• Ellery Newcomer (8/8) Nov 11 2012 Playing with pypy.
• Jacob Carlborg (4/12) Nov 11 2012 Yes, although I don't know if it should be in shared libraries or not.
• Johannes Pfau (20/31) Nov 12 2012 How did you link that shared lib? With ld, gcc or g++? If you link via
• Jacob Carlborg (6/10) Nov 12 2012 I'm not sure but I think it won't. The runtime needs to iterate all
• Jacob Carlborg (5/8) Nov 12 2012 I think "dl_iterate_phdr" needs to be used. That is what the Boehm GC
• Ellery Newcomer (4/12) Nov 12 2012 Well, that could be one reason why multiple shared libs doesn't work

Ellery Newcomer <ellery-newcomer utulsa.edu> writes:

Playing with pypy.

I build me a shared library with ldc and try to access it via ctypes, 
and it gives me a

/usr/lib64/libdruntime-ldc.so.60: undefined symbol: __data_start

So the natural question is what is __data_start? Am I right in assuming 
it is a symbol that points to the data section or something and that it 
is relevant in executables but not shared libraries (and thus shouldn't 
be in druntime for shared lib builds)?

Jacob Carlborg <doob me.com> writes:

On 2012-11-12 03:49, Ellery Newcomer wrote:
 Playing with pypy.

 I build me a shared library with ldc and try to access it via ctypes,
 and it gives me a

 /usr/lib64/libdruntime-ldc.so.60: undefined symbol: __data_start

 So the natural question is what is __data_start? Am I right in assuming
 it is a symbol that points to the data section or something and that it
 is relevant in executables but not shared libraries (and thus shouldn't
 be in druntime for shared lib builds)?

Yes, although I don't know if it should be in shared libraries or not.

-- 
/Jacob Carlborg

Johannes Pfau <nospam example.com> writes:

Am Sun, 11 Nov 2012 18:49:18 -0800
schrieb Ellery Newcomer <ellery-newcomer utulsa.edu>:

 Playing with pypy.
 
 I build me a shared library with ldc and try to access it via ctypes, 
 and it gives me a
 
 /usr/lib64/libdruntime-ldc.so.60: undefined symbol: __data_start

How did you link that shared lib? With ld, gcc or g++? If you link via
gcc it pulls in some special object files, one of these could contain
__data_start. g++ pulls in some more object files for c++ support, but
that's probably not necessary here.

 
 So the natural question is what is __data_start? Am I right in
 assuming it is a symbol that points to the data section or something
 and that it is relevant in executables but not shared libraries (and
 thus shouldn't be in druntime for shared lib builds)?

There doesn't seem to be much documentation about __data_start. It's a
C library / linker symbol, but I think it's local to each shared
object. So only the main application can access _it's_ __data_start, and
according to some sources each shared library should get it's own
__data_start. I don't know why it's not defined in your case. It does
mark the start of the data section of the module accessing it but each
module (app/shared object) has it's own data section and therefore
needs a different __data_start.

See also:
http://forum.dlang.org/thread/ftnv6c$2odr$1 digitalmars.com#post-ftpobo:24oi:241:40digitalmars.com

But anyway, the runtime uses __data_start to find the data
section which should be scanned by the gc (see rt.memory). I really
doubt this approach will work in an application with multiple shared
libraries.

Jacob Carlborg <doob me.com> writes:

On 2012-11-12 09:54, Johannes Pfau wrote:

 But anyway, the runtime uses __data_start to find the data
 section which should be scanned by the gc (see rt.memory). I really
 doubt this approach will work in an application with multiple shared
 libraries.

I'm not sure but I think it won't. The runtime needs to iterate all 
loaded images (executables and dynamic libraries) and collect the data 
section of each image.

-- 
/Jacob Carlborg

Jacob Carlborg <doob me.com> writes:

On 2012-11-12 10:02, Jacob Carlborg wrote:

 I'm not sure but I think it won't. The runtime needs to iterate all
 loaded images (executables and dynamic libraries) and collect the data
 section of each image.

I think "dl_iterate_phdr" needs to be used. That is what the Boehm GC 
uses on Linux.

-- 
/Jacob Carlborg

Ellery Newcomer <ellery-newcomer utulsa.edu> writes:

On 11/12/2012 12:54 AM, Johannes Pfau wrote:
 How did you link that shared lib? With ld, gcc or g++? If you link via
 gcc it pulls in some special object files, one of these could contain
 __data_start. g++ pulls in some more object files for c++ support, but
 that's probably not necessary here.

gcc -nostartfiles

 But anyway, the runtime uses __data_start to find the data
 section which should be scanned by the gc (see rt.memory). I really
 doubt this approach will work in an application with multiple shared
 libraries.

Well, that could be one reason why multiple shared libs doesn't work 
with my setup.