From: ian AT cygnus DOT com
Subject: Re: ld / dlltool
9 Dec 1997 13:50:10 -0800
Message-ID: <199712092128.QAA23107.cygnus.gnu-win32@tweedledumb.cygnus.com>
References: <199712091434 DOT OAA16836 AT pluto DOT tiuk DOT ti DOT com>
To: Nick DOT Ing-Simmons AT tiuk DOT ti DOT com
Cc: gnu-win32 AT cygnus DOT com

In gnu-win32 Nick DOT Ing-Simmons AT tiuk DOT ti DOT com writes:

>Why cannot the linker do the rellocation stuff itself, why does it need
>this bag-on-the-side?  If linker had to be modified to accept and output 
>--dll and --base-file why could it not be taught to write the .reloc section?

It can.  The ELF shared library support essentially builds all the
relocation information inside the linker, and the Win32 support could
do the same.  The AIX support can even read import and export files
when building a shared library, much the way dlltool does.

>I would be willing to assist in/perform or make the effort to clean this up, 
>but would like to know why it was done this way rather than as part of the 
>bfd port for the win32 object format.

I would guess because Steve Chamberlain found it easier to write a
separate program than to figure out how the other shared library
support worked.  No deep reason.

It would be great if you, or anybody, volunteered to clean this up.
It's not a simple job, though.  I think the way to start is to
understand how the ELF shared library support works.

Ian
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