From Surf Wiki (app.surf) — the open knowledge base

GNU Libtool

Shared library creation tool from GNU

Summary

Shared library creation tool from GNU

Field	Value
name	GNU Libtool
logo	[[File:Libtool.jpg	frameless]]
developer	GNU Project
released
operating_system	Cross-platform
genre	Library
license	GPLv2
website

GNU Libtool is a software development tool, part of the GNU build system, consisting of a shell script created to address the software portability problem when compiling shared libraries from source code. It hides the differences between computing platforms for the commands which compile shared libraries. It provides a command-line interface that is identical across platforms and it executes the platform's native commands, allowing software authors to offer build support for their code across many diverse platforms such as Linux, BSD variants, Windows (via Cygwin), HP-UX, Solaris (including on SPARC processors), AIX, and IRIX.

Rationale

Different operating systems handle shared libraries differently. Some platforms do not use shared libraries at all. It can be difficult to make a software program portable: the C compiler differs from system to system; certain library functions are missing on some systems; header files may have different names.

Libtool helps manage the creation of static and dynamic libraries on various Unix-like operating systems. Libtool accomplishes this by abstracting the library-creation process, hiding differences between various systems (e.g. Linux systems vs. Solaris).

GNU Libtool is designed to simplify the process of compiling a computer program on a new system, by "encapsulating both the platform-specific dependencies, and the user interface, in a single script". When porting a program to a new system, Libtool is designed so the porter need not read low-level documentation for the shared libraries to be built, rather just run a configure script (or equivalent).

Use

Libtool is used by Autoconf and Automake, two other portability tools in the GNU build system. It can also be used directly.

Clones and derivatives

Since GNU Libtool was released, other free software projects have created drop-in replacements under different software licenses. slibtool is one such implementation.

References

"GNU".
. (2015-02-15). ["The GNU Libtool manual"](https://www.gnu.org/software/libtool/manual/libtool.html#Postmortem). *The GNU project*.
. (2015-02-15). ["The GNU Libtool manual"](https://www.gnu.org/software/libtool/manual/libtool.html#Introduction). *The GNU project*.
. (2015-02-15). ["The GNU Libtool manual"](https://www.gnu.org/software/libtool/manual/libtool.html#Tested-platforms). *The GNU project*.
[https://www.gnu.org/software/libtool/manual/libtool.html Libtool Manual]
. (2015-02-15). ["The GNU Libtool manual"](https://www.gnu.org/software/libtool/manual/libtool.html#Makefile-rules). *The GNU project*.
[http://BXR.SU/OpenBSD/usr.bin/libtool/ BSD-licensed libtool].
"Slibtool - Gentoo wiki".

Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

compiling-tools gnu-project-software free-computer-libraries cross-platform-software

Want to explore this topic further?

Ask Mako anything about GNU Libtool — get instant answers, deeper analysis, and related topics.

Research with Mako

Free with your Surf account

Content sourced from Wikipedia, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

This content may have been generated or modified by AI. CloudSurf Software LLC is not responsible for the accuracy, completeness, or reliability of AI-generated content. Always verify important information from primary sources.

Report