Re: RFC: strip --strip-nondebug

[Nick Clifton <nickc@redhat.com>]

Hi Michael,

> How big a reduction in size would you expect, typically?
> I'm a little ignorant, but what strippable info is in there
> that gdb doesn't need?

Quite a lot it would seem.  I have not done any rigorous studies but I
did try out a simple hello world program:
    
    compiled hello executable:    11999 bytes
    after strip --strip-debug:     4350 bytes
    after strip --strip-all:       2772 bytes
    after strip --strip-nondebug   6725 bytes
    
So even taking a debug stripped executable and its associated debug
file, the combined size is 4350 + 6725 = 11075 which is less than the
original.

Of course the patch does not work properly yet.  (GDB does not seem to
find/understand the debug info file) so the sizes will probably
change).  But in the normal case of running an program, having an
executable that is significantly smaller must surely result in some
performance benefits.

Cheers
        Nick