The ELF Tool Chain Project

The goal of this project is to create BSD licensed implementations of essential compilation tools for the ELF object file format.

Implementation Status

Native or POSIX mandated Tools

Tool	Description	Status	Owner	Repository Location	Comments
ar	Archiver	beta	kaiwang27	ar/
as	Assembler	planning			(see libmc)
brandelf	Set ELF brand	beta		brandelf/
c++filt	Translated encoded symbols	beta	kaiwang27	c++filt/
elfdump	Diagnostic tool	beta	kaiwang27	elfdump/
ld	Link editor	planning	jkoshy
nm	List symbols	beta	hglee	nm/
ranlib	Generate archive symbol table	beta	kaiwang27	(see ar(1) above)
size	List object sizes	beta	samarunraj	size/
strings	Extract printable strings	beta	samarunraj	strings/
strip	Discard symbols from objects	beta	kaiwang27	(see elfcopy(1) below)

GNU Tools

Tool	Description	Status	Owner	Repository Location	Comments
addr2line	Debug tool	beta	kaiwang27	addr2line/
elfcopy	Copy and translate between formats	beta	kaiwang27	elfcopy/
objdump	Display object information	planning			Merge with elfdump?
readelf	Display ELF information	beta	kaiwang27	readelf/

Libraries and API sets

API Set	Description	Status	Owner	Repository Location	Comments
libdwarf	A library for parsing DWARF debug information	in development	kaiwang27	libdwarf/	"pfgshield-freebsd" (email suppressed) notes that early versions of SGI's libdwarf library were released under a non-GPL'ed license.
libelf	A library for handling ELF objects	beta	jkoshy	libelf/
libelftc	Common code used by tools	beta		libelftc/
libmc	Machine/assembly code manipulation.	planning			For use in an optimizing linker, debugger and assember. See the NJ Toolkit below.

Test Suites

Name	Description	Status	Owner	Repository Location	Comments
libelf-test-suite	A TET based test suite for libelf	beta	jkoshy	libelf-test-suite/

Documentation

Name	Description	Status	Owner	Repository Location	Comments
Manual pages	Reference documentation	(multiple)	(multiple owners)	(multiple locations)	Each tool and library has its own manual pages.
libelf by Example	Tutorial introduction to the ELF(3)/GELF(3) API	Released	jkoshy	documentation/libelf-by-example
libdwarf by Example	An introduction to DWARF and libdwarf	planning	jkoshy	TBD

Project Metadata

• View the project overview at SourceForge.Net.
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• View an analysis of the project's code, by Ohloh.

Open Project-Wide Tickets

Ticket	Status	Owner	Milestone	Summary
#28	new	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Testing for memory leaks
#30	new	jkoshy	Future Work	Restrict symbol visibility and use of relocations in our libraries
#273	assigned	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Document the project's coding style
#279	accepted	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Create tools to ease building the project's source code on multiple OSes
#286	new	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Package up the project's manual pages
#288	new	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Setup infrastructure to perform test coverage measurements
#293	new	jkoshy	Future Work	Localization of messages
#306	new	jkoshy	Future Work	Supporting systems with case-insensitive file systems
#321	assigned	jkoshy	Future Work	Patch to get libraries and applications building with autotools
#336	new	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Support for Fedora
#352	new	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Revisit the use of binary data files in test suites
#359	new	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Configure TET correctly on NetBSD/amd64
#367	accepted	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Code review and code cleanups
#370	new	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Code duplication in ar(1) and elfcopy(1)
#373	accepted	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Port the project to OpenBSD
#374	accepted	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Darwin support.
#377	new	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Implement "libar"
#384	new	jkoshy	Future Work	Refactoring: move common code in elfcopy/mcs/strip to a library
#385	new	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Port the project to OpenIndiana
#386	new	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	dwarf_srclines() should sort line number array since dwarf line numbers are not always globally sorted in .debug_line
#388	accepted	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	File descriptor exhaustion under Minix
#391	accepted	jkoshy	Future Work	[PATCH] GNU/kFreeBSD build fixes
#393	new	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Scan sources for typos in user messages
#395	accepted	jkoshy	Trac Hosting	Migrate Trac to a standalone instance
#399	assigned	jkoshy	Future Work	Support building on the Android OS
#410	accepted	jkoshy	RELEASE_1_0	Merge requests for v0.6 -stable

Project History

This work was originally a part of the FreeBSD Project; it has been moved to SourceForge.Net to encourage wider participation from the open-source developer community.

Related Reading

• The Libunwind project.
• The Linux Standard Base specification (v3.1).
• The New Jersey Machine Code Toolkit.
• The Knit utility.
• The Solaris Linker and Libraries Guide.
• The NASM and YASM open source assemblers.