1 Installing the GNU C Library
2 ****************************
4 Before you do anything else, you should read the FAQ at
5 <http://sourceware.org/glibc/wiki/FAQ>. It answers common questions and
6 describes problems you may experience with compilation and installation.
8 Features can be added to the GNU C Library via "add-on" bundles.
9 These are separate tar files, which you unpack into the top level of the
10 source tree. Then you give 'configure' the '--enable-add-ons' option to
11 activate them, and they will be compiled into the library.
13 You will need recent versions of several GNU tools: definitely GCC
14 and GNU Make, and possibly others. *Note Tools for Compilation::,
17 Configuring and compiling the GNU C Library
18 ===========================================
20 The GNU C Library cannot be compiled in the source directory. You must
21 build it in a separate build directory. For example, if you have
22 unpacked the GNU C Library sources in '/src/gnu/glibc-VERSION', create a
23 directory '/src/gnu/glibc-build' to put the object files in. This
24 allows removing the whole build directory in case an error occurs, which
25 is the safest way to get a fresh start and should always be done.
27 From your object directory, run the shell script 'configure' located
28 at the top level of the source tree. In the scenario above, you'd type
30 $ ../glibc-VERSION/configure ARGS...
32 Please note that even though you're building in a separate build
33 directory, the compilation may need to create or modify files and
34 directories in the source directory.
36 'configure' takes many options, but the only one that is usually
37 mandatory is '--prefix'. This option tells 'configure' where you want
38 the GNU C Library installed. This defaults to '/usr/local', but the
39 normal setting to install as the standard system library is
40 '--prefix=/usr' for GNU/Linux systems and '--prefix=' (an empty prefix)
43 It may also be useful to set the CC and CFLAGS variables in the
44 environment when running 'configure'. CC selects the C compiler that
45 will be used, and CFLAGS sets optimization options for the compiler.
47 The following list describes all of the available options for
51 Install machine-independent data files in subdirectories of
52 'DIRECTORY'. The default is to install in '/usr/local'.
54 '--exec-prefix=DIRECTORY'
55 Install the library and other machine-dependent files in
56 subdirectories of 'DIRECTORY'. The default is to the '--prefix'
57 directory if that option is specified, or '/usr/local' otherwise.
59 '--with-headers=DIRECTORY'
60 Look for kernel header files in DIRECTORY, not '/usr/include'. The
61 GNU C Library needs information from the kernel's header files
62 describing the interface to the kernel. The GNU C Library will
63 normally look in '/usr/include' for them, but if you specify this
64 option, it will look in DIRECTORY instead.
66 This option is primarily of use on a system where the headers in
67 '/usr/include' come from an older version of the GNU C Library.
68 Conflicts can occasionally happen in this case. You can also use
69 this option if you want to compile the GNU C Library with a newer
70 set of kernel headers than the ones found in '/usr/include'.
72 '--enable-add-ons[=LIST]'
73 Specify add-on packages to include in the build. If this option is
74 specified with no list, it enables all the add-on packages it finds
75 in the main source directory; this is the default behavior. You
76 may specify an explicit list of add-ons to use in LIST, separated
77 by spaces or commas (if you use spaces, remember to quote them from
78 the shell). Each add-on in LIST can be an absolute directory name
79 or can be a directory name relative to the main source directory,
80 or relative to the build directory (that is, the current working
81 directory). For example,
82 '--enable-add-ons=nptl,../glibc-libidn-VERSION'.
84 '--enable-kernel=VERSION'
85 This option is currently only useful on GNU/Linux systems. The
86 VERSION parameter should have the form X.Y.Z and describes the
87 smallest version of the Linux kernel the generated library is
88 expected to support. The higher the VERSION number is, the less
89 compatibility code is added, and the faster the code gets.
91 '--with-binutils=DIRECTORY'
92 Use the binutils (assembler and linker) in 'DIRECTORY', not the
93 ones the C compiler would default to. You can use this option if
94 the default binutils on your system cannot deal with all the
95 constructs in the GNU C Library. In that case, 'configure' will
96 detect the problem and suppress these constructs, so that the
97 library will still be usable, but functionality may be lost--for
98 example, you can't build a shared libc with old binutils.
101 Use this option if your computer lacks hardware floating-point
102 support and your operating system does not emulate an FPU.
105 Don't build shared libraries even if it is possible. Not all
106 systems support shared libraries; you need ELF support and
107 (currently) the GNU linker.
110 Don't build libraries with profiling information. You may want to
111 use this option if you don't plan to do profiling.
113 '--enable-static-nss'
114 Compile static versions of the NSS (Name Service Switch) libraries.
115 This is not recommended because it defeats the purpose of NSS; a
116 program linked statically with the NSS libraries cannot be
117 dynamically reconfigured to use a different name database.
119 '--enable-hardcoded-path-in-tests'
120 By default, dynamic tests are linked to run with the installed C
121 library. This option hardcodes the newly built C library path in
122 dynamic tests so that they can be invoked directly.
124 '--disable-timezone-tools'
125 By default, timezone related utilities ('zic', 'zdump', and
126 'tzselect') are installed with the GNU C Library. If you are
127 building these independently (e.g. by using the 'tzcode' package),
128 then this option will allow disabling the install of these.
130 Note that you need to make sure the external tools are kept in sync
131 with the versions that the GNU C Library expects as the data
132 formats may change over time. Consult the 'timezone' subdirectory
135 '--enable-lock-elision=yes'
136 Enable lock elision for pthread mutexes by default.
139 The file 'pt_chown' is a helper binary for 'grantpt' (*note
140 Pseudo-Terminals: Allocation.) that is installed setuid root to fix
141 up pseudo-terminal ownership. It is not built by default because
142 systems using the Linux kernel are commonly built with the 'devpts'
143 filesystem enabled and mounted at '/dev/pts', which manages
144 pseudo-terminal ownership automatically. By using
145 '--enable-pt_chown', you may build 'pt_chown' and install it setuid
146 and owned by 'root'. The use of 'pt_chown' introduces additional
147 security risks to the system and you should enable it only if you
148 understand and accept those risks.
151 By default, the GNU C Library is built with '-Werror'. If you wish
152 to build without this option (for example, if building with a newer
153 version of GCC than this version of the GNU C Library was tested
154 with, so new warnings cause the build with '-Werror' to fail), you
155 can configure with '--disable-werror'.
158 By default for x86_64, the GNU C Library is built with the vector
159 math library. Use this option to disable the vector math library.
161 '--build=BUILD-SYSTEM'
163 These options are for cross-compiling. If you specify both options
164 and BUILD-SYSTEM is different from HOST-SYSTEM, 'configure' will
165 prepare to cross-compile the GNU C Library from BUILD-SYSTEM to be
166 used on HOST-SYSTEM. You'll probably need the '--with-headers'
167 option too, and you may have to override CONFIGURE's selection of
168 the compiler and/or binutils.
170 If you only specify '--host', 'configure' will prepare for a native
171 compile but use what you specify instead of guessing what your
172 system is. This is most useful to change the CPU submodel. For
173 example, if 'configure' guesses your machine as 'i686-pc-linux-gnu'
174 but you want to compile a library for 586es, give
175 '--host=i586-pc-linux-gnu' or just '--host=i586-linux' and add the
176 appropriate compiler flags ('-mcpu=i586' will do the trick) to
179 If you specify just '--build', 'configure' will get confused.
181 '--with-pkgversion=VERSION'
182 Specify a description, possibly including a build number or build
183 date, of the binaries being built, to be included in '--version'
184 output from programs installed with the GNU C Library. For
185 example, '--with-pkgversion='FooBar GNU/Linux glibc build 123''.
186 The default value is 'GNU libc'.
189 Specify the URL that users should visit if they wish to report a
190 bug, to be included in '--help' output from programs installed with
191 the GNU C Library. The default value refers to the main
192 bug-reporting information for the GNU C Library.
194 To build the library and related programs, type 'make'. This will
195 produce a lot of output, some of which may look like errors from 'make'
196 but aren't. Look for error messages from 'make' containing '***'.
197 Those indicate that something is seriously wrong.
199 The compilation process can take a long time, depending on the
200 configuration and the speed of your machine. Some complex modules may
201 take a very long time to compile, as much as several minutes on slower
202 machines. Do not panic if the compiler appears to hang.
204 If you want to run a parallel make, simply pass the '-j' option with
205 an appropriate numeric parameter to 'make'. You need a recent GNU
206 'make' version, though.
208 To build and run test programs which exercise some of the library
209 facilities, type 'make check'. If it does not complete successfully, do
210 not use the built library, and report a bug after verifying that the
211 problem is not already known. *Note Reporting Bugs::, for instructions
212 on reporting bugs. Note that some of the tests assume they are not
213 being run by 'root'. We recommend you compile and test the GNU C
214 Library as an unprivileged user.
216 Before reporting bugs make sure there is no problem with your system.
217 The tests (and later installation) use some pre-existing files of the
218 system such as '/etc/passwd', '/etc/nsswitch.conf' and others. These
219 files must all contain correct and sensible content.
221 Normally, 'make check' will run all the tests before reporting all
222 problems found and exiting with error status if any problems occurred.
223 You can specify 'stop-on-test-failure=y' when running 'make check' to
224 make the test run stop and exit with an error status immediately when a
227 To format the 'GNU C Library Reference Manual' for printing, type
228 'make dvi'. You need a working TeX installation to do this. The
229 distribution builds the on-line formatted version of the manual, as Info
230 files, as part of the build process. You can build them manually with
233 The library has a number of special-purpose configuration parameters
234 which you can find in 'Makeconfig'. These can be overwritten with the
235 file 'configparms'. To change them, create a 'configparms' in your
236 build directory and add values as appropriate for your system. The file
237 is included and parsed by 'make' and has to follow the conventions for
240 It is easy to configure the GNU C Library for cross-compilation by
241 setting a few variables in 'configparms'. Set 'CC' to the
242 cross-compiler for the target you configured the library for; it is
243 important to use this same 'CC' value when running 'configure', like
244 this: 'CC=TARGET-gcc configure TARGET'. Set 'BUILD_CC' to the compiler
245 to use for programs run on the build system as part of compiling the
246 library. You may need to set 'AR' to cross-compiling versions of 'ar'
247 if the native tools are not configured to work with object files for the
248 target you configured for. When cross-compiling the GNU C Library, it
249 may be tested using 'make check
250 test-wrapper="SRCDIR/scripts/cross-test-ssh.sh HOSTNAME"', where SRCDIR
251 is the absolute directory name for the main source directory and
252 HOSTNAME is the host name of a system that can run the newly built
253 binaries of the GNU C Library. The source and build directories must be
254 visible at the same locations on both the build system and HOSTNAME.
256 In general, when testing the GNU C Library, 'test-wrapper' may be set
257 to the name and arguments of any program to run newly built binaries.
258 This program must preserve the arguments to the binary being run, its
259 working directory and the standard input, output and error file
260 descriptors. If 'TEST-WRAPPER env' will not work to run a program with
261 environment variables set, then 'test-wrapper-env' must be set to a
262 program that runs a newly built program with environment variable
263 assignments in effect, those assignments being specified as 'VAR=VALUE'
264 before the name of the program to be run. If multiple assignments to
265 the same variable are specified, the last assignment specified must take
266 precedence. Similarly, if 'TEST-WRAPPER env -i' will not work to run a
267 program with an environment completely empty of variables except those
268 directly assigned, then 'test-wrapper-env-only' must be set; its use has
269 the same syntax as 'test-wrapper-env', the only difference in its
270 semantics being starting with an empty set of environment variables
271 rather than the ambient set.
273 Installing the C Library
274 ========================
276 To install the library and its header files, and the Info files of the
277 manual, type 'make install'. This will build things, if necessary,
278 before installing them; however, you should still compile everything
279 first. If you are installing the GNU C Library as your primary C
280 library, we recommend that you shut the system down to single-user mode
281 first, and reboot afterward. This minimizes the risk of breaking things
282 when the library changes out from underneath.
284 'make install' will do the entire job of upgrading from a previous
285 installation of the GNU C Library version 2.x. There may sometimes be
286 headers left behind from the previous installation, but those are
287 generally harmless. If you want to avoid leaving headers behind you can
288 do things in the following order.
290 You must first build the library ('make'), optionally check it ('make
291 check'), switch the include directories and then install ('make
292 install'). The steps must be done in this order. Not moving the
293 directory before install will result in an unusable mixture of header
294 files from both libraries, but configuring, building, and checking the
295 library requires the ability to compile and run programs against the old
296 library. The new '/usr/include', after switching the include
297 directories and before installing the library should contain the Linux
298 headers, but nothing else. If you do this, you will need to restore any
299 headers from libraries other than the GNU C Library yourself after
300 installing the library.
302 You can install the GNU C Library somewhere other than where you
303 configured it to go by setting the 'DESTDIR' GNU standard make variable
304 on the command line for 'make install'. The value of this variable is
305 prepended to all the paths for installation. This is useful when
306 setting up a chroot environment or preparing a binary distribution. The
307 directory should be specified with an absolute file name. Installing
308 with the 'prefix' and 'exec_prefix' GNU standard make variables set is
311 The GNU C Library includes a daemon called 'nscd', which you may or
312 may not want to run. 'nscd' caches name service lookups; it can
313 dramatically improve performance with NIS+, and may help with DNS as
316 One auxiliary program, '/usr/libexec/pt_chown', is installed setuid
317 'root' if the '--enable-pt_chown' configuration option is used. This
318 program is invoked by the 'grantpt' function; it sets the permissions on
319 a pseudoterminal so it can be used by the calling process. If you are
320 using a Linux kernel with the 'devpts' filesystem enabled and mounted at
321 '/dev/pts', you don't need this program.
323 After installation you might want to configure the timezone and
324 locale installation of your system. The GNU C Library comes with a
325 locale database which gets configured with 'localedef'. For example, to
326 set up a German locale with name 'de_DE', simply issue the command
327 'localedef -i de_DE -f ISO-8859-1 de_DE'. To configure all locales that
328 are supported by the GNU C Library, you can issue from your build
329 directory the command 'make localedata/install-locales'.
331 To configure the locally used timezone, set the 'TZ' environment
332 variable. The script 'tzselect' helps you to select the right value.
333 As an example, for Germany, 'tzselect' would tell you to use
334 'TZ='Europe/Berlin''. For a system wide installation (the given paths
335 are for an installation with '--prefix=/usr'), link the timezone file
336 which is in '/usr/share/zoneinfo' to the file '/etc/localtime'. For
337 Germany, you might execute 'ln -s /usr/share/zoneinfo/Europe/Berlin
340 Recommended Tools for Compilation
341 =================================
343 We recommend installing the following GNU tools before attempting to
344 build the GNU C Library:
346 * GNU 'make' 3.79 or newer
348 You need the latest version of GNU 'make'. Modifying the GNU C
349 Library to work with other 'make' programs would be so difficult
350 that we recommend you port GNU 'make' instead. *Really.* We
351 recommend GNU 'make' version 3.79. All earlier versions have
352 severe bugs or lack features.
356 GCC 4.7 or higher is required. In general it is recommended to use
357 the newest version of the compiler that is known to work for
358 building the GNU C Library, as newer compilers usually produce
359 better code. As of release time, GCC 5.3 is the newest compiler
360 verified to work to build the GNU C Library.
362 For multi-arch support it is recommended to use a GCC which has
363 been built with support for GNU indirect functions. This ensures
364 that correct debugging information is generated for functions
365 selected by IFUNC resolvers. This support can either be enabled by
366 configuring GCC with '--enable-gnu-indirect-function', or by
367 enabling it by default by setting 'default_gnu_indirect_function'
368 variable for a particular architecture in the GCC source file
371 You can use whatever compiler you like to compile programs that use
374 Check the FAQ for any special compiler issues on particular
377 * GNU 'binutils' 2.22 or later
379 You must use GNU 'binutils' (as and ld) to build the GNU C Library.
380 No other assembler or linker has the necessary functionality at the
381 moment. As of release time, GNU 'binutils' 2.25 is the newest
382 verified to work to build the GNU C Library.
384 * GNU 'texinfo' 4.7 or later
386 To correctly translate and install the Texinfo documentation you
387 need this version of the 'texinfo' package. Earlier versions do
388 not understand all the tags used in the document, and the
389 installation mechanism for the info files is not present or works
390 differently. As of release time, 'texinfo' 6.0 is the newest
391 verified to work to build the GNU C Library.
393 * GNU 'awk' 3.1.2, or higher
395 'awk' is used in several places to generate files. Some 'gawk'
396 extensions are used, including the 'asorti' function, which was
397 introduced in version 3.1.2 of 'gawk'. As of release time, 'gawk'
398 version 4.1.3 is the newest verified to work to build the GNU C
403 Perl is not required, but it is used if present to test the
404 installation. We may decide to use it elsewhere in the future.
406 * GNU 'sed' 3.02 or newer
408 'Sed' is used in several places to generate files. Most scripts
409 work with any version of 'sed'. As of release time, 'sed' version
410 4.2.2 is the newest verified to work to build the GNU C Library.
412 If you change any of the 'configure.ac' files you will also need
414 * GNU 'autoconf' 2.69 (exactly)
416 and if you change any of the message translation files you will need
418 * GNU 'gettext' 0.10.36 or later
420 If you wish to regenerate the 'yacc' parser code in the 'intl'
421 subdirectory you will need
423 * GNU 'bison' 2.7 or later
425 You may also need these packages if you upgrade your source tree using
426 patches, although we try to avoid this.
428 Specific advice for GNU/Linux systems
429 =====================================
431 If you are installing the GNU C Library on GNU/Linux systems, you need
432 to have the header files from a 3.2 or newer kernel around for
433 reference. These headers must be installed using 'make
434 headers_install'; the headers present in the kernel source directory are
435 not suitable for direct use by the GNU C Library. You do not need to
436 use that kernel, just have its headers installed where the GNU C Library
437 can access them, referred to here as INSTALL-DIRECTORY. The easiest way
438 to do this is to unpack it in a directory such as
439 '/usr/src/linux-VERSION'. In that directory, run 'make headers_install
440 INSTALL_HDR_PATH=INSTALL-DIRECTORY'. Finally, configure the GNU C
441 Library with the option '--with-headers=INSTALL-DIRECTORY/include'. Use
442 the most recent kernel you can get your hands on. (If you are
443 cross-compiling the GNU C Library, you need to specify
444 'ARCH=ARCHITECTURE' in the 'make headers_install' command, where
445 ARCHITECTURE is the architecture name used by the Linux kernel, such as
448 After installing the GNU C Library, you may need to remove or rename
449 directories such as '/usr/include/linux' and '/usr/include/asm', and
450 replace them with copies of directories such as 'linux' and 'asm' from
451 'INSTALL-DIRECTORY/include'. All directories present in
452 'INSTALL-DIRECTORY/include' should be copied, except that the GNU C
453 Library provides its own version of '/usr/include/scsi'; the files
454 provided by the kernel should be copied without replacing those provided
455 by the GNU C Library. The 'linux', 'asm' and 'asm-generic' directories
456 are required to compile programs using the GNU C Library; the other
457 directories describe interfaces to the kernel but are not required if
458 not compiling programs using those interfaces. You do not need to copy
459 kernel headers if you did not specify an alternate kernel header source
460 using '--with-headers'.
462 The Filesystem Hierarchy Standard for GNU/Linux systems expects some
463 components of the GNU C Library installation to be in '/lib' and some in
464 '/usr/lib'. This is handled automatically if you configure the GNU C
465 Library with '--prefix=/usr'. If you set some other prefix or allow it
466 to default to '/usr/local', then all the components are installed there.
471 There are probably bugs in the GNU C Library. There are certainly
472 errors and omissions in this manual. If you report them, they will get
473 fixed. If you don't, no one will ever know about them and they will
474 remain unfixed for all eternity, if not longer.
476 It is a good idea to verify that the problem has not already been
477 reported. Bugs are documented in two places: The file 'BUGS' describes
478 a number of well known bugs and the central GNU C Library bug tracking
479 system has a WWW interface at <http://sourceware.org/bugzilla/>. The
480 WWW interface gives you access to open and closed reports. A closed
481 report normally includes a patch or a hint on solving the problem.
483 To report a bug, first you must find it. With any luck, this will be
484 the hard part. Once you've found a bug, make sure it's really a bug. A
485 good way to do this is to see if the GNU C Library behaves the same way
486 some other C library does. If so, probably you are wrong and the
487 libraries are right (but not necessarily). If not, one of the libraries
488 is probably wrong. It might not be the GNU C Library. Many historical
489 Unix C libraries permit things that we don't, such as closing a file
492 If you think you have found some way in which the GNU C Library does
493 not conform to the ISO and POSIX standards (*note Standards and
494 Portability::), that is definitely a bug. Report it!
496 Once you're sure you've found a bug, try to narrow it down to the
497 smallest test case that reproduces the problem. In the case of a C
498 library, you really only need to narrow it down to one library function
499 call, if possible. This should not be too difficult.
501 The final step when you have a simple test case is to report the bug.
502 Do this at <http://www.gnu.org/software/libc/bugs.html>.
504 If you are not sure how a function should behave, and this manual
505 doesn't tell you, that's a bug in the manual. Report that too! If the
506 function's behavior disagrees with the manual, then either the library
507 or the manual has a bug, so report the disagreement. If you find any
508 errors or omissions in this manual, please report them to the bug
509 database. If you refer to specific sections of the manual, please
510 include the section names for easier identification.