source: chapter06/binutils.xml@ 1dc34de7

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<sect1 id="ch-system-binutils" xreflabel="Binutils" role="wrap">
<title>Binutils-&binutils-version;</title>
<?dbhtml filename="binutils.html"?>

<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils"><primary sortas="a-Binutils">Binutils</primary></indexterm>

<sect2 role="package"><title/>
<para>The Binutils package contains a linker, an assembler, and other tools for
handling object files.</para>

<segmentedlist>
<segtitle>&buildtime;</segtitle>
<segtitle>&diskspace;</segtitle>
<seglistitem><seg>1.4 SBU</seg><seg>167 MB</seg></seglistitem>
</segmentedlist>

<segmentedlist>
<segtitle>Binutils installation depends on</segtitle>
<seglistitem><seg>Bash, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC, Gettext,
Glibc, Grep, Make, Perl, Sed, Texinfo</seg></seglistitem>
</segmentedlist>
</sect2>

<sect2 role="installation">
<title>Installation of Binutils</title>

<para>Verify that your the terminals (PTYs) are working properly
inside the chroot environment. Check that everything is set up
correctly by performing a simple test:</para>

<screen><userinput>expect -c "spawn ls"</userinput></screen>

<para>If the following message shows up, the chroot environment is not
set up for proper PTY operation:</para>

<screen><computeroutput>The system has no more ptys.  Ask your system administrator to create more.</computeroutput></screen>

<para>The issue needs to be resolved before running the test suites
for Binutils and GCC.</para>

<para>This package is known to have issues when its default
optimization flags (including the <parameter>-march</parameter> and
<parameter>-mcpu</parameter> options) are changed. If any environment
variables that override default optimizations have been defined, such
as <emphasis>CFLAGS</emphasis> and <emphasis>CXXFLAGS</emphasis>,
unset or modifying them when building Binutils.</para>

<para>The Binutils documentation recommends building Binutils outside of the
source directory in a dedicated build directory:</para>

<screen><userinput>mkdir ../binutils-build
cd ../binutils-build</userinput></screen>

<para>Prepare Binutils for compilation:</para>

<screen><userinput>../binutils-&binutils-version;/configure --prefix=/usr --enable-shared</userinput></screen>

<para>Compile the package:</para>

<screen><userinput>make tooldir=/usr</userinput></screen>

<para>Normally, the tooldir (the directory where the executables will
ultimately be located) is set to <filename
class="directory">$(exec_prefix)/$(target_alias)</filename>, which
expands into <filename
class="directory">/usr/i686-pc-linux-gnu</filename>. Because this is a
custom system, this target-specific directory in <filename
class="directory">/usr</filename> is not required. This setup would be
used if the system was used to cross-compile (for example, compiling a
package on an Intel machine that generates code that can be executed
on PowerPC machines).</para>

<important><para>The test suite for Binutils in this section is
considered critical. Do not skip it under any
circumstances.</para></important>

<para>Test the results:</para>

<screen><userinput>make check</userinput></screen>

<para>Install the package:</para>

<screen><userinput>make tooldir=/usr install</userinput></screen>

<para>Install the <filename class="headerfile">libiberty</filename> header file that is needed by
some packages:</para>

<screen><userinput>cp ../binutils-&binutils-version;/include/libiberty.h /usr/include</userinput></screen>

</sect2>


<sect2 id="contents-binutils" role="content"><title>Contents of Binutils</title>

<segmentedlist>
<segtitle>Installed programs</segtitle>
<segtitle>Installed libraries</segtitle>
<seglistitem><seg>addr2line, ar, as, c++filt, gprof, ld, nm, objcopy, objdump, 
ranlib, readelf, size, strings and strip</seg>
<seg>libiberty.a, libbfd.[a,so] and libopcodes.[a,so]</seg></seglistitem>
</segmentedlist>

<variablelist><title>Short descriptions</title>

<varlistentry id="addr2line">
<term><command>addr2line</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils addr2line"><primary sortas="b-addr2line">addr2line</primary></indexterm>
<para>translates program addresses to file names and line numbers.
Given an address and the name of an executable, it uses the debugging
information in the executable to determine which source file and line
number are associated with the address.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="ar">
<term><command>ar</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils ar"><primary sortas="b-ar">ar</primary></indexterm>
<para>creates, modifies, and extracts from archives. An archive is a
single file holding a collection of other files in a structure that
makes it possible to retrieve the original individual files (called
members of the archive).</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="as">
<term><command>as</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils as"><primary sortas="b-as">as</primary></indexterm>
<para>an assembler. It assembles the output of gcc into object
files.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="c-filt">
<term><command>c++filt</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils c-filt"><primary sortas="b-c++filt">c++filt</primary></indexterm>
<para>used by the linker to de-mangle C++ and Java symbols and to keep
overloaded functions from clashing.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="gprof">
<term><command>gprof</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils gprof"><primary sortas="b-gprof">gprof</primary></indexterm>
<para>displays call graph profile data.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="ld">
<term><command>ld</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils ld"><primary sortas="b-ld">ld</primary></indexterm>
<para>a linker. It combines a number of object and archive files into a single file, 
relocating their data and tying up symbol references.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="nm">
<term><command>nm</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils nm"><primary sortas="b-nm">nm</primary></indexterm>
<para>lists the symbols occurring in a given object file.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="objcopy">
<term><command>objcopy</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils objcopy"><primary sortas="b-objcopy">objcopy</primary></indexterm>
<para>used to translate one type of object file into another.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="objdump">
<term><command>objdump</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils objdump"><primary sortas="b-objdump">objdump</primary></indexterm>
<para>displays information about the given object file, with options
controlling the particular information to display. The information
shown is useful to programmers who are working on the compilation
tools.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="ranlib">
<term><command>ranlib</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils ranlib"><primary sortas="b-ranlib">ranlib</primary></indexterm>
<para>generates an index of the contents of an archive and stores it
in the archive. The index lists all of the symbols defined by archive
members that are relocatable object files.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="readelf">
<term><command>readelf</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils readelf"><primary sortas="b-readelf">readelf</primary></indexterm>
<para>displays information about ELF type binaries.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="size">
<term><command>size</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils size"><primary sortas="b-size">size</primary></indexterm>
<para>lists the section sizes and the total size for the given object files.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="strings">
<term><command>strings</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils strings"><primary sortas="b-strings">strings</primary></indexterm>
<para>outputs, for each given file, the sequences of printable
characters that are of at least the specified length (defaulting to
four). For object files, it prints, by default, only the strings from
the initializing and loading sections. For other types of files, it
scans the whole file.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="strip">
<term><command>strip</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils strip"><primary sortas="b-strip">strip</primary></indexterm>
<para>discards symbols from object files.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="libiberty">
<term><filename class="libraryfile">libiberty</filename></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils libiberty"><primary sortas="c-libiberty">libiberty</primary></indexterm>
<para>contains routines used by various GNU programs, including
<command>getopt</command>, <command>obstack</command>,
<command>strerror</command>, <command>strtol</command> and
<command>strtoul</command>.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="libbfd">
<term><filename class="libraryfile">libbfd</filename></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils libbfd"><primary sortas="c-libbfd">libbfd</primary></indexterm>
<para>the Binary File Descriptor library.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="libopcodes">
<term><filename class="libraryfile">libopcodes</filename></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-binutils libopcodes"><primary sortas="c-libopcodes">libopcodes</primary></indexterm>
<para>a library for dealing with opcodes.
It is used for building utilities like <command>objdump</command>. Opcodes are the <quote>readable
text</quote> versions of instructions for the processor.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
</variablelist>

</sect2>

</sect1>