Starling <wassdamo@xxxxxxxxxxx> writes: > On the subject of incremental linking I did find something saying you > can go > ld -r -o piece1.o A.o B.o C.o ... > ld -r -o piece2.o D.o E.o F.o ... > ld -o all main.o piece1.o piece2.o > And that way you don't have to relink D, E, and F when A, B or C > changes. However, wouldn't that generate a large object file > (pieceN.o)? How is linking piece1.o and piece2.o more efficient than > linking all of the lesser object files at once? Is it more efficient, > or does the linker have to piece together the files just as if they > were separate? It's a little bit more efficient, because the linker doesn't have to open as many files, and because it can read the information in bigger chunks--that is, all the relocation information will be gathered together in pieceN.o and can be processed at once rather than being processed in several different parts. That may sound completely trivial, but that kind of thing is what the linker spends a lot of time doing. But it's not a lot more efficient. Ian
