On Sun, May 30, 2010 at 10:47 AM, Marilyn Sander < marilyn-san...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> > [...] My reasoning was that the thing being > loaded is a shared object (.so file). The system loader (ld) has to be > invoked for loading > a shared object. That seems to me to require a separate process, with an > environment > stack inherited from the Perl process that invokes it. There's a problem here. What you describe is not what happens. The system loader, ld, is used to create executables and shared objects. It indeed is a separate program that is most often invoked automatically by a compiler - GCC for example. There is a wholly separate module, often with a name such as ld.so.1, which is the dynamic library loader. It is actually a part of the program you are running - Perl in the current context. It is responsible for loading other shared libraries into the current process. Dynamically loading a shared library adds the code to the current process; it does not invoke a separate program/process. -- Jonathan Leffler <jonathan.leff...@gmail.com> #include <disclaimer.h> Guardian of DBD::Informix - v2008.0513 - http://dbi.perl.org "Blessed are we who can laugh at ourselves, for we shall never cease to be amused."
