Re: [RFA] Add stabs entries for coalesced symbols.

[Jim Blandy <jimb@redhat.com>]

Klee Dienes <klee@apple.com> writes:

> The following patch adds definitions for Mac OS X -style coalesced
> symbols to aout/stab.def and stabs.texinfo.  For general documentation
> on coalesced symbols, search for N_BNSYM in the following link:
> 
> http://web.mit.edu/darwin/src/modules/cctools/RelNotes/
> Private_CompilerTools.html
> 
> I suspect there may be a better place to "Relocatable Symbol Blocks"
> section of the TeXinfo file, but I wasn't able to find it; I'm happy
> to  move it elsewhere in the document if someone can tell me a better
> place.

Couldn't you call the section "Coalesced Symbol Blocks"?  That way,
someone familiar with the OS X feature would recognize that the
section was relevant to the concept.

I have the impression that GDB doesn't need to know about these
symbols, since the static linker has removed them by the time GDB sees
the file.  If that's so, that should be stated explicitly.

There must be more information in these stabs that allows the static
linker to pair up a BNSYM..ENSYM region with its symbol in the
coalesced section.  Whatever the case, the way the pairing is done
should be explained in complete detail here.