Re: don't install .la do install .so

[Nick Bowler]

On 2011-03-21 10:52 -0500, Paul Elliott wrote:
> According to the Fedora Packaging:Guidelines
> http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging/Guidelines
> 
> .la files should not be installed:

This is a task for the Fedora packagers, and not for developers to bake
into their makefiles.  See below.

> How do I create a Makefile.am for a shared library so that make install will 
> not install the .la file but will install the .so?

Please do not do this.  The .la files are necessary except for very
special situations.  Since Fedora has complete control over how packages
are configured and installed, they can afford to make the necessary
arrangements rendering the .la files unnecessary.  But when your
package is configured by a user, you have no way of knowing a priori
whether or not they need the .la files.

See the autotools FAQ entry on this:

  
http://www.gnu.org/software/automake/faq/autotools-faq.html#What-are-these-_002ela-files-for-and-can-I-safely-remove-them_003f

In particular,

   Removing usually only works OK if done in directories which the
   runtime linker searches by default anyway (otherwise you might need
   to set LD_LIBRARY_PATH or an equivalent variable) and only on systems
   where the runtime linker loads indirect library dependencies
   automatically (includes GNU/Linux, GNU, Solaris).

-- 
Nick Bowler, Elliptic Technologies (http://www.elliptictech.com/)