[Info-vax] Linking problem with multiply defined symbols, how to resolve?

[hb]

On 9/29/22 5:09 PM, chris wrote:
> On 9/28/22 08:33, Richard Levitte wrote:
>> Hi all!
>>
>> I have this problem, that I want to build an app or a shareable image,
>> which is linked with another shared library, but which also implements
>> its own variant of symbols that are defined in that other shared library.
>>...
> Can you use the "weak" keyword with one of the sets of symbols, which
> automatically gets over ridden at link time in favour of another
> conventionally defined same ident symbol at link time ?
The short answer is no.

The VMS linker manual has some paragraphs about weak symbols. There it
is said: "In general, a symbol can have only one strong or one VMS-style
weak definition but it can have multiple UNIX-style weak definitions."

Yes, there is one exception for VMS-style weak definitions, but that
does not apply here.

Here you want to have multiple definitions - in the shareable image and
in the object module. So you would need to have UNIX-style weak
definitions. These weak definitions are IA64 and x86 specific. They are
created by the C++ compiler. If the OP's code were C++ code resulting in
UNIX-style weak definitions then the linker would not report a
%ILINK-W-MULDEF. Also, the IA64 shareable image's GST only contains
strong definitions. So the object module's definition would be
discarded. On x86 this can be different. So the source code is either
not C++ or the language constructs used, do not result in UNIX-style
weak definitions.

Creating a UNIX-style weak definition in other languages than C++ is not
possible. Converting any strong (or VMS-style weak) definition into a
UNIX-style weak definition is not possible (except you use the patch
utility).