortran

    * Support for a number of extensions for compatibility with legacy code
      with new flags:
          o -fdec-structure Support for DEC STRUCTURE and UNION
          o -fdec-intrinsic-ints Support for new integer intrinsics with B/I/J/
            K prefixes such as BABS, JIAND...
          o -fdec-math Support for additional math intrinsics, including COTAN
            and degree-valued trigonometric functions such as TAND, ASIND...
          o -fdec Enable the -fdec-* family of extensions.
    * New flag -finit-derived to allow default initialization of derived-type
      variables.
    * Improved DO loops with step equal to 1 or -1, generates faster code
      without a loop preheader. A new warning, -Wundefined-do-loop, warns when
      a loop iterates either to HUGE(i) (with step equal to 1), or to -HUGE(i)
      (with step equal to -1). Invalid behavior can be caught at run time with
      -fcheck=do enabled:

           program test
             implicit none
             integer(1) :: i
             do i = -HUGE(i)+10, -HUGE(i)-1, -1
               print *, i
             end do
           end program test

           At line 8 of file do_check_12.f90
           Fortran runtime error: Loop iterates infinitely

    * Version 4.5 of the OpenMP_specification is now partially supported also
      in the Fortran compiler; the largest missing item is structure element
      mapping.
    * User-defined derived-type input/output (UDTIO) is added.
    * Derived type coarrays with allocable and pointer components is partially
      supported.
    * Non-constant stop codes and error stop codes (Fortran 2015 feature).
    * Derived types with allocatable components of recursive type.
    * Intrinsic assignment to polymorphic variables.
    * Improved submodule support.
    * Improved diagnostics (polymorphic results in pure functions).

Go

    * GCC 7 provides a complete implementation of the Go 1.8.1 user packages.
    * Compared to the Go 1.8.1 toolchain, the garbage collector is more
      conservative and less concurrent.
    * Escape analysis is available for experimental use via the -fgo-optimize-
      allocs option. The -fgo-debug-escape prints information useful for
      debugging escape analysis choices.

Java (GCJ)

The GCC Java frontend and associated libjava runtime library have been removed
from GCC.

libgccjit

The libgccjit API gained support for marking calls as requiring tail-call
optimization via a new entrypoint: gcc_jit_rvalue_set_bool_require_tail_call.
libgccjit performs numerous checks at the API boundary, but if these succeed,
it previously ignored errors and other diagnostics emitted within the core of
GCC, and treated the compile of a gcc_jit_context as having succeeded. As of
GCC 7 it now ensures that if any diagnostics are emitted, they are visible from
the libgccjit API, and that the the context is flagged as having failed.

New Targets and Target Specific Improvements

AArch64

    * The ARMv8.3-A architecture is now supported. It can be used by specifying
      the -march=armv8.3-a option.
    * The option -msign-return-address= is supported to enable return address
      protection using ARMv8.3-A Pointer Authentication Extensions. For more
      information on the arguments accepted by this option, please refer to
      AArch64-Options.
    * The ARMv8.2-A architecture and the ARMv8.2-A 16-bit Floating-Point
      Extensions are now supported. They can be used by specifying the -
      march=armv8.2-a or -march=armv8.2-a+fp16 options. The 16-bit Floating-
      Point Extensions introduce new half-precision data processing floating-
      point instructions.
    * Support has been added for the following processors (GCC identifiers in
      parentheses): ARM Cortex-A73 (cortex-a73), Broadcom Vulcan (vulcan),
      Cavium ThunderX CN81xx (thunderxt81), Cavium ThunderX CN83xx
      (thunderxt83), Cavium ThunderX CN88xx (thunderxt88), Cavium ThunderX
      CN88xx pass 1.x (thunderxt88p1), Cavium ThunderX 2 CN99xx (thunderx2t99),
      Qualcomm Falkor (falkor). The GCC identifiers can be used as arguments to
      the -mcpu or -mtune options, for example: -mcpu=cortex-a73 or -
      mtune=vulcan or as arguments to the equivalent target attributes and
      pragmas.

ARC

    * Add support for ARC HS and ARC EM processors.
    * Add support for ARC EM variation found in Intel QuarkSE SoCs.
    * Add support for NPS400 ARC700 based CPUs.
    * Thread Local Storage is now supported by ARC CPUs.
    * Fix errors for ARC600 when using 32x16 multiplier option.
    * Fix PIE for ARC CPUs.
    * New CPU templates are supported via multilib.

ARM

    * Support for the ARMv5 and ARMv5E architectures has been deprecated (which
      have no known implementations) and will be removed in a future GCC
      release. Note that ARMv5T, ARMv5TE and ARMv5TEJ architectures remain
      supported. The values armv5 and armv5e of -march are thus deprecated.
    * The ARMv8.2-A architecture and the ARMv8.2-A 16-bit Floating-Point
      Extensions are now supported. They can be used by specifying the -
      march=armv8.2-a or -march=armv8.2-a+fp16 options. The 16-bit Floating-
      Point Extensions introduce new half-precision data processing floating-
      point instructions.
    * The ARMv8-M architecture is now supported in its two architecture
      profiles: ARMv8-M Baseline and ARMv8-M Mainline with its DSP and
      Floating-Point Extensions. They can be used by specifying the -
      march=armv8-m.base, armv8-m.main or armv8-m.main+dsp options.
    * Support has been added for the following processors (GCC identifiers in
      parentheses): ARM Cortex-A73 (cortex-a73), ARM Cortex-M23 (cortex-m23)
      and ARM Cortex-M33 (cortex-m33). The GCC identifiers can be used as
      arguments to the -mcpu or -mtune options, for example: -mcpu=cortex-a73
      or -mtune=cortex-m33.
    * A new command-line option -mpure-code has been added. It does not allow
      constant data to be placed in code sections. This option is only
      available when generating non-pic code for ARMv7-M targets.
    * Support for the ACLE Coprocessor Intrinsics has been added. This enables
      the generation of coprocessor instructions through the use of intrinsics
      such as cdp, ldc, and others.
    * The configure option --with-multilib-list now accepts the value rmprofile
      to build multilib libraries for a range of embedded targets. See our
      installation_instructions for details.

AVR

    * On the reduced Tiny cores, the progmem variable_attribute is now properly
      supported. Respective read-only variables are located in flash memory in
      section .progmem.data. No special code is needed to access such
      variables; the compiler automatically adds an offset of 0x4000 to all
      addresses, which is needed to access variables in flash memory. As
      opposed to ordinary cores where it is sufficient to specify the progmem
      attribute with definitions, on the reduced Tiny cores the attribute also
      has to be specified with (external) declarations:

           extern const int array[] __attribute__((__progmem__));

           int get_value2 (void)
           {
             /* Access via addresses array + 0x4004 and array + 0x4005. */
             return array[2];
           }

           const int* get_address (unsigned idx)
           {
             /* Returns array + 0x4000 + 2 * idx. */
             return &array[idx];
           }

    * A new command-line option -Wmisspelled-isr has been added. It turns off —
      or turns into errors — warnings that are reported for interrupt service
      routines (ISRs) which don't follow AVR-LibC's naming convention of
      prefixing ISR names with __vector.
    * __builtin_avr_nops(n) is a new built-in_function that inserts n NOP
      instructions into the instruction stream. n must be a value known at
      compile time.

IA-32/x86-64

    * Support for the AVX-512 Fused Multiply Accumulation Packed Single
      precision (4FMAPS), AVX-512 Vector Neural Network Instructions Word
      variable precision (4VNNIW), AVX-512 Vector Population Count (VPOPCNTDQ)
      and Software Guard Extensions (SGX) ISA extensions has been added.

NVPTX

    * OpenMP target regions can now be offloaded to NVidia PTX GPGPUs. See the
      Offloading_Wiki on how to configure it.

PowerPC / PowerPC64 / RS6000

    * The PowerPC port now uses LRA by default.
    * GCC now diagnoses inline assembly that clobbers register r2. This has
      always been invalid code, and is no longer quietly tolerated.
    * The PowerPC port's support for ISA 3.0 (-mcpu=power9) has been enhanced
      to generate more of the new instructions by default, and to provide more
      built-in functions to generate code for other new instructions.
    * The configuration option --enable-gnu-indirect-function is now enabled by
      default on PowerPC GNU/Linux builds.
    * The PowerPC port will now allow 64-bit and 32-bit integer types to be
      allocated to the VSX vector registers (ISA 2.06 and above). In addition,
      on ISA 3.0, 16-bit and 8-bit integer types can be allocated in the vector
      registers. Previously, only 64-bit integer types were allowed in the
      traditional floating point registers.
    * New options -mstack-protector-guard=global, -mstack-protector-guard=tls,
      -mstack-protector-guard-reg=, and -mstack-protector-guard-offset= change
      how the stack protector gets the value to use as canary.

RISC-V

    * Support for the RISC-V instruction set has been added.

SPARC

    * The SPARC port now uses LRA by default.
    * Support for the new Subtract-Extended-with-Carry instruction available in
      SPARC M7 (Niagara 7) has been added.

Operating Systems

AIX

    * Visibility support has been enabled for AIX 7.1 and above.

Fuchsia

    * Support has been added for the Fuchsia_OS.

RTEMS

    * The ABI changes on ARM so that no short enums are used by default.

Other significant improvements

    * -fverbose-asm previously emitted information on the meanings of assembly
      expressions. This has been extended so that it now also prints comments
      showing the source lines that correspond to the assembly, making it
      easier to read the generated assembly (especially with larger functions).
      For example, given this C source file:

           int test (int n)
           {
             int i;
             int total = 0;

             for (i = 0; i < n; i++)
               total += i * i;
             return total;
           }

      -fverbose-asm now gives output similar to this for the function body
      (when compiling for x86_64, with -Os):

                  .text
                  .globl  test
                  .type   test, @@function
           test:
           .LFB0:
                  .cfi_startproc
           # example.c:4:   int total = 0;
                  xorl    %eax, %eax      # <retval>
           # example.c:6:   for (i = 0; i < n; i++)
                  xorl    %edx, %edx      # i
           .L2:
           # example.c:6:   for (i = 0; i < n; i++)
                  cmpl    %edi, %edx      # n, i
                  jge     .L5     #,
           # example.c:7:     total += i * i;
                  movl    %edx, %ecx      # i, tmp92
                  imull   %edx, %ecx      # i, tmp92
           # example.c:6:   for (i = 0; i < n; i++)
                  incl    %edx    # i
           # example.c:7:     total += i * i;
                  addl    %ecx, %eax      # tmp92, <retval>
                  jmp     .L2     #
           .L5:
           # example.c:10: }
                  ret
                  .cfi_endproc

    * Two new options have been added for printing fix-it hints:
          o -fdiagnostics-parseable-fixits allows for fix-it hints to be
            emitted in a machine-readable form, suitable for consumption by
            IDEs. For example, given:

                 spellcheck-fields.cc:52:13: error: 'struct s' has no member named 'colour'; did you mean 'color'?
                    return ptr->colour;
                                ^~~~~~
                                color
            it will emit:
                 fix-it:"spellcheck-fields.cc":{52:13-52:19}:"color"
          o -fdiagnostics-generate-patch will print a patch in "unified" format
            after any diagnostics are printed, showing the result of applying
            all fix-it hints. For the above example it would emit:
                 --- spellcheck-fields.cc
                 +++ spellcheck-fields.cc
                 @@ -49,5 +49,5 @@

                  color get_color(struct s *ptr)
                  {
                 -  return ptr->colour;
                 +  return ptr->color;
                  }
    * The gcc and g++ driver programs will now provide suggestions for
      misspelled arguments to command-line options.
           $ gcc -c test.c -ftls-model=global-dinamic
           gcc: error: unknown TLS model 'global-dinamic'
           gcc: note: valid arguments to '-ftls-model=' are: global-
           dynamic initial-exec local-dynamic local-exec; did you mean
           'global-dynamic'?
    * The compiler will now provide suggestions for misspelled parameters.
           $ gcc -c test.c --param max-early-inliner-iteration=3
           cc1: error: invalid --param name 'max-early-inliner-iteration';
           did you mean 'max-early-inliner-iterations'?
    * Profile-guided optimization (PGO) instrumentation, as well as test
      coverage (GCOV), can newly instrument constructors (functions marks with
      __attribute__((constructor))), destructors and C++ constructors (and
      destructors) of classes that are used as a type of a global variable.
    * A new option -fprofile-update=atomic prevents creation of corrupted
      profiles created during instrumentation run (-fprofile=generate) of an
      application. Downside of the option is a speed penalty. Providing -
      pthread on command line would result in selection of atomic profile
      updating (when supports by a target).
    * GCC's already extensive testsuite has gained some new capabilities, to
      further improve the reliability of the compiler:
          o GCC now has has an internal unit testing API and a suite of tests
            for programmatic self-testing of subsystems.
          o GCC's C frontend has been extended so that it can parse dumps of
            GCC's internal representations, allowing for DejaGnu tests that
            more directly exercise specific optimization passes. This covers
            both the GIMPLE_representation (for testing higher-level
            optimizations) and the RTL_representation, allowing for more direct
            testing of lower-level details, such as register allocation and
            instruction selection.

     For questions related to the use of GCC, please consult these web
     pages and the GCC_manuals. If that fails, the gcc-help@gcc.gnu.org
     mailing list might help. Comments on these web pages and the
     development of GCC are welcome on our developer list at
     gcc@gcc.gnu.org. All of our_lists have public archives.

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GCC team. Last modified 2017-05-01.