[vlc-devel] [PATCH 1/2] configure: allow toggling of -Wl, -z, defs and -no-undefined

[Filip Roséen]

There are cases where it is annoying to build VLC with this
restriction as you would like to use symbols that are simply not
present (in terms of definition) when things are being built.

SUMMARY:

 - "-Wl,-z,defs" is now opt-out + automatic detection
 - "-no-undefined" is now opt-out

Both options are governed by a new configure flag,
"--{enable,disable}-no-undefined-symbols" as they are tightly coupled.

--

RATIONALE:

 - simplify usage of -fsanitize together with llvm/clang
 - out-of-tree definitions of VLC related functions (I sometimes do
   this for extensive testing by building object files that I later
   circle between when trying out samples).

Using llvm/clang with -fsanitize=address, the symbols put in the
resulting object-file related to the address sanitizer are not
available, and we will get an error diagnostic due to the relevant
flags.

The below linked articles elaborates the issue further:

 - https://clang.llvm.org/docs/AddressSanitizer.html#usage
 - https://github.com/google/sanitizers/wiki/AddressSanitizer#faq

One can circumvent the issue by manually specifying flags to
effectivelly have the symbols resolved during linking, and preventing
use of the relevant shared library. The drawbacks are, of course:

 - negative impact on build time
 - negative impact on execution speed
 - unnecessary complex for those who are not familiar with the
   intrinsics of libtools and configure.ac
---
 configure.ac | 24 +++++++++++++++---------
 1 file changed, 15 insertions(+), 9 deletions(-)

diff --git a/configure.ac b/configure.ac
index 71f19c43f9..1081e14ec8 100644
--- a/configure.ac
+++ b/configure.ac
@@ -1086,16 +1086,22 @@ VLC_RESTORE_FLAGS
 SYMBOLIC_LDFLAGS="${ac_cv_ld_bsymbolic}"
 AC_SUBST(SYMBOLIC_LDFLAGS)
 
-VLC_SAVE_FLAGS
-LDFLAGS="${LDFLAGS} -Wl,-z,defs"
-AC_CACHE_CHECK([if linker supports -z,defs], [ac_cv_ld_z_defs], [
-  AC_TRY_LINK([],, [
-    ac_cv_ld_z_defs="yes"
-  ], [
-    ac_cv_ld_z_defs="no"
-  ])
+dnl
+dnl No undefined symbols for libvlc* objects
+dnl
+AC_ARG_ENABLE(no-undefined-symbols,
+  [AS_HELP_STRING([--disable-no-undefined-symbols],
+    [disable error on undefined symbols when linking \
+     core VLC objects (default enabled)] )] )
+
+AS_IF([test "${enable_no_undefined_symbols}" != "no" ], [
+  VLC_SAVE_FLAGS
+  LDFLAGS="${LDFLAGS} -Wl,-z,defs"
+  AC_CACHE_CHECK([if linker supports -z,defs], [ac_cv_ld_z_defs], [
+    AC_TRY_LINK([],, [ac_cv_ld_z_defs="yes"], [ac_cv_ld_z_defs="no"]) ])
+  AS_IF([test "${ac_cv_ld_z_defs}" = "no"], [VLC_RESTORE_FLAGS])
+  AC_SUBST([LDFLAGS_no_undefined], [-no-undefined])
 ])
-AS_IF([test "${ac_cv_ld_z_defs}" = "no"], [VLC_RESTORE_FLAGS])
 
 dnl Check for __attribute__((packed))
 AC_CACHE_CHECK([for __attribute__((packed))],
-- 
2.12.0