DWARF DW_AT_external

[P J P]

  Hi,

As I understand, the DWARF tag DW_AT_external is meant to indicate whether a variable/function is accessible from outside the compilation unit(object file) containing the given DWARF DIE - Debugging Information Entry.

But it looks like DW_AT_external is also set for variables/functions defined in a different object file, but has a DIE because of linking.

See: http://pastebin.com/vFiBWuhh

It has a small C++ program - greeting.cpp, with it's output and some DWARF information.

As can be seen, the external flag is set for the standard library functions such as - swscanf, ungetwd, or vfwprintf - which are not defined or used in greeting.cpp, but are part of the object file because of linking.

This makes it *difficult* to locate the DIEs describing the functions that are defined and used in greeting.cpp.

Thank you.
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Regards
    -Prasad
PS: Please don't send me html/attachment/Fwd mails