DTrace issues?

[George Neville-Neil]

On 17 Apr 2017, at 16:28, Sevan / Venture37 wrote:

> On 17 April 2017 at 20:54, Ryan Stone <rysto32 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Sat, Apr 15, 2017 at 10:50 AM, George Neville-Neil 
>> <gnn at neville-neil.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> Can you explain this grief?  What is the problem?
>>>
>>> Best,
>>> George
>>>
>>
>> dtrace -G requires the ability to modify the object files in-place 
>> before
>> linking.  This causes havoc if the objects are in .a archives (dtrace 
>> can't
>> read those) or if the objects need to be linked into multiple 
>> binaries.  It
>> also destroys the ability to do an incremental build, as dtrace -G 
>> can't be
>> run on the same object twice.
>>
>> The whole process is really a hack.  The build actions done by dtrace
>> should be done by the compiler and linker instead.  Getting the 
>> linker to
>> support the process would go a long way, as then dtrace -G could be 
>> run on
>> individual objects and most of my complaints go away.
>
> Not to detract from the issue with the -G flag, I just wanted to
> highlight that it's used for ELF binaries, until Apple switches away
> from Mach-o, this wont be an issue there (dtrace on OS X does not
> feature the -G flag).
>
>

Well at least I now "get" the issue.  Thanks.

Best,
George