Re: [Mingw-users] Re: libbfd, libtool & Win32

[Max Bowsher]

Guido Draheim wrote:
> I am not that knowing about the actual backgrounds, but to me
> it did look as if one can not be sure about the dll.a format,
> so that one does not trust it. Unlike cygwin, it is much more
> likely that mingw binds with dlls *not* compiled by mingw gcc
> but from another compiler. Since mingw is on the same
> augenhoehe ("eye height", here: being-level) other than cygwin's
> posixisch environment which is another layer atop the basic
> operating system services. And damn, we want to bind with
> other dlls for which we have no dll.a available. About all the
> other win32 compilers come with some kind of implib.exe that
> one can use to make an importlib from any dll that was not
> shipped along with that compiler. That is, in another step,
> before linking. That's not the gcc/unix way I say, where we
> are even used that LD link lines look always somewhat like
> -L. -lz, other than the plethora of w32 compilers, IIRC.
>
> Personally, I do not have a problem with having libtool to do
> some automatics, to call some implib.exe  if the importlib
> is not availabe  - or when one does not trust that the imp.lib
> is up to date with the lib in parallel that (the dll versioning
> scheme is not quite like that one unix systems, and dlls get
> often replaced, while unix sharedlibs are not and get a cousin
> in parallel). Anyway, for having libtool to do some automatics
> successfully... there has to be an implib.exe-like step that
> can be done and trusted.

I think the correct approach is to use a libfoo.dll.a if it is present, and do
funny impgen stuff if it is not.

Max.