Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!bonnie.concordia.ca!nstn.ns.ca!news.cs.indiana.edu!julius.cs.uiuc.edu!usc!samsung!uunet!tcs!quark!gwu From: gwu@quark.tcs.com (George Wu) Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++ Subject: Let's write a new linker! (Was: Re: Naming Conventions) Keywords: name mangling linking symbol clashes Message-ID: <1604@tcs.tcs.com> Date: 26 Jan 91 07:20:52 GMT References: <60352@microsoft.UUCP> <278D1767.505@tct.uucp> <61785@brunix.UUCP> <556@taumet.com> <1568@tcs.tcs.com> <62211@brunix.UUCP> <70185@microsoft.UUCP> Sender: root@tcs.com Reply-To: gwu@quark.tcs.com (George Wu) Organization: Teknekron Communications Systems Lines: 20 In article <70185@microsoft.UUCP>, jimad@microsoft.UUCP (Jim ADCOCK) writes: |> It would seem that we need linkers that allow renaming of classes etc |> at link time. One way to "automate" this would be if you could tell |> the linker to imply a libname:: extension to the classes implemented |> in that lib. Thus, assuming two libraries aren't named the same |> [and you _can_ rename them by changing the name of the file containing |> the library] you could resolve the conflicts. What, with name mangling and symbol clashes, what we really need is a new linker. The whole concept of name mangling just to be able to use the venerable UNIX linker should be tossed. Yeah, and I can hear to screams of agony as some people would switch to such a linker before others. Still, I've long thought name mangling is revolting. George ---- George J Wu | gwu@tcs.com or uunet!tcs!gwu Software Engineer | 2121 Allston Way, Berkeley, CA, 94704 Teknekron Communications Systems, Inc.| (415) 649-3752