Symbols from a static library are not exported while linking to a shared library

Question

Code for a shared library is modular, consists of several independent units. Each unit is built into a static library.

---

unit1.c

#include <stdio.h>

void HelloWorld() {
  printf("Hello World!\n");
}

---

unit2.c

#include <stdio.h>

void GoodbyeWorld() {
  printf("Goodbye World!\n");
}

---

CMakeLists.txt

cmake_minimum_required(VERSION 3.0.2)

add_library(unit1 STATIC unit1.c)
target_compile_options(unit1 PRIVATE -fPIC)

add_library(unit2 STATIC unit2.c)
target_compile_options(unit2 PRIVATE -fPIC)

add_library(merged SHARED)
target_link_libraries(merged unit1 unit2)
set_target_properties(merged PROPERTIES LINKER_LANGUAGE C)

---

Build steps:

cmake . && cmake --build .

Exported symbols by libmerged.so:

$ nm -D --defined-only libmerged.so 
0000000000201020 B __bss_start
0000000000201020 D _edata
0000000000201028 B _end
00000000000005a0 T _fini
0000000000000458 T _init

Q Why symbols HelloWorld and GoodbyeWorld are not exported? How to fix it?

• I've tried --version-script without success.

  Additional setting in CMakeLists.txt

  set_target_properties(merged PROPERTIES LINK_FLAGS -Wl,--version- 
  script=merged.version)
  

  ---

  merged.version

  merged {
    global: HelloWorld; GoodbyeWorld;
    local: *;
  };
  

• Also tried force load static libaries without success

  set_target_properties(merged PROPERTIES LINK_FLAGS -Wl,-force_load,libunit1.a)
  

Answer 1

You need to pass the --whole-archive option to the linker. In CMake, you can do it as follows.

CMakeLists.txt

cmake_minimum_required(VERSION 3.0.2)

add_library(unit1 STATIC unit1.c)
target_compile_options(unit1 PRIVATE -fPIC)

add_library(unit2 STATIC unit2.c)
target_compile_options(unit2 PRIVATE -fPIC)

add_library(merged SHARED)
set_target_properties(merged PROPERTIES LINKER_LANGUAGE C)
target_link_libraries(merged
        "-Wl,--whole-archive libunit1.a libunit2.a -Wl,--no-whole-archive"
        unit1 unit2
)

Note: The target_link_libraries command can be used to specify linker flags as well, not only library names. The quotes are important, otherwise CMake might rearrange the flags and remove duplicates.

Exported symbols

$ nm libmerged.so | grep " T "
000000000000065d T GoodbyeWorld
000000000000064a T HelloWorld
0000000000000670 T _fini
0000000000000520 T _init

---

Another option, to avoid the problem, would be to create OBJECT instead of STATIC libraries for unit1 and unit2.

CMakeLists.txt

cmake_minimum_required(VERSION 3.0.2)

add_library(unit1 OBJECT unit1.c)
target_compile_options(unit1 PRIVATE -fPIC)

add_library(unit2 OBJECT unit2.c)
target_compile_options(unit2 PRIVATE -fPIC)

add_library(merged SHARED $<TARGET_OBJECTS:unit1> $<TARGET_OBJECTS:unit2>)
set_target_properties(merged PROPERTIES LINKER_LANGUAGE C)