[Bug ld/12565] NOLOAD sections empty

[amodra at gmail dot com]

http://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=12565

--- Comment #14 from Alan Modra <amodra at gmail dot com> 2011-07-01 00:03:38 
UTC ---
On Thu, Jun 30, 2011 at 03:37:43PM +0100, Nick Clifton wrote:
> Hi H.J., Hi Alan,
> 
> I have been looking at PR 12565, and I have to say that I do not
> understand the linker's behaviour for NOLOAD sections on ELF based
> targets.  What is the point of having a section that cannot be
> loaded and that does not have any contents ?
> 
> Also, as far as I can see, this behaviour is not documented
> anywhere. Do you know of any applications that rely upon this
> feature ?

I spent quite a lot of time wrestling with NOLOAD before
http://sourceware.org/ml/binutils/2010-09/msg00245.html.  I believe we
have fairly strong historical precedent for the current behaviour on
ELF, ie. that NOLOAD makes a .bss style section, noload, alloc, no
contents.  As others have replied, people make use of it this way.
See also http://sourceware.org/ml/binutils/2010-10/msg00433.html

-- 
Configure bugmail: http://sourceware.org/bugzilla/userprefs.cgi?tab=email
------- You are receiving this mail because: -------
You are on the CC list for the bug.