LD.AOUT_SO(1) BSD General Commands Manual LD.AOUT_SO(1)
NAME
ld.aout_so -- run-time link-editor
DESCRIPTION
ld.aout_so is a self-contained, position independent program image providing run-time support for loading and link-editing shared objects
into a process' address space. It uses the data structures (see link(5)) contained within dynamically linked programs to determine which
shared libraries are needed and loads them at a convenient virtual address using the mmap(2) system call.
After all shared libraries have been successfully loaded, ld.aout_so proceeds to resolve external references from both the main program and
all objects loaded. A mechanism is provided for initialization routines to be called, on a per-object basis, giving a shared object an
opportunity to perform any extra set-up, before execution of the program proper begins. ld.aout_so looks for a symbol named .init in each
object's symbol table. If present, this symbol is assumed to represent a C-function declared as void .init(void), which is then called.
Similarly, a void .fini(void) function is called just before an object is unloaded from the process address space as a result of calling
dlclose(3). Note that while an object's .init is always called, whether the object is loaded automatically at program startup or programmat-
ically by using dlopen(3), the .fini function is called only on 'last dlclose(3)'.
This mechanism is exploited by the system-supplied C++ constructor initialization code located in /usr/lib/c++rt.o. This file should be
included in the list of object-code files passed to ld(1) when building a shared C++ library.
ld.aout_so is itself a shared object that is initially loaded by the startup module crt0. Since a.out(5) formats do not provide easy access
to the file header from within a running process, crt0 uses the special symbol _DYNAMIC to determine whether a program is in fact dynamically
linked or not. Whenever the linker ld(1) has relocated this symbol to a location other than 0, crt0 assumes the services of ld.aout_so are
needed (see link(5) for details). crt0 passes control to rtld's entry point before the program's main() routine is called. Thus, ld.aout_so
can complete the link-editing process before the dynamic program calls upon services of any dynamic library.
To quickly locate the required shared objects in the filesystem, ld.aout_so may use a ``hints'' file, prepared by the ldconfig(8) utility, in
which the full path specification of the shared objects can be looked up by hashing on the 3-tuple <library-name, major-version-number,
minor-version-number>.
ld.aout_so recognizes a number of environment variables that can be used to modify its behavior as follows:
LD_LIBRARY_PATH A colon separated list of directories, overriding the default search path for shared libraries.
LD_PRELOAD A colon separated list of shared object filenames to be loaded after the main program but before its shared object
dependencies.
LD_WARN_NON_PURE_CODE When set, issue a warning whenever a link-editing operation requires modification of the text segment of some loaded
object. This is usually indicative of an incorrectly built library.
LD_SUPPRESS_WARNINGS When set, no warning messages of any kind are issued. Normally, a warning is given if satisfactorily versioned
library could not be found.
LD_TRACE_LOADED_OBJECTS When set, causes ld.aout_so to exit after loading the shared objects and printing a summary which includes the abso-
lute pathnames of all objects, to standard output.
LD_TRACE_LOADED_OBJECTS_FMT1
LD_TRACE_LOADED_OBJECTS_FMT2
When set, these variables are interpreted as format strings a la printf(3) to customize the trace output and are
used by ldd(1)'s -f option and allows ldd(1) to be operated as a filter more conveniently. The following conver-
sions can be used:
%a The main program's name (also known as ``__progname'').
%A The value of the environment variable LD_TRACE_LOADED_OBJECTS_PROGNAME
%o The library name.
%m The library's major version number.
%n The library's minor version number.
%p The full pathname as determined by rtld's library search rules.
%x The library's load address.
Additionally,
and are recognized and have their usual meaning.
LD_NO_INTERN_SEARCH When set, ld.aout_so does not process any internal search paths that were recorded in the executable.
LD_NOSTD_PATH When set, do not include a set of built-in standard directory paths for searching. This might be useful when run-
ning on a system with a completely non-standard filesystem layout.
FILES
/var/run/ld.so.hints library location hints built by ldconfig(8)
SEE ALSO
ld(1), ld.elf_so(1), ld.so(1), link(5), ldconfig(8)
HISTORY
The shared library model employed first appeared in SunOS 4.0.
SECURITY CONSIDERATIONS
The environment variables LD_LIBRARY_PATH and LD_PRELOAD are not honored when executing in a set-user-ID or set-group-ID environment. This
action is taken to prevent malicious substitution of shared object dependencies or interposition of symbols.
BSD
January 1, 2011 BSD