2016-06-10 12:06, Ferruh Yigit:

On 6/10/2016 11:18 AM, Thomas Monjalon wrote:

quoted

2016-06-10 10:57, Ferruh Yigit:

quoted

On 6/10/2016 10:03 AM, Thomas Monjalon wrote:

quoted

2016-05-27 17:48, Ferruh Yigit:

quoted

--whole-archive argument only required for pmd libraries, and currently
it covers more libraries. Reducing scope of the argument to pmd
libraries slightly reduce final application size.

In my understanding, --whole-archive is required for static libraries used
by plugins:
	http://dpdk.org/commit/20afd76a

Right, required for static libraries. But more than used by plugins,
required for plugin to work.

quoted

If we want to restrict it, I would say it must be around EAL, ring,
mbuf, mempool, ethdev, cryptodev, etc.

We should restrict to plugins. What happens is, since there is no direct
call to PMDs from application, PMD code is not included into final
application. To force PMDs to be included into final binary,
--whole-archive is required.

But --whole-archive is not required for other libraries, and just cause
unnecessary increase in binary size.

Yes it is necessary for other libraries, otherwise some symbols needed by
plugins won't be available.
Example:
In function `rte_pmd_af_packet_devuninit':
rte_eth_af_packet.c:(.text+0x8bf): undefined reference to `rte_eth_dev_allocated'
rte_eth_af_packet.c:(.text+0x930): undefined reference to `rte_eth_dev_release_port'

If there is a direct call to that API, linker should include required
object file into final binary, --whole-archive shouldn't be required for
this.

What is special for PMD's is there are not directly called, but
initialized using constructors.

How are you getting above compilation error?

The error was generated with your patch on top of others I'm going to send.
I suggest to continue the discussion/review based on the v2 coming soon.