Re: [Axiom-developer] about compilation error on mandrake 1.0

[Stephen Wilson]

Hi Tim,
 
On Fri, Jul 30, 2004 at 01:00:37PM -0400, root wrote:
> > what is locbfd? i need to document it either in the FAQ or 
> > as a separate branch of the make.

Most of my understanding of this issue has been derived from reading
this list. GCL carries its own version of the BDF (Binary File
Descriptor) library which is a part of binutils. For gcl-2.6.3 as
packaged with Axiom, in gcl/binutils/bfd/README, there is a short
description:

   BFD is an object file library.  It permits applications to use the
   same routines to process object files regardless of their format.

   BFD is used by the GNU debugger, assembler, linker, and the binary
   utilities.

   The documentation on using BFD is scanty and may be occasionally
   incorrect.  Pointers to documentation problems, or an entirely
   rewritten manual, would be appreciated.

   There is some BFD internals documentation in doc/bfdint.texi which may
   help programmers who want to modify BFD.

   BFD is normally built as part of another package.  See the build
   instructions for that package, probably in a README file in the
   appropriate directory.


Now again, for gcl-2.6.3, ./configure --help yields:

 --enable-statsysbfd \
     uses a static sytem bfd library for loading and relocationing \
     object files.

 --enable-locbfd \
      uses a static bfd library built from this source tree for \
      loading and relocationing object files. 

So, my suggestion of --disable-statsysbfd --enable-locbfd seems to
imply "don't use the system bfd library, use the gcl based library
instead". 

I have next to zero understanding as to how gcl works internally. I do
not know under what system conditions the build fails w.r.t bfd. I
have built Axiom under Mandrake 10 and Slackware 9.1, and in both cases
I have had this same problem. I will try to build under Redhat 9, and
if the build succeeds, then perhaps I can start looking at the system
differences and get some idea as to what causes the failure. If there
are any suggestions as how one might better understand this problem, I
am more than willing to help in what ever way I can.

Thanks,
Steve