Re: gettext 0.12.1 build failure (Solaris 7 or 8, GCC 2.95.3)

[Bruno Haible]

Paul Eggert wrote:
[Attempting to build gettext's libasprintf on Solaris 7 with gcc/g++]

> gettext 0.12.1 fails to build on a Solaris 7 (sparc) host with GCC 2.95.3
> installed. 

> Here are the symptoms on Solaris 7.  Apparently the problem is that
> the gettext build procedure assumes that libstdc++ has been compiled
> with -fpic, but this isn't true here: only the static libraries exist,
> and they are not compiled with -fpic.
>
> ...
> /bin/ksh ./libtool --mode=link g++  -g -O2   -o libasprintf.la -rpath
> /u/f2/eggert/opt/SunOS-5.7-sparc/gettext-0.12.1/lib  lib-asprintf.lo
> autosprintf.lo
>
> g++ -shared -nostdlib 
> /usr/local/lib/gcc-lib/sparc-sun-solaris2.7/2.95.3/crti.o
> /usr/ccs/lib/values-Xa.o
> /usr/local/lib/gcc-lib/sparc-sun-solaris2.7/2.95.3/crtbegin.o 
> .libs/lib-asprintf.o .libs/autosprintf.o 
> -L/usr/local/lib/gcc-lib/sparc-sun-solaris2.7/2.95.3 -L/usr/ccs/bin
> -L/usr/ccs/lib -L/usr/local/lib -lstdc++ -lm -lgcc
> /usr/local/lib/gcc-lib/sparc-sun-solaris2.7/2.95.3/crtend.o
> /usr/local/lib/gcc-lib/sparc-sun-solaris2.7/2.95.3/crtn.o  -Wl,-h
> -Wl,libasprintf.so.0 -o .libs/libasprintf.so.0.0.0 Text relocation remains 

I think it's a bug in libtool, because

  - libasprintf's configure.ac invokes AC_PROG_LIBTOOL but neither
    AC_DISABLE_SHARED nor AC_DISABLE_STATIC, thus leaving the choice
    to libtool. (Libtool used to correctly recognize that it can't
    build shared libraries on AIX, so when it cannot do that on Solaris
    it's a bug.)

  - libtool knows that it's building a C++ library. libtool has a language
    specific configuration checks, including one for C++. IMO the
    configuration check should determine that shared libraries are not
    buildable with g++ in your case, and perform the equivalent of
    AC_DISABLE_SHARED for the C++ shared libraries (but not for the C
    shared libraries!).

> I do not have any problem when building with the Sun C compiler.

Whereas I do have a problem with libasprintf and the Sun C compiler; see
http://mail.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-libtool/2003-05/msg00023.html

Bruno