The goal: calls from inside libc to other libc functions should * not be overridable (except for the malloc family), and * not have pointless inefficiencies. To achieve this, we arrange that all these internal call be via identifiers that are of hidden visibility and--to avoid confusion and work correctly in static executables--are in the reserved namespace. This document describes the details of the naming scheme and how it is implemented. I've chosen a prefix of underbar-libc-underbar ("_libc_") for this. These are not declared directly; instead, the gcc "asm labels" extension is used to rename the function. We need many of the symbols to be weak in *static* builds, but they can be strong in the dynamic library, as there's a natural precedence from the search order there. When the descriptions below say a name is "weak", that is only necessary for the static library and not for the shared library. Note: use defined(PIC) to recognize when compiling the shared objects: some archs define __PIC__ *all* the time. --------- For syscalls which are not cancellation points, such as getpid(), the identifiers are just: _libc_getpid hidden alias, for use internal to libc only _thread_sys_getpid global name, for use outside libc only getpid weak alias, for use outside libc only For syscalls which are cancellation points, such as wait4(), there are identifiers that do not provide cancellation: _libc_wait4 hidden alias, for use internal to libc only _thread_sys_wait4 global name, for use outside libc only ...and identifiers that do provide cancellation: wait4 weak alias, for general use _libc_wait4_cancel hidden name, for use internal to libc only Inside libc, the bare name ("wait4") binds to the version *with* cancellation. If it's necessary to use the syscall without doing cancellation it can be obtained by calling HIDDEN(x) instead of just x. Some other calls need to be wrapped for reasons other than cancellation, such as to provide functionality beyond the underlying syscall (e.g., ptrace). For these, there are identifiers for the raw call, without the wrapping: _libc_ptrace hidden alias, for use internal to libc only _thread_sys_ptrace global name, for use outside libc only ...and identifiers that do provide the libc wrapping: ptrace weak alias, for general use _libc_ptrace_wrap hidden name, for use internal to libc only Inside libc, the bare name ("ptrace") binds to the wrapper; if the raw version is necessary it can be obtained by calling HIDDEN(x) instead of just x. For syscalls implemented in ASM, the aliases of the raw syscall stub are provided by the ASM macros. Of the macros used by sys/Makefile.inc: RSYSCALL(), PSEUDO(), and PSEUDO_NOERROR() generate all three names (ala getpid() above), while RSYSCALL_HIDDEN() generates just the _thread_sys_x and _libc_x names. By using gcc's "asm label" extension, we can usually avoid having to type those prefixes in the .h and .c files. However, for those cases where a non-default binding is necessary we can use these macros to get the desired identifier: CANCEL(x) This expands to the internal, hidden name of a cancellation wrapper: _libc_x_cancel. ex: CANCEL(fsync)(fd) WRAP(x) This expands to the internal, hidden name of a non-cancellation wrapper: _libc_x_wrap. ex: WRAP(sigprocmask)(set) In order to actually set up the desired asm labels, we use these in the internal .h files: PROTO_NORMAL(x) Symbols used both internally and externally This makes gcc convert use of x to use _libc_x instead ex: PROTO_NORMAL(getpid) PROTO_STD_DEPRECATED(x) Standard C symbols that we don't want to use This just marks the symbol as deprecated, with no renaming. ex: PROTO_STD_DEPRECATED(strcpy) PROTO_DEPRECATED(x) Symbols not in ISO C that we don't want to use This marks the symbol as both weak and deprecated, with no renaming ex: PROTO_DEPRECATED(creat) PROTO_CANCEL(x) Functions that have cancellation wrappers Like PROTO_NORMAL(x), but also declares _libc_x_cancel ex: PROTO_CANCEL(wait4) PROTO_WRAP(x) Functions that have wrappers for other reasons Like PROTO_NORMAL(x), but also declares _libc_x_wrap. Internal calls that want the wrapper's processing should invoke WRAP(x)(...) ex: PROTO_WRAP(sigaction) Finally, to create the expected aliases, we use these in the .c files where the definitions are: DEF_STRONG(x) Symbols reserved to or specified by ISO C This defines x as a strong alias for _libc_x; this must only be used for symbols that are reserved by the C standard (or reserved in the external identifier namespace). Matches with PROTO_NORMAL() ex: DEF_STRONG(fopen) DEF_WEAK(x) Symbols used internally and not in ISO C This defines x as a weak alias for _libc_x Matches with PROTO_NORMAL() ex: DEF_WEAK(lseek) DEF_CANCEL(x) Symbols that have a cancellation wrapper This defines x as a weak alias for _libc_x_cancel. Matches with PROTO_CANCEL() ex: DEF_CANCEL(read) DEF_WRAP(x) This defines x as a weak alias for _libc_x_wrap. Matches with PROTO_WRAP() ex: DEF_WRAP(ptrace) MAKE_CLONE(dst, src) Symbols that are exact clones of other symbols This declares _libc_dst as being the same type as dst, and makes _libc_dst a strong, hidden alias for _libc_src. You still need to DEF_STRONG(dst) or DEF_WEAK(dst) to alias dst itself ex: MAKE_CLONE(SHA224Pad, SHA256Pad)