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Diffstat (limited to 'toolchain/uClibc/Glibc_vs_uClibc_Differences.txt')
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diff --git a/toolchain/uClibc/Glibc_vs_uClibc_Differences.txt b/toolchain/uClibc/Glibc_vs_uClibc_Differences.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 4ed24639e..000000000 --- a/toolchain/uClibc/Glibc_vs_uClibc_Differences.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,215 +0,0 @@ - uClibc and Glibc are not the same -- there are a number of differences which -may or may not cause you problems. This document attempts to list these -differences and, when completed, will contain a full list of all relevant -differences. - - -1) uClibc is smaller than glibc. We attempt to maintain a glibc compatible -interface, allowing applications that compile with glibc to easily compile with -uClibc. However, we do not include _everything_ that glibc includes, and -therefore some applications may not compile. If this happens to you, please -report the failure to the uclibc mailing list, with detailed error messages. - -2) uClibc is much more configurable then glibc. This means that a developer -may have compiled uClibc in such a way that significant amounts of -functionality have been omitted. - -3) uClibc does not even attempt to ensure binary compatibility across releases. -When a new version of uClibc is released, you may or may not need to recompile -all your binaries. - -4) malloc(0) in glibc returns a valid pointer to something(!?!?) while in -uClibc calling malloc(0) returns a NULL. The behavior of malloc(0) is listed -as implementation-defined by SuSv3, so both libraries are equally correct. -This difference also applies to realloc(NULL, 0). I personally feel glibc's -behavior is not particularly safe. To enable glibc behavior, one has to -explicitly enable the MALLOC_GLIBC_COMPAT option. - -4.1) glibc's malloc() implementation has behavior that is tunable via the -MALLOC_CHECK_ environment variable. This is primarily used to provide extra -malloc debugging features. These extended malloc debugging features are not -available within uClibc. There are many good malloc debugging libraries -available for Linux (dmalloc, electric fence, valgrind, etc) that work much -better than the glibc extended malloc debugging. So our omitting this -functionality from uClibc is not a great loss. - -5) uClibc does not provide a database library (libdb). - -6) uClibc does not support NSS (/lib/libnss_*), which allows glibc to easily -support various methods of authentication and DNS resolution. uClibc only -supports flat password files and shadow password files for storing -authentication information. If you need something more complex than this, -you can compile and install pam. - -7) uClibc's libresolv is only a stub. Some, but not all of the functionality -provided by glibc's libresolv is provided internal to uClibc. Other functions -are not at all implemented. - -8) libnsl provides support for Network Information Service (NIS) which was -originally called "Yellow Pages" or "YP", which is an extension of RPC invented -by Sun to share Unix password files over the network. I personally think NIS -is an evil abomination and should not be used. These days, using ldap is much -more effective mechanism for doing the same thing. uClibc provides a stub -libnsl, but has no actual support for Network Information Service (NIS). -We therefore, also do not provide any of the headers files provided by glibc -under /usr/include/rpcsvc. - -9) uClibc's locale support is not 100% complete yet. We are working on it. - -10) uClibc's math library only supports long double as inlines, and even -then the long double support is quite limited. Also, very few of the -float math functions are implemented. Stick with double and you should -be just fine. - -11) uClibc's libcrypt does not support the reentrant crypt_r, setkey_r and -encrypt_r, since these are not required by SuSv3. - -12) uClibc directly uses kernel types to define most opaque data types. - -13) uClibc directly uses the linux kernel's arch specific 'stuct stat'. - -14) uClibc's librt library currently lacks all aio routines, all clock - routines, and all shm routines (only the timer routines and the mq - routines are implemented). - -<other things as we notice them> - - - -****************************** Manuel's Notes ****************************** - -Some general comments... - -The intended target for all my uClibc code is ANSI/ISO C99 and SUSv3 -compliance. While some glibc extensions are present, many will eventually -be configurable. Also, even when present, the glibc-like extensions may -differ slightly or be more restrictive than the native glibc counterparts. -They are primarily meant to be porting _aides_ and not necessarily -drop-in replacements. - -Now for some details... - -time functions --------------- -1) Leap seconds are not supported. -2) /etc/timezone and the whole zoneinfo directory tree are not supported. - To set the timezone, set the TZ environment variable as specified in - http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/007904975/basedefs/xbd_chap08.html - or you may also create an /etc/TZ file of a single line, ending with a - newline, containing the TZ setting. For example - echo CST6CDT > /etc/TZ -3) Currently, locale specific eras and alternate digits are not supported. - They are on my TODO list. - -wide char support ------------------ -1) The only multibyte encoding currently supported is UTF-8. The various - ISO-8859-* encodings are (optionally) supported. The internal - representation of wchar's is assumed to be 31 bit unicode values in - native endian representation. Also, the underlying char encoding is - assumed to match ASCII in the range 0-0x7f. -2) In the next iteration of locale support, I plan to add support for - (at least some) other multibyte encodings. - -locale support --------------- -1) The target for support is SUSv3 locale functionality. While nl_langinfo - has been extended, similar to glibc, it only returns values for related - locale entries. -2) Currently, all SUSv3 libc locale functionality should be implemented - except for wcsftime and collating item support in regex. - -stdio ------ -1) Conversion of large magnitude floating-point values by printf suffers a loss - of precision due to the algorithm used. -2) uClibc's printf is much stricter than glibcs, especially regarding positional - args. The entire format string is parsed first and an error is returned if - a problem is detected. In locales other than C, the format string is checked - to be a valid multibyte sequence as well. Also, currently at most 10 positional - args are allowed (although this is configurable). -3) BUFSIZ is configurable, but no attempt is made at automatic tuning of internal - buffer sizes for stdio streams. In fact, the stdio code in general sacrifices - sophistication/performace for minimal size. -4) uClibc allows glibc-like custom printf functions. However, while not - currently checked, the specifier must be <= 0x7f. -5) uClibc allows glibc-like custom streams. However, no in-buffer seeking is - done. -6) The functions fcloseall() and __fpending() can behave differently than their - glibc counterparts. -7) uClibc's setvbuf is more restrictive about when it can be called than glibc's - is. The standards specify that setvbuf must occur before any other operations - take place on the stream. -8) Right now, %m is not handled properly by printf when the format uses positional - args. -9) The FILEs created by glibc's fmemopen(), open_memstream(), and fopencookie() - are not capable of wide orientation. The corresponding uClibc routines do - not have this limitation. -10) For scanf, the C99 standard states "The fscanf function returns the value of - the macro EOF if an input failure occurs before any conversion." But glibc's - scanf does not respect conversions for which assignment was surpressed, even - though the standard states that the value is converted but not stored. - -glibc bugs that Ulrich Drepper has refused to acknowledge or comment on - ( http://sources.redhat.com/ml/libc-alpha/2003-09/ ) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -1) The C99 standard says that for printf, a %s conversion makes no special - provisions for multibyte characters. SUSv3 is even more clear, stating - that bytes are written and a specified precision is in bytes. Yet glibc - treats the arg as a multibyte string when a precision is specified and - not otherwise. -2) Both C99 and C89 state that the %c conversion for scanf reads the exact - number of bytes specified by the optional field width (or 1 if not specified). - uClibc complies with the standard. There is an argument that perhaps the - specified width should be treated as an upper bound, based on some historical - use. However, such behavior should be mentioned in the Conformance document. -3) glibc's scanf is broken regarding some numeric patterns. Some invalid - strings are accepted as valid ("0x.p", "1e", digit grouped strings). - In spite of my posting examples clearly illustrating the bugs, they remain - unacknowledged by the glibc developers. -4) glibc's scanf seems to require a 'p' exponent for hexadecimal float strings. - According to the standard, this is optional. -5) C99 requires that once an EOF is encountered, the stream should be treated - as if at end-of-file even if more data becomes available. Further reading - can be attempted by clearing the EOF flag though, via clearerr() or a file - positioning function. For details concerning the original change, see - Defect Report #141. glibc is currently non-compliant, and the developers - did not comment when I asked for their official position on this issue. -6) glibc's collation routines and/or localedef are broken regarding implicit - and explicit UNDEFINED rules. - -More to follow as I think of it... - - - - -Profiling: -------------------------------------------------------------------- - -uClibc no longer supports 'gcc -fprofile-arcs -pg' style profiling, which -causes your application to generate a 'gmon.out' file that can then be analyzed -by 'gprof'. Not only does this require explicit extra support in uClibc, it -requires that you rebuild everything with profiling support. There is both a -size and performance penalty to profiling your applications this way, as well -as Heisenberg effects, where the act of measuring changes what is measured. - -There exist a number of less invasive alternatives that do not require you to -specially instrument your application, and recompile and relink everything. - -The OProfile system-wide profiler is an excellent alternative: - http://oprofile.sourceforge.net/ - -Many people have had good results using the combination of Valgrind -to generate profiling information and KCachegrind for analysis: - http://developer.kde.org/~sewardj/ - http://kcachegrind.sourceforge.net/ - -Prospect is another alternative based on OProfile: - http://prospect.sourceforge.net/ - -And the Linux Trace Toolkit (LTT) is also a fine tool: - http://www.opersys.com/LTT/ - -FunctionCheck: - http://www710.univ-lyon1.fr/~yperret/fnccheck/ - |