[Various] obsoleting the annotate level 2 interface

[Andrew Cagney]

> Right, that's not acceptable in the context of a multipurpose and portable
> GUI front-end, where basically people can plug the version of gdb they like.
> So Apple's approach of hacking a particular version of gdb is not feasible,
> and not something that can be maintained in the long run.

Er, reality check.  Even ACT have a customized GDB.  I'm pretty sure 
that ACT, when shipping their GUI, only test it against one, and 
possibly two, local GDB releases.  Reality is that any GUI dependant on 
the CLI / annotations has reliability problems by design.

Apple, like everyone else, want to kill off their branch.

>> The problems they have encountered have been turned into bug reports. 
>> See the bug database.  The only big one is the console and both Apple 
>> and Eclipse managed to hack around it.
> 
> 
> Does it mean that there are no plans to actually fix this critical missing
> feature, and that each front-end will have to "hack around it" ?

I'd conclude the exact oposite.

Given the `big iron' supporting MI, it is very likely that dedicated 
resources can be found that fix these problems.  All the parties 
involved know that they can't sustain local GDB branches.

Andrew