Problem with building static convenience libraries without --tag

[Jakub Bogusz]

I was trying to make static convenience library (to link into some
binary), and found following problem using libtool 1.5:

library is in C++, so it uses g++ compiler and libtool configuration for
CXX tag. When --tag=CXX is not passed (and thus autodetected based on
compiler name) I got:

| $ libtool --mode=link athlon-pld-linux-g++ -o libblah.la -static
| rm -fr  .libs/libblah.a .libs/libblah.la
| rm -fr .libs/libblah.lax
| mkdir .libs/libblah.lax
| rm -fr .libs/libblah.lax/libstdc++.a
| mkdir .libs/libblah.lax/libstdc++.a
| (cd .libs/libblah.lax/libstdc++.a && ar x /usr/lib/./libstdc++.a)
| ar: /usr/lib/./libstdc++.a: No such file or directory

or (when trying to link with more libraries):

| $ libtool --mode=link athlon-pld-linux-g++ -o libblah.la -static -lgd
| rm -fr  .libs/libblah.a .libs/libblah.la
| rm -fr .libs/libblah.lax
| mkdir .libs/libblah.lax
| rm -fr .libs/libblah.lax/libgd.a
| mkdir .libs/libblah.lax/libgd.a
| (cd .libs/libblah.lax/libgd.a && ar x /usr/lib/libgd.a)
| ar: /usr/lib/libgd.a: No such file or directory

I don't have static libraries installed and I think they shouldn't be
needed here (only dependencies should be added to libblah.la, to be used
when linking some program with libblah.la); even more, they are in fact
not needed if --tag=CXX is passed:

| $ libtool --mode=link --tag=CXX athlon-pld-linux-g++ -o libblah.la -static
| rm -fr  .libs/libblah.a .libs/libblah.la
| ar cru .libs/libblah.a
| ranlib .libs/libblah.a
| creating libblah.la
| (cd .libs && rm -f libblah.la && ln -s ../libblah.la libblah.la)

(the same with -lgd added; libraries are added to dependency_libs in
libblah.la)


I found that this problem may be caused by the order of processing
libtool command line: when --tag=CXX is used, libtool tag config is
loaded earlier than if tagname is autodetected based on compiler.
-static option sets build_libtool_libs to "no" (overriding default
value "yes"), and when --tag=CXX is not passed, this setting is
overridden by "yes" set in CXX tag configuration...
(build_libtool_libs=yes later causes attempts to link shared libraries
into libtool convenience library)

Libtool version details:

| $ libtool --version
| ltmain.sh (GNU libtool) 1.5 (1.1220 2003/04/05 19:32:58)
| 
| Copyright (C) 2003  Free Software Foundation, Inc.
| This is free software; see the source for copying conditions.  There is NO
| warranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR
| PURPOSE.


-- 
Jakub Bogusz    http://cyber.cs.net.pl/~qboosh/
PLD Linux       http://www.pld.org.pl/