Static executables

[Andrzej Bialecki]

Andrew Haley wrote:
> Andrzej Bialecki writes:
>  > Tom Tromey wrote:
>  > >>>>>> "Andrzej" == Andrzej Bialecki <ab@getopt.org> writes:
>  > >>>>>>             
>  > >
>  > > Andrzej> The question is: is it possible to build static binaries on Linux/BSD,
>  > > Andrzej> and if yes, what is the right incantation to do this, for input files
>  > > Andrzej> consisting of a mix of *.java, *.jar, and JNI *.o objects? Eg. if I'm
>  > > Andrzej> using Fedora Core 4, which sports gcc 4.0.2, whenever I try to pass
>  > > Andrzej> the -static flag, the compiler complains that static compilation is
>  > > Andrzej> not supported.
>  > >
>  > > Funny, I didn't realize that this error was in there.
>  > > I don't remember this decision.
>  > >
>  > > Andrzej> * it's not supported, because it's broken in some well-defined cases
>  > >
>  > > Any code that uses reflection will not work properly.  This is a
>  > > problem because parts of the core class library depend on reflection.
>  > > For instance, character set translators and locales are loaded this
>  > > way.
>  > 
>  > Ugh, that's pretty serious ... Ok, then this means that it's not 
>  > possible to redistribute binaries to machines where there is no runtime 
>  > installation. :-( Or at least not as a single file.
>
> I don't get it.
>
> Why is that an issue?  Surely you can wrap your application and
> whatever libraries it requires in a package and distribute that.
>   

That's precisely what I want to avoid. No installation, no myriads of 
dependencies - as long as the kernel is compatible it will work.

-- 
Best regards,
Andrzej Bialecki     <><
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