getauxval() and the auxiliary vector [LWN.net]

getauxval() and the auxiliary vector

Posted Oct 15, 2012 19:21 UTC (Mon) by BenHutchings (subscriber, #37955)
In reply to: getauxval() and the auxiliary vector by dashesy
Parent article: getauxval() and the auxiliary vector

Sorry if I am outright clueless, but it would be very interesting if it can be used for multiarch scenarios.

Multiarch and biarch requite that each coexisting architecture has a distinct dynamic linker.

Maybe to simplify mixing x64 and x86 in a distribution-agnostic fashion, or even more interesting; Not only to run the foreign code but also link to a library of foreign architecture.

This is not possible even with thunking of function calls (very expensive if you have to make 32/64-bit mode switches) as the different architectures have different memory layouts.

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getauxval() and the auxiliary vector

Posted Nov 13, 2012 11:09 UTC (Tue) by oak (subscriber, #2786) [Link]

Nice. Yet another way for programs to find out on what kind of a platform they're running at runtime.

(If everything would use it instead of reading the /proc/self/auxv file directly, it would be nice, now it just means that tools like SB2 and user-space Qemu have yet another thing they need to catch & override, but at least this new method is easier to override.)