Re-export Shared Library Symbols from Other Library (OS X / POSIX) - c

My question is fairly OS X on x86-64 specific but a universal solution that works on other POSIX OSes is even more appreciated.
Given a list of symbol names of some shared library (called original library in the following) and I want my shared library to re-export these symbols. Re-export as in if someone tries to resolve the symbol against my library I either provide my version of this symbol or (if my library doesn't have this symbol) forward to the original library's symbol.
I don't know the types of the symbols, I only know whether they are functions (type T in nm output) or other symbols (type S in nm output).
For functions, I already have a solution: For every function I want to re-export I generate an assembly stub that does dynamically resolve the symbol (using dlsym()) and then jumps into the resolved function with the very same environment (registers rdi, rsi, rdx, rcx, r8, r9, stack pointer, ...). I'm basically generating universal proxy functions. Using some macro trickery that can be generated fairly easy without writing code for each and every symbol.
For non-function symbols the problem seems to be harder because I cannot generate this universal proxy function, because the resolving party does never call a function.
Using a constructor function static void init(void) __attribute__((constructor)); I can execute code whenever someone loads my library, that would be a good point to resolve and re-export all non-function symbols if that's possible.
In other words, I'd like to write the symbol table of my library to point to the respective symbols of another shared library. Doing the rewriting at compile or run time is okay (run time preferred). Or put yet another way, the behaviour of DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES (LD_PRELOAD) is exactly what I need but I don't want to insert a new library, I want to replace one (in the file system). EDIT: The reason I don't want/can't use DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES or any other environment variable of the DYLD_* family is that they are ignored for code signed, restricted, ... binaries.
I'm aware of the -reexport-l, -reexport_library and -reexported_symbols_list linker flags but I could not get them to work, especially when my library is a "replacement" for frameworks that are part of umbrella frameworks (example: /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Frameworks/SearchKit.framework/SearchKit) because ld forbids to link directly against parts of umbrella frameworks.
EDIT: Because I explained it somewhat ambiguously: I can't change the way the actual program is linked. The goal is to produce a shared library that is a replacement for the original library. (Apparently called filter library.)

Found it out now (OS X specific): clang -o replacement-lib.dylib ... -Xlinker -reexport_library PATH_TO_ORIGINAL_LIB does the trick. PATH_TO_ORIGINAL_LIB could for example be /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Frameworks/SearchKit.framework/Versions/Current/SearchKit.
If PATH_TO_ORIGINAL_LIB is a library that is part of an umbrella framework (as in the example above), then replace PATH_TO_ORIGINAL_LIB by the path of some other lib (I created a lib empty.dylib for that) and as a second step do
install_name_tool -change /usr/local/lib/empty.dylib PATH_TO_ORIGINAL_LIB replacement-lib.dylib
To see if the actual reexporting worked use:
otool -l replacement-lib.dylib | grep -A2 LC_REEXPORT_DYLIB
The output should look like
cmd LC_REEXPORT_DYLIB
cmdsize XX
name empty.dylib (offset YY)
After launching the install_name_tool it could be
cmd LC_REEXPORT_DYLIB
cmdsize XX
name /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Frameworks/SearchKit.framework/Versions/Current/SearchKit (offset YY)

You could link against both libraries and use the link order to make sure to link against the right symbols. This works on both OS X and Linux:
cc -o executable -lmylib -loriglib
Where origlib is the original library and mylib contains symbols that are supposed to overwrite symbols in origlib. Then the executable will be linked against your symbols from mylib first and all unresolved symbols will be linked against origlib.
This works in the same way when linking against OS X frameworks. Just link against your library that replaces symbols first and against the framework after.
cc -o executable -lmylib -framework SomeFramework
Edit: If you just want to replace symbols at runtime then you can use LD_PRELOAD in the same way:
cc -o executable -framework SomeFramework
LD_PRELOAD=libmylib.dylib ./executable

Related

Removing symbols from `.a`s

I'm compiling a C++ static library using g++ via Cmake. I want to remove symbols relating to the internal implementation so they don't show up in nm. (See here and here for the same with shared libraries.)
This answer tells you how to do it on iOS, and I'm trying to understand what happens under the hood so I can replicate on Linux. They invoke ld with:
-r/--relocatable to Generate relocatable output---i.e., generate an output file that can in turn serve as input to ld.
-x/--discard-all: Delete all local symbols.
AFAICS the -r glues all the modules into one module, and then the -x removes symbols only used inside that module. Is that right?
It's not clear how the linker 'knows' which symbols will be exported externally? Does it rely on __attribute__((visibility("hidden/default"))) as in the .so case?
Edit: clearly I'm confused... I thought cmake invoked ld to link the .os into .a. Googled + clarified above.
Question still stands: how do I modify the build process to exclude most symbols?

cannot find symbol "Embeddedrcall_Init"

I am trying to create a dll file using swig for an embeddedR C Program in windows environment. I am using the below commands:
C:\swigwin-3.0.12\Examples\r\Z>swig -c++ -tcl embeddedRCall.i
C:\swigwin-3.0.12\Examples\r\Z>gcc -c embeddedRCall.c -I/swigwin-3.0.12/Examples/r/Z
C:\swigwin-3.0.12\Examples\r\Z>gcc -c embeddedRCall_wrap.c -I/Tcl/include/tcl8.6 -I/swigwin-3.0.12/Examples/r/Z
C:\swigwin-3.0.12\Examples\r\Z>gcc -shared embeddedRCall.o embeddedRCall_wrap.o -o embeddedRCall.dll -L/Tcl/lib -L/R/R-3.3.2/bin/i386 -lR -lRblas -lRiconv -lRlapack -ltcl86
% load embeddedRCall
cannot find symbol "Embeddedrcall_Init"
I was able to load other example.dll files with tclsh
However I was unable to figure out the reason-- I am already using tcl 32 bit
My module file name is and module name is embeddedRcall
Am I missing something???
I am relatively new to TCL can someone please help me.
You should have an exported (extern "C") function symbol in your library called something like Embeddedrcall_Init; it is the entry point that lets Tcl install the library into a specific interpreter instance. (It has to be found explicitly because it takes an argument.) By default, the name of the function is found by munging the name of the library (strip version number, case convert, append _Init) but the determination of the name can be overridden by the optional second argument to load.
To be more exact, if the entry is actually called EmbeddedRCall_Init, you would have to load it with:
load embeddedRCall EmbeddedRCall
# The _Init suffix is fixed when loading into a standard interp
Note the case difference! (Also, we recommend using fully qualified path names to loaded libraries, as it avoids some complexities in the dlopen() system.)

Linking against a shared library on AIX

I'm trying to link against a shared library (apr) on AIX 5.3 using gcc/libtool.
The output from the compiler is as follows (with some irrelevant flags removed for the sake of simplicity):
libtool: link: gcc -o test test.o -L/opt/freeware/lib -lapr-1 -lpthread -Wl,-blibpath:/opt/freeware lib:/usr/lib:/lib
Then I checked what shared libs the resulting binary uses:
$ ldd test
test needs:
/usr/lib/libc.a(shr.o)
/usr/lib/libpthread.a(shr_xpg5.o)
/unix
/usr/lib/libcrypt.a(shr.o)
/usr/lib/libpthreads.a(shr_comm.o)
Notice that 'libapr-1' is missing here, though the symbols are there in the binary (verified with nm), which suggests that it is linked in statically.
This wouldn't be such a big problem for simple programs. Unfortunately my code in question uses dynamically loadable modules. The main program calls apr_initialize which sets a static variable 'apr_pools_initialized' inside the library. The loadable modules then try to use apr_pool_create which first check whether the initialization has been performed. Since they have their own statically linked apr, the static variable 'apr_pools_initialized' is not at the same memory location what the main program initialized. This makes the statically linked binary non-functional.
The apr library is installed using a precompiled binary rpm (apr and apr-devel). The relevant library files are there:
# rpm -ql apr|grep \\.so$
/opt/freeware/lib/libapr-1.so
/opt/freeware/lib64/libapr-1.so
/usr/lib/libapr-1.so
# rpm -ql apr-devel|grep \\.a$
/opt/freeware/lib/libapr-1.a
/opt/freeware/lib64/libapr-1.a
/usr/lib/libapr-1.a
/usr/lib64/libapr-1.a
/usr/lib64/libapr-1.so
I tried to remove the '.a' files hoping that the linker would have no choice but to use the '.so' and link it dynamically, unfortunately AIX is different and this does not work.
Regarding this topic I have found this answer and another libtool question which give some insight.
The question is: How can I link this to my binary dynamically?
Actually the links referenced contained the solution to this problem, which is:
-Wl,-brtl
Adding these LDFLAGS solved the linking problem.

how do I always include symbols from a static library?

Suppose I have a static library libx.a. How to I make some symbols (not all) from this library to be always present in any binary I link with my library? Reason is that I need these symbols to be available via dlopen+dlsym. I'm aware of --whole-archive linker switch, but it forces all object files from library archive to linked into resulting binary, and that is not what I want...
Observations so far (CentOS 5.4, 32bit) (upd: this paragraph is wrong; I could not reproduce this behaviour)
ld main.o libx.a
will happily strip all non-referenced symbols, while
ld main.o -L. -lx
will link whole library in. I guess this depends on version of binutils used, however, and newer linkers will be able to cherry-pick individual objects from a static library.
Another question is how can I achieve the same effect under Windows?
Thanks in advance. Any hints will be greatly appreciated.
Imagine you have a project which consists of the following three C files in the same folder;
// ---- jam.h
int jam_badger(int);
// ---- jam.c
#include "jam.h"
int jam_badger(int a)
{
return a + 1;
}
// ---- main.c
#include "jam.h"
int main()
{
return jam_badger(2);
}
And you build it with a boost-build bjam file like this;
lib jam : jam.c <link>static ;
lib jam_badger : jam ;
exe demo : jam_badger main.c ;
You will get an error like this.
undefined reference to `jam_badger'
(I have used bjam here because the file is easier to read, but you could use anything you want)
Removing the 'static' produces a working binary, as does adding static to the other library, or just using the one library (rather than the silly wrapping on inside the other)
The reason this happens is because ld is clever enough to only select the parts of the archive which are actually used, which in this case is none of them.
The solution is to surround the static archives with -Wl,--whole-archive and -Wl,--no-whole-archive, like so;
g++ -o "libjam_candle_badger.so" -Wl,--whole-archive libjam_badger.a Wl,--no-whole-archive
Not quite sure how to get boost-build to do this for you, but you get the idea.
First things first: ld main.o libx.a does not build a valid executable. In general, you should never use ld to link anything directly; always use proper compiler driver (gcc in this case) instead.
Also, "ld main.o libx.a" and "ld main.o -L. -lx" should be exactly equivalent. I am very doubtful you actually got different results from these two commands.
Now to answer your question: if you want foo, bar and baz to be exported from your a.out, do this:
gcc -Wl,-u,foo,-u,bar,-u,baz main.o -L. -lx -rdynamic
Update:
your statement: "symbols I want to include are used by library internally only" doesn't make much sense: if the symbols are internal to the library, why do you want to export them? And if something else uses them (via dlsym), then they are not internal to the library -- they are part of the library public API.
You should clarify your question and explain what you really are trying to achieve. Providing sample code will not hurt either.
I would start with splitting off those symbols you always need into a seperate library, retaining only the optional ones in libx.a.
Take an address of the symbol you need to include.
If gcc's optimiser anyway eliminates it, do something with this address - should be enough.

Is there a way to know which compiler generated a static library?

A third party provided me a static lib (.a) to link with on solaris station.
I tried to compile with sunpro, and failed at link step.
I suppose the issue is coming from the compiler I use (gcc instead?) or simply its version (as the std lib provided by the compiler could change from the version expected by the library AFAIK it could leads to errors at link step).
How could I know which compiler was used to generate this lib? Is there some tools doing that? Some option in sunpro/gcc or whatever?
As an hint: I've read some time ago that compilers use different mangling conventions when generating object files (true?). Still, "nm --demangle" command line prints me well all function names from debug symbols in this static lib. How does it work ? If my assumption is ok, nm does have a way to resolve which convention is in use in a static library, isn't it? Or is it simply meaning that lib was generated by GNU gcc, as nm is a part of GNU binutils?
I am not close to my workstation so I can't copy & paste error output from the linker (not for the moment but I could copy them in a further edit)
Extract the object files from the archive then run the strings command on some of them (first on the smaller ones since there'd be less noise to sift through). Many compilers insert ASCII signatures in the object files.
For example, the following meaningless source file, foo.c:
extern void blah();
when compiled on my Fedora 10 machine into foo.o via gcc -c -o foo.o foo.c results in a 647 byte foo.o object file. Running strings on foo.o results in
GCC: (GNU) 4.3.2 20081105 (Red Hat 4.3.2-7)
.symtab
.strtab
.shstrtab
.text
.data
.bss
.comment
.note.GNU-stack
foo.c
which makes it clear the compiler was GCC. Even if I'd compiled it with -fno-ident, the .GNU-stack note ELF section would have still been present.
You can extract the object files using the ar utility, or using Midnight Commander (which integrates ar), or you can simply run strings on the archive (which might give you more noise and be less relevant, but would still help.)
I tend to use the strings program (with the '-a' option, or my own variant where the '-a' behaviour is standard) and look for the tell-tale signs. For example, in one of my own libraries, I find:
/work1/gcc/v4.2.3/bin/../lib/gcc/sparc-sun-solaris2.10/4.2.3/include
/work1/gcc/v4.3.0/bin/../lib/gcc/sparc-sun-solaris2.10/4.3.0/include
/work1/gcc/v4.3.1/bin/../lib/gcc/sparc-sun-solaris2.10/4.3.1/include
/work1/gcc/v4.3.3/bin/../lib/gcc/sparc-sun-solaris2.10/4.3.3/include
That suggests that the code in the library has been compiled with a variety of versions of GCC over a period of years (actually, I'm quite startled to find so many versions in a single library).
Another library contains:
cg: Sun Compiler Common 11 Patch 120760-06 2006/05/26
acomp: Sun C 5.8 Patch 121015-02 2006/03/29
iropt: Sun Compiler Common 11 Patch 120760-06 2006/05/26
/compilers/v11/SUNWspro/prod/bin/cc -O -v -Xa -xarch=v9 ...
So, there are usually fingerprints in the object files indicating which compiler was used. But you have to know how to look for them.
Is the library supposed to be a C or C++ library?
If it is a C library then name mangling can not be the problem, as there is none in C. It could be however in a wrong format. Unices used to have libraries in the a.out format but almost all newer versions switched to more powerful formats like ELF.
If it is a C++ library then name mangling can be an issue. Most compilers embed some symbols that are compiler specific into the code, so if you have a tool like nm to list the symbols you can hopefully deduce from what compiler it came.
For example g++ creates a symbol
__gxx_personality_v0
in it's libraries
You can try the unix utility file:
file foo.a

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