Re: libtool RFE

[Guido Draheim]

address@hidden wrote:
> 
> On Tue, Sep 11, 2001 at 12:14:42PM -0700, Bruce Korb wrote:
> > It seems I need to be able to build both 32 and 64 bit
> > libraries.  Since nobody seems to have anything to do,
> > maybe we can add this to our copious spare time activities:
> >
> > Construction of multiple output libraries based on more
> > than just the -PIC compiler flags.  viz., the
> > ``-xarch=v9 -xregs=no%appl,no%float'' variation on Sun.
> >
> > Since I have not taken a serious look at how you manage
> > the build-with-PIC vs. build-without-PIC stuff, how hard
> > would anyone guess it might be to put together a list
> > of compile options and associated target library names,
> > then going through all the compiles to build libraries
> > one after the other?  Can I do it over lunch?  ;-)
> > Probably not.  :-(
> 
> What? Are you talking about building *both* 32 and 64-bit libraries at
> once. How do you handle naming the library? What directory do they get
> installed in. For now, I say no. Build the 32-bit libs and install,
> then the 64-bit libs and install (into separate locations). Are you
> aware of any OS that supports 32 and 64-bit libraries in the same
> directory? I know Solaris and AIX don't do this.
> 
> And, if you're going to *link* a program against the library you've
> created, do you then generate both 32 and 64-bit versions as well?
> 

I agree that libtool is probably not the right place for it - and
the libraries are usually named slightly different AFAIK. However,
once in a while I take a deep breath and hope that once upon a
time I can just `configure` once and have multiple variations of
a library be made - the distinction between a debug-version and
an optimized version should be known to all of us. The option that
comes to my mind is the availability of a multilib subdir build
of the project instead of the in-place build, so that a toplevel
configure will always know to fork into two build-subdirs all by
itself and let the makefile do the same. Since I've done this for
my project with a handmade makefile/configure pair, I can assure
you that it is possible. For the question asked, it would simply
fork into a 32bit and 64bit build-subdir, let `configure` create
different makefiles with slightly different options to be passed
to libtool, and then `make` each of them seperatly but in the same
go and therefore possibly in parallel. And again - I've done this
and it works, and I guess for quite a few platforms it would be
great if the autotools could provide us with good support for it.

-- guido