Re: [gentoo-amd64] Re: Problem emergin cdk

[Paul de Vrieze]

On Tuesday 28 February 2006 14:46, Duncan wrote:
> Kirby Walborn posted <44043BB1.7020703@×××××××××××××.com>, excerpted
>
> libtool is, I /believe/, the "library tool" (real smart there, eh? <g>)
> that creates all those *.la (not sure what that stands for but linker
> advice fits) text files, that in turn give gcc some help figuring out
> libraries.  I've never happened to come across the details and haven't
> gotten around to looking them up either, but I HAVE seen a Gentoo dev
> remark that libtool was a solution to one problem that ended up
> creating another -- PARTICULARLY for a frequently updated from-source
> distro like Gentoo.

It actually does not let gcc figure out anything, but people use libtool 
to use gcc. Libtool then "fixes up" the call to gcc. In many cases 
deleting the .la files just works.

> Complicating matters is that *.o files are binary object files --
> pieces of binary executables and libraries that gcc creates from C and
> C++ source files, as a mid-stage, before combining them into the
> various libraries and executables they form.
>
> So... *.o object files should exist in the portage working dirs, for a
> short time until the package is fully created and merged, after which
> portage usually cleans them up; they should **NOT** exist in the
> library dirs.  Correspondingly, *.so files will be the most common file
> in the library dirs, and would be what gcc was wanting.

These particular files are the default pieces of code that gcc in 
executable linking mode automatically adds to your executables (not your 
shared libraries). They take care that your "C" system behaves as you 
expect it to. They do things such as setting up the system in such a way 
that main gets called correctly, libraries are initialised, etc. As this 
code is common for all C files, gcc just links in these files instead of 
generating them all the time.

Paul

-- 
Paul de Vrieze
Gentoo Developer
Mail: pauldv@g.o
Homepage: http://www.devrieze.net