3 * Add support for the Texas Instruments PRU processor.
5 * When configuring for arc*-*-linux* targets the default linker emulation will
6 change if --with-cpu=nps400 is used at configure time.
10 * The EXCLUDE_FILE linker script construct can now be applied outside of the
11 section list in order for the exclusions to apply over all input sections in
14 * Add support for the RISC-V architecture.
16 * The command line option --no-eh-frame-hdr can now be used in ELF based
17 linkers to disable the automatic generation of .eh_frame_hdr sections.
19 * Add --in-implib=<infile> to the ARM linker to enable specifying a set of
20 Secure Gateway veneers that must exist in the output import library specified
21 by --out-implib=<outfile> and the address they must have. As such,
22 --in-implib is only supported in combination with --cmse-implib.
24 * Extended the --out-implib=<file> option, previously restricted to x86 PE
25 targets, to any ELF based target. This allows the generation of an import
26 library for an ELF executable, which can then be used by another application
27 to link against the executable.
31 * Add a configure option --enable-relro to decide whether -z relro should
32 be enabled in ELF linker by default. Default to yes for all Linux
33 targets except FRV, HPPA, IA64 and MIPS.
35 * Support for -z noreloc-overflow in the x86-64 ELF linker to disable
36 relocation overflow check.
38 * Add -z common/-z nocommon options for ELF targets to control whether to
39 convert common symbols to the STT_COMMON type during a relocatable link.
41 * Support for -z nodynamic-undefined-weak in the x86 ELF linker, which
42 avoids dynamic relocations against undefined weak symbols in executable.
44 * The NOCROSSREFSTO command was added to the linker script language.
46 * Add --no-apply-dynamic-relocs to the AArch64 linker to do not apply link-time
47 values for dynamic relocations.
51 * Add --fix-stm32l4xx-629360 to the ARM linker to enable a link-time
52 workaround for a bug in the bus matrix / memory controller for some of
53 the STM32 Cortex-M4 based products (STM32L4xx)
55 * Add a configure option --enable-compressed-debug-sections={all,ld} to
56 decide whether DWARF debug sections should be compressed by default.
58 * Add support for the ARC EM/HS, and ARC600/700 architectures.
60 * Experimental support for linker garbage collection (--gc-sections)
61 has been enabled for COFF and PE based targets.
63 * New command line option for ELF targets to compress DWARF debug
64 sections, --compress-debug-sections=[none|zlib|zlib-gnu|zlib-gabi].
66 * New command line option, --orphan-handling=[place|warn|error|discard], to
67 adjust how orphan sections are handled. The default is 'place' which gives
68 the current behaviour, 'warn' and 'error' issue a warning or error
69 respectively when orphan sections are found, and 'discard' will discard all
72 * Add support for LLVM plugin.
74 * Add --print-memory-usage option to report memory blocks usage.
76 * Add --require-defined option, it's like --undefined except the new symbol
77 must be defined by the end of the link.
81 * PE binaries now once again contain real timestamps by default. To disable
82 the inclusion of a timestamp in a PE binary, use the --no-insert-timestamp
85 * Replace support for openrisc and or32 with support for or1k.
87 * Add support for the --build-id command line option to COFF based targets.
89 * x86/x86_64 pe-coff now supports the --build-id option.
91 * Add support for the Andes NDS32.
95 * Add LOG2CEIL() builtin function to the linker script language
97 * Add support for the Texas Instruments MSP430X processor.
99 * Add support for Altera Nios II.
101 * Add support for the V850E3V5 architecture.
103 * Add support for the Imagination Technologies Meta processor.
105 * --enable-new-dtags no longer generates old dtags in addition to new dtags.
107 * Remove linker support for MIPS ECOFF targets.
109 * Add ALIGN_WITH_INPUT to the linker script language to force the alignment of
110 an output section to use the maximum alignment of all its input sections.
114 * Enable compressed debug section feature for x86/x86_64 pe-coff.
116 * Add support for the 64-bit ARM architecture: AArch64.
118 * Added SORT_NONE to the linker script language to disable section sorting.
120 * Add a linker-provided symbol when producing ELF output, '__ehdr_start'
121 to point to the ELF file header (and nearby program headers) in the
122 program's memory image.
124 * Add support for S12X processor.
126 * Add support for the VLE extension to the PowerPC architecture.
128 * Add support for the Freescale XGATE architecture.
130 * Add option -f FILE on AIX (for response file).
132 * Add support for the Renesas RL78 architecture.
134 * Add support for the Adapteva EPIPHANY architecture.
138 * --copy-dt-needed-entries is no longer enabled by default. Instead
139 --no-copy-dt-needed-entries is the default.
141 * INPUT_SECTION_FLAGS has been added to the linker script language
142 to allow selection of input sections by section header section flags.
144 * Add support for the Tilera TILEPro and TILE-Gx architectures.
146 * Added SORT_BY_INIT_PRIORITY to the linker script language to permit
147 sorting sections by numerical value of the GCC init_priority attribute
148 encoded in the section name.
152 * Linker script expression evaluation is somewhat more sane. This may
153 break scripts that depend on quirks of the old expression evaluation.
155 * Turn off underscoring for x86_64 PE+-COFF targets. For old behavior the
156 option --enable-leading-mingw64-underscores can be used on configure of
159 * Add support for the TMS320C6000 (TI C6X) processor family.
161 * --add-needed renamed to --copy-dt-needed-entries in order to avoid confusion
162 with --as-needed option.
164 * Extend .def file syntax by '== <ID>' for imports and exports. This allows
165 to alias the import/export table name written in PE image.
167 * Add --exclude-all-symbols option to PE based linkers. This prevents all
168 symbols from automatically being exported.
170 * Add support for the Renesas RX processor.
172 * Add support for alpha-vms target.
176 * GNU/Linux targets now support the STB_GNU_UNIQUE symbol binding. This is a
177 GNU extension to the standard set of ELF symbol bindings. The binding will
178 be passed on to the dynamic linker which will make sure that in the entire
179 process there is just one symbol with the given name and type in use.
181 * PE targets now support a GNU extension to allow the alignment of common
182 common symbols to be specified. This support uses custom options in
183 the .drectve section, which will be disregarded by the native tools.
185 * PE targets now add primitive support for ELF version scripts; symbols
186 are not versioned, but the local and global symbol visibility directives
187 are respected when filtering symbols in auto-export mode.
189 * New option --no-export-dynamic to undo the effect of the -E and
190 --export-dynamic options.
192 * ELF: --warn-alternate-em option to warn if an object has alternate
195 * New script function REGION_ALIAS to add alias names to memory regions.
197 * PE targets no longer make use of the long section names PE extension to
198 the COFF format when generating executable images, by default. The old
199 (slightly non-conformant) behaviour can still be invoked by using the
200 new '--enable-long-section-names' command-line option. It is also enabled
201 automatically in the presence of un-stripped debug information, as GDB
202 needs to be able to find the debug info sections by their full names.
204 * For GNU/Linux systems the linker will now avoid processing any relocations
205 made against symbols of the STT_GNU_IFUNC type and instead emit them into
206 the resulting binary for processing by the loader.
208 * --as-needed now links in a dynamic library if it satisfies undefined
209 symbols in regular objects, or in other dynamic libraries. In the
210 latter case the library is not linked if it is found in a DT_NEEDED
211 entry of one of the libraries already linked.
213 * Add a new command line option, -Ttext-segment ADDR, for ELF targets
214 to set the address of the first byte of the text segment.
216 * Add support for Sunplus score architecture.
218 * Add new option --use-nul-prefixed-import-tables to ld for PE targets to
219 allow fallback to old import table generation with null element prefix.
221 * Windows PE systems now support a new --exclude-modules-for-implib option,
222 allowing users to partition object files and archive members between a DLL
223 and its associated import library as they are generated during linking.
225 * Add support for Lattice Mico32 (lm32) architecture.
227 * Add CR16 ELF --embedded-relocs (used to embedded relocations into binaries
228 for Embedded-PIC code) option.
230 * Add to the PE/PE+ targets the support of two different kinds of
231 pseudo-relocations. They can be selected by the switches
232 --enable-runtime-pseudo-reloc-v1 and --enable-runtime-pseudo-reloc-v2.
233 For the switch --enable-runtime-pseudo-reloc it uses for 32-bit
234 runtime pseudo relocation version one, for 64-bit the version two.
238 * Linker scripts support a new INSERT command that makes it easier to
239 augment the default script.
241 * Linker script input section filespecs may now specify a file within an
242 archive by writing "archive:file".
244 * The --sort-common switch now has an optional argument which specifies the
245 direction of sorting.
247 * The M68K linker now supports multiple GOT generation schemes controlled via
248 the --got=<type> command line option.
250 * The ARM EABI linker will now generate stubs for function calls to symbols
251 that are too far away. The placement of the stubs is controlled by a new
252 linker command line option: --stub-group-size=N.
256 * Linker sources now released under version 3 of the GNU General Public
259 * ELF: New --build-id option to generate a unique per-binary identifier
260 embedded in a note section.
262 * Added support for National Semicondutor CompactRISC (ie CR16) target.
264 * -l:foo now searches the library path for a filename called foo,
265 without converting it to libfoo.a or libfoo.so.
267 * Add a new command line option '--default-script=FILE' or '-dT FILE'
268 which specifies a replacement for the built in, default linker
271 * ELF: Add -Bsymbolic-functions, --dynamic-list-cpp-new, which puts C++
272 operator new and delete on the dynamic list, and --dynamic-list-data,
273 builtin list for --dynamic-list, which puts global data symbols on the
276 * Add support for x86_64 PE+ target.
278 * Add support for Score target.
280 * ELF: Add --dynamic-list option to specify a list of global symbols
281 whose references shouldn't be bound to the definition within the
282 shared library, or a list of symbols which should be added to the
283 symbol table in the executable.
285 * The default output section LMA has changed for allocatable sections from
286 being equal to VMA, to keeping the difference between LMA and VMA the same as
287 the previous output section in the same region. This is a more useful
288 default when using overlays and other cases where you specify an LMA
289 differing from the VMA for some sections.
291 * New switch: --print-gc-sections to list any sections removed by garabge
294 * ARM: Added --vfp11-denorm-fix option to work around an erratum in current
299 * Support for the Infineon XC16X has been added by KPIT Cummins Infosystems.
301 * Modify the Linux linker search order to better match ld.so search order.
302 Look for DT_NEEDED libraries in paths specified by ld.so.conf before
303 searching the default directories, rather than vice versa.
304 Use $prefix/etc/ld.so.conf if it exists, otherwise /etc/ld.so.conf.
306 * PE-COFF: Forward exports from DLL's can now be specified in .def files
307 passed directly to ld.
309 * Support for the Z80 processor family has been added.
311 * Add support for the "@<file>" syntax to the command line, so that extra
312 switches can be read from <file>.
316 * Support for the R_ARM_V4BX relocation as defined in the ARM AAELF
317 specification has been added via the --fix-v4bx command-line option.
319 * New linker script construct AS_NEEDED(), which sets the --as-needed flag
320 for input files listed inside of it.
322 * A new command-line option, --sysroot, can be used to override the
323 default sysroot location. It only applies to toolchains that were
324 configured using --with-sysroot.
326 * New linker script functions: ORIGIN() and LENGTH() which return information
327 about a specified memory region.
329 * Port to MAXQ processor contributed by HCL Tech.
331 * Added SEGMENT_START to the linker script language to permit the user to
332 override the base address for a segment from the command-line.
334 * ELF: --warn-shared-textrel option to warn if adding a DT_TEXTREL to a shared
337 * Added SORT_BY_NAME and SORT_BY_ALIGNMENT to the linker script
338 language to permit sorting sections by section name or section
341 * Added a new linker command line switch, --sort-section name|alignment,
342 to sort sections by section name or maximum alignment.
344 * ELF: --add-needed/--no-add-needed options to control if a DT_NEEDED tag
345 should be added when a shared library comes from DT_NEEDED tags.
347 * Support for the crx-elf target added.
349 * Support for the sh-symbianelf target added.
351 * A new linker command line switch has been added which allows the hash table
352 size to be set to a suitable prime value near to its argument. This switch
353 is --hash-size=<NUMBER>. Also if the switch --reduce-memory-overheads is
354 used, and --hash-size has not been used, then the default value will be set
357 * Linker map files are now generated with an O(N) algorithm for finding symbols
358 that are defined in each section. This uses about 40% more memory for
359 symbols than the old O(N^2) algorithm. You can use the new
360 --reduce-memory-overheads option to select the old algorithm; this option
361 might also be used in the future to select similar tradeoffs.
365 * ELF: --as-needed/--no-as-needed options to control if a DT_NEEDED tag should
366 be added only when a shared library is referenced.
368 * PE: --large-address-aware option to indicate executables support virtual
369 addresses greater than 2 gigabytes.
371 * DWARF 2 support for i386pe added.
373 * The linker script operator DEFINED() will now yield 1 only for a symbol that
374 is defined before the statement where DEFINED is used.
376 * The MIPS --embedded-relocs (used to embed relocations into binaries for
377 Embedded-PIC code) is deprecated and will be removed in a future release.
379 * cr16c support added by NSC.
381 * m32r Linux (ELF) support added by Renesas.
383 * Improved linker's handling of unresolved symbols. The switch
384 --unresolved-symbols=<method> has been added to tell the linker when it
385 should report them and the switch --warn-unresolved-symbols has been added to
386 make reports be issued as warning messages rather than errors.
390 * Added support for Xtensa architecture.
392 * Added --with-sysroot configure switch to specify a target system root, for
393 linking against a target filesystem image.
395 * Added --accept-unknown-linker-format to restore old linker behaviour (pre
396 2.14) of silently accepting and linking in any files in an unknown binary
399 * Added --no-omagic to undo the effects of the -N option.
401 * Support for Texas Instruments TMS320C4x and TMS320C3x series of
402 DSP's contributed by Michael Hayes and Svein E. Seldal.
404 * Added --with-lib-path configure switch to specify default value for
407 * ARM port to QNX operating system added by Graeme Peterson.
409 * IP2K support added by Denis Chertykov.
413 * Support for the Fujitsu FRV architecture added by Red Hat. Models for FR400
416 Changes in version 2.13:
418 * DEC VAX ELF support, by Matt Thomas.
420 Changes in version 2.12:
422 * Support for Don Knuth's MMIX, by Hans-Peter Nilsson.
424 * Support for the OpenRISC 32-bit embedded processor by OpenCores.
426 * Support for -z nocopyreloc in the x86 ELF linker, which disables
427 production of copy relocs. Warning: using this option may result in
428 non-sharable applications.
430 * Support for -z combreloc in the ELF linker, which puts dynamic
431 relocations against the same symbol together, so that dynamic linker
432 can use an one-entry symbol lookup cache.
434 * Support for ELF SHF_MERGE section merging, by Jakub Jelinek.
436 Changes in version 2.11:
438 * Support for AMD x86-64 architecture, by Jan Hubicka, SuSE Labs.
440 * Support added for eliminating duplicate DWARF2 debug information by
441 having the compiler generate the information in sections called
442 .gnu.linkonce.wi.XXXX where XXXX is a checksum for the contents. The
443 linker then merges these sections together into the normal .debug_info
446 * The native ELF linker now searches the directories in DT_RUNPATH or
447 DT_RPATH of a shared library for shared libraries needed by it.
449 * TI C54x support, by Timothy Wall.
451 * Added command line switch --section-start to set the start address of any
454 * Added ability to emit full relocation information in linked executables,
455 enabled by --emit-relocs. Some post-linkage optimization tools need
456 this information in order to be able to correctly identify and perform
457 symbol relative addressing in the event of changes in section contents
458 (instructions being added or deleted, extending data sections, etc.)
460 * Support for i860, by Jason Eckhardt (preliminary, alpha quality).
462 * Support for CRIS (Axis Communications ETRAX series).
464 * Support for PDP-11 and 2.11BSD a.out format, by Lars Brinkhoff.
466 Changes in version 2.10:
468 * Added AT> to the linker script language to allow load-time allocation of
469 sections into regions.
471 * Added garbage collection of unused sections, enabled by --gc-sections.
472 It does require a bit of backend support; currently implemented are
473 arm-elf, avr-elf, d10v-elf, fr30-elf, i386-elf, m32r-elf, m68k-elf,
474 mcore-elf, mips-elf, mn10300-elf, ppc-elf, sh-elf, sparc-elf, and v850-elf.
475 Others will ignore the option.
477 * Added SORT to the linker script language to permit sorting sections by file
478 name or section name.
480 * Added EXTERN to the linker script language as an equivalent to the -u
483 * Added ASSERT to the linker script language.
485 * Added EXCLUDE_FILE to the linker script language for further control over
488 * Added -O option to optimize linker output (as of this writing, this only
489 affects ELF shared library generation).
491 * The -e option now accepts a number as well as a symbol name.
493 * Added --no-undefined option to disallow undefined symbols when creating a
496 * The linker now issues a warning, not an error, for an undefined symbol when
497 using -Bsymbolic; use the new --no-undefined option to get the old
500 * Added --demangle and --no-demangle options.
502 Changes in version 2.9:
504 * Added SQUAD to the linker script language.
506 * New option --no-warn-mismatch.
508 * The MEMORY command now parses the attributes to determine where sections that
509 are not placed in a specific memory region are placed.
511 Changes in version 2.8:
513 * Linker scripts may now contain shell wildcard characters for file and section
516 * The linker now supports symbol versions in ELF.
518 * The NOCROSSREFS command was added to the linker script language.
520 * The LOADADDR expression was added to the linker script language.
522 * MAX and MIN functions were added to the linker script language.
524 * The OVERLAY construct was added to the linker script language.
526 * New option --warn-section-align to warn when the address of an output section
527 changes due to alignment of an input section.
529 * New options --filter/-F and --auxiliary/-f.
531 Changes in version 2.7:
533 * New option --cref to print out a cross reference table.
535 * New option --wrap SYMBOL.
537 * New option --no-whole-archive, to turn off the effect of --whole-archive.
539 * Input sections assigned to the output section /DISCARD/ in the linker script
540 are not included in the output file.
542 * The SunOS and ELF linkers now merge stabs debugging information which uses
543 the N_BINCL and N_EINCL stab types. This reduces the amount of debugging
544 information generated.
546 Changes in version 2.6:
548 * When an ELF section name is representable as a C identifier (this is not true
549 of most ELF section names), the linker will automatically define symbols
550 __start_SECNAME and __stop_SECNAME, where SECNAME is the section name, at the
551 beginning and the end of the section. This is used by glibc.
553 Addendum: Current versions of the linker (at least for version 2.18 onwards
554 and possibly much earlier as well) place two restrictions on this feature: The
555 symbols are only implemented for orphaned sections, not for explicitly placed
556 sections and they are PROVIDEd rather than being defined.
558 * When an ELF section named .gnu.warning is encountered in an input file, the
559 contents of the section are displayed as an error message, and the section is
560 not copied into the output file. This is used by glibc.
562 * When an ELF section named .gnu.warning.SYMBOL is encountered in an input
563 file, and the symbol SYMBOL is referenced by some object file, the contents of
564 the section are displayed as an error message. The section is not copied into
565 the output file, unless doing a relocatable or shared link. This is used by
568 * New options -split-by-reloc and -split-by-file.
570 * The linker now supports linking PIC compiled code on SPARC SunOS. It can
571 also create SPARC SunOS shared libraries, and, like the native SunOS linker,
572 will do so whenever there is an undefined symbol in the link and neither the -e
573 nor the -r option was used.
575 * The -rpath option may be used on SunOS to set the list of directories to be
576 searched at run time. This overrides the default of building the list from the
579 * The COFF linker now combines debugging information for structs, unions, and
580 enums, so that even if the same type is defined in multiple input files it will
581 only be defined once in the output file. The --traditional-format switch will
582 prevent this optimization.
584 Changes in version 2.5:
586 * The linker now supports linking against SunOS shared libraries. It still can
587 not link SunOS PIC (Position Independent Code) files, so it can not be used to
588 generate shared libraries.
590 * The linker now supports linking against ELF shared libraries for the i386
591 (UnixWare) and SPARC (Solaris). It can also link ELF PIC files, and can be
592 used to generate shared libraries. Shared library generation is not well
593 tested; please report any problems encountered. The linker is now enabled for
596 * Eric Youngdale has contributed Linux support code, including linking against
597 Linux a.out shared libraries. The linker produces Linux QMAGIC binaries.
599 * The ELF backend has been converted to the new linker code. To use the new
600 ELF linker, each particular target requires a relocation function. So far,
601 this function has been written for i386 (UnixWare), SPARC (Solaris) MIPS (Irix
602 5), and HPPA ELF targets.
604 * The -( (--start-group) and -) (--end-group) options have been added to
605 support searching a group of archives as though they were a single archive.
606 This can also be used in a linker script, as GROUP ( files ).
608 * When a file is named on the command line, and the linker does not recognize
609 it as an object file, the linker will now treat the file as a linker script
610 file. A linker script named in this way augments, but does not replace, the
611 default linker script.
613 * The -warn-once option was added. It causes the linker to only warn once per
614 undefined symbol, rather than once per reference.
616 * The COFF backend has been converted to the new linker code. As with ELF, to
617 use the new linker, each particular target requires a relocation function. So
618 far, this function has been written for the i386, m68k, a29k and SH targets.
620 * The -V flag was made a synonym for -v, for SVR4 compatibility. The old -V
621 behaviour is available via --verbose.
623 Changes in version 2.4:
625 * New linker code, by Steve Chamberlain and Ian Taylor. For a.out and ecoff
626 formats (so far), this should result in considerable savings in time
627 and memory used while linking; slightly poorer performance than
628 before for formats not converted yet.
630 * Command-line parsing is no longer done with flex. This means
631 oddball characters in filenames won't get treated as argument
634 * HP-PA ELF support, by Jeff Law. (No SOM support yet.)
636 * Mach i386 support, by David Mackenzie.
638 * Irix 4 shared libraries are now supported (Irix 5 uses ELF, and ELF shared
639 libraries are not yet supported).
641 * COFF shared libraries (as on SCO) should work as well.
643 * The linker is disabled for Solaris. (Actually, it was in 2.3 also, I just
644 forgot to note it.) Some of their C library routines don't work when
645 statically linked, and the GNU linker doesn't support dynamic linking yet.
647 Changes in version 2.3:
649 * Weak symbols are now supported.
651 * ELF support has been added. The linker has been bootstrapped on
652 UnixWare and Solaris.
654 * Alpha OSF/1 support has been added (non dynamic linking only).
656 Changes in version 2.2:
658 * The `bfd' library has been updated to reduce a.out-format string
659 table size. The effect of this is that files linked from many input
660 files with duplicate symbols (`-g' debugging records, or identical
661 static symbols) should be much smaller.
663 Changes in version 2.1:
665 * The ld -ySYMBOL flag (to trace references to SYMBOL) is now implemented.
667 * There is now support for writing ECOFF files, so ld and the
668 other utilities should work on Risc/Ultrix and Irix.
671 Copyright (C) 2012-2017 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
673 Copying and distribution of this file, with or without modification,
674 are permitted in any medium without royalty provided the copyright
675 notice and this notice are preserved.