.. default-role:: literal


Autotools tips and tricks
=========================

Compile a 64 bits library
-------------------------

That tips is aimed at solving the following error message, usually appearing
when compiling some large piece of software on a 64 bits system::

    $afile: relocation R_X86_64_32 against $afile can not be used when making 
      a shared object; recompile with -fPIC

where `$afile` is the path to some `.a` library file. The solution to this to
recompile the library containing `$afile` as a pure shared 64 bits library. I
will assume the library is using the `GNU autotools`_ (i.e the configure script,
Make etc...) as its build system

To recompile, cd into the library's build directory and run something like::

    $ make distclean
    $ CFLAGS='-m64 -fPIC' CC='gcc -m64 -fPIC' ./configure --enable-shared

You can of course add other options to `./configure` as you see fit. 

.. _GNU autotools: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_build_system