Re: Should .a library contains non-reallocatable code?

[Jeff Epler <jepler@unpythonic.net>]

Here are two scenarios where building a static library (libfoo) with
-fPIC is desirable:

 * libbar has a stable API, so it should be shipped as a .so,
   but if it links libfoo.a, and libfoo.a is not -fPIC, then
   libbar has to be shipped as a a static library too

 * foomodule is a Python wrapper for libfoo, so it must be shipped
   as a .so, but if it links libfoo.a, and libfoo.a is not -fPIC,
   it is not possible to build foomodule at all

   (The same goes for wrapping the library for most other interpreted
   languages)

   (At $DAY_JOB this bit me in the last week [not pertaining to
   Debian-packaged software] so it's a sore spot at the moment)

Unless the circumstances of libfoo make these scenarios unlikely, it
seems like it is better for other packages to prefer -fPIC even when
building a static library.

I wonder whether these scenarios were considered when the Policy was
written.

Jeff