Re: [rfa] Add SYMBOL_SET_LINKAGE_NAME

David Carlton
2004-02-18T16:45:38Z

On Wed, 18 Feb 2004 00:11:49 -0800, "Paul N. Hilfinger" <hilfingr@otisco.mckusick.com> said:

> I admit that I have never been clear on the precise limits of
> "linkage name". The linker DOES see these things (else how do they
> find their way into the executable file?) although it's true that it
> does not "link" them as it does for regular symbols.

> After watching you struggle manfully through a number of terminology
> changes, I was a little reluctant to suggest the introduction of
> still another concept, so I stuck with "linkage name". The point is
> that WHATEVER you call Ada's mangled type names, they are NOT what
> is written in the source code (so can't be "natural names") and they
> ARE the raw names extracted from the executable's debugging
> information. Hmm; they also happen to be what I proposed calling
> "search names"---i.e., the names used internally to search by. We
> could use the opportunity to introduce search names and make this
> "SET_SEARCH_NAME". Just a thought.

I was actually having similar thoughts on the way into work this
morning. Maybe what I should focus on first is trying to establish
the notion that, when calling lookup_symbol, the name you pass in
always has to be in the appropriate form: in particular, lookup_symbol
would never try to demangle a name on the fly. In the non-Ada world,
that would mean that we always search by natural name; but it would
pave the way for you to introduce your SYMBOL_SEARCH_NAME concept.
That way, SYMBOL_SEARCH_NAME would have a clear meaning (even if
nothing else would :-) ): it would be the name that you pass to
lookup_symbol when trying to search for that symbol.

Does that make sense to you? If so, I'll start generating appropriate
patches.

David Carlton
carlton@kealia.com