ranlib and ``ucb''

[guy at sun.UUCP]

> This is a real win if you copy library archives around,
> since Berkeley "ld" thinks your new archives are out-of-date
> if you don't run "ranlib" on the newly-created libraries,
> whereas the correct information is embedded in the library
> and follows it around under the System V scheme.

Well, more precisely, the correct information is embedded in the library
and follows it around under both schemes.  However, in the V7 scheme, when
you *modify* the library, you have to regenerate the table of contents,
while in the S5 scheme, the archiver does it for you.  As such, the V7
linker must check to make sure that the modification time of the library
isn't more recent than the modification time of the symbol table;
unfortunately, this breaks things when you copy libraries.  The S5 linker
doesn't need to make this check, and doesn't.
-- 
	Guy Harris
	{ihnp4, decvax, seismo, decwrl, ...}!sun!guy
	guy at sun.com (or guy at sun.arpa)