Adriaan van Os wrote:

Frank Heckenbach wrote:

...

Relying on the default linker names was never reliable.

OK, but how to solve the following problem, without relying on linker names:

• create a Mac OS X dynamic library (dylib)
• for that purpose, use a GPC unit "MyDylib"
• pass -init _MyDylibInit to ld so that MyDylibInit is called when the

dynamic library is loaded

• declare a procedure MyDylibInit with attribute( name = 'MyDylibInit')

So far no problem, but MyDylibInit ...

• first calls GPCRuntimeInitialize (or GPC_Initialize if you like)

declared with external name '_p_initialize' (relying on a linker name that may change)

Yes, three fixed names, including this one as well as _p_finalize (RTS cleanup) and _p__M0_init (Pascal main program -- not in units, of course), are indeed special. They're "documented" in gpc-in-c.h though this is aimed at C interfaces, not really useful for you. So indeed, I suppose I should add those declarations in gpc.pas, so they can be properly called from Pascal:

{ Initialize the GPC Run Time System. This is normally called automatically. Call it manually only in very special situations. ArgumentCount, Arguments are argc and argv in C; StartEnvironment is the environment variable pointer, and can be nil if other ways to obtain the environment are available. Options can be 0 or a combination of ro_* flags as defined in rts/constants.def. } procedure GPC_Initialize (ArgumentCount: CInteger; Arguments, StartEnvironment: PCStrings; Options: CInteger); attribute (name = '_p_initialize'); external;

{ Finalize the GPC Run Time System. This is normally called automatically. Call it manually only in very special situations. } procedure GPC_Finalize; attribute (name = '_p_finalize'); external;

BTW, those linker names might have to change again. There was recently, in March, a thread about a name conflict of _p_initialize with plotutils. Though it turned out that actually plotutils should change the name, and GPC reserving a `_p_' prefix seems reasonable, if there's still desire by some to change the names, we should now agree on a set of new names and change them once and finally.

• then calls MyDylibUnitInit, the compiler glue that initializes the

MyDylib unit. The external name used to be init_Mydylib but has recently changed to _p__M7_Mydylib_init (relying on a linker name again).

unit MyDylib; attribute (name = 'MyDylib');

procedure MyDylibUnitInit; external name 'MyDylib_init';

This part was recently changed, together with the introduction of QI. Now only the ending part (_init) is "magic", but I hope it won't change again (cf. rts/init.pas which has the same issue).

Frank