Re: Link time affected by debug info?

[Ravi Ramaseshan <ramaseshan dot ravi at gmail dot com>]

Hi,

On 11/16/05, Alan Modra <amodra@bigpond.net.au> wrote:
> On Wed, Nov 16, 2005 at 06:03:11PM -0500, Pierre Sarrazin wrote:
> > Hi.  I work on a large C++ application that takes a lot more time
> > to link when I compile the sources with debugging information (-g
> > switch of g++ 3.4.2).  (The linking is static and produces an 20
> > meg executable file.)
> >
> > Why does the presence of debugging information slow the linking
> > process so much?  It would seem like all the linker has to do
> > is to copy the debug info to the executable without caring about
> > its contents.  The complexity of the linking task does not seem
> > to depend on that info.  I'm trying to determine if the problem is
> > with the linker or with gcc.  Thanks.
>
> The linker optimises the debug info.  You may find that the current cvs
> linker is much faster than whatever you are currently using.

Shouldn't one expect that since there would be lots of relocations to
be handled by the linker in the debugging sections ? Maybe the newer
linker may be faster than whatever you were using, but I would still
expect the linker to be slower when compiling your application with
debugging information.

Please correct me if I am wrong here.

Regards,
--
Ravi Ramaseshan
http://www.geocities.com/ramaseshan_ravi/

" Reality is only something we believe in strongly. "