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RE: What is the best manual for understanding the basics of `nm`?
- From: Andrew Bennett <Andrew dot Bennett at imgtec dot com>
- To: Peng Yu <pengyu dot ut at gmail dot com>, "binutils at sourceware dot org" <binutils at sourceware dot org>
- Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2014 10:51:53 +0000
- Subject: RE: What is the best manual for understanding the basics of `nm`?
- Authentication-results: sourceware.org; auth=none
- References: <CABrM6wmJVY21ogrYq7ZsTp8HSR5Hp4NryMrNqMA0C9RWVSJRzg at mail dot gmail dot com>
> I am trying to understand `nm`. But it mentions quite some technical
> terms (e.g., "initialized data section", ELF, "text (code) section").
> Is there a manual that describes all the background knowledge
> necessary for understanding `nm` and other binutils tools? Thanks.
I donât know your background on linkers, but I would recommend firstly
looking at a book that describes the ELF format, and how a linker works
in general.
I have found that Linkers and Loaders by John R. Levine to be very useful:
(http://www.amazon.com/Linkers-Kaufmann-Software-Engineering-Programming/dp/1558604960/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1418899197&sr=8-1&keywords=linkers+and+loaders&pebp=1418899203520)
Then I would consult the binutils documentation at:
https://sourceware.org/binutils/docs-2.24/
Finally (if you want a complete technical overview) there is documentation
that describes the internals of gas/ld/bfd etc in the sources, but this is
quite detailed.
I hope this helps.
Regards,
Andrew