On 8 Nov 2000 17:22:02 GMT, Kent Polk wrote:
>IT appears to me that Python 2.0 shared modules build correctly on
>ELF machines, but aren't built correctly on the older a.out machines.
>
 [...]

>Evidently there's a problem with the symbol naming mechanism to be
>used when building shared modules for a.out. I compared configure
>options with Python 1.5.2 and can't determine how this should be
>fixed for a.out with Python 2.0. (Tried a number of possibilities)
>
>Any suggestions? Thanks

A little help pointed me to the source of the problem. Python 2.0
has a new platform-independent runtime dynamic loading mechanism.
The typical unix loader assumes ELF, with a note wondering if this
was appropriate:

  /* ### should there be a leading underscore for some platforms? */
  sprintf(funcname, "init%.200s", shortname);

I added the following patch, which works, but as naieve as I am
about this stuff, I was wondering if the patch is appropriate for
other platforms (probably ought to change the comment). If so, I'll
submit it to the Python folks :

Thanks
-----------------------------------------------
--- dynload_shlib.c.org Wed Nov  8 20:01:21 2000
+++ dynload_shlib.c     Wed Nov  8 20:38:49 2000
@@ -55,7 +55,11 @@
        }
 
        /* ### should there be a leading underscore for some platforms? */
-       sprintf(funcname, "init%.200s", shortname);
+#ifndef __ELF__
+       sprintf(funcname, "_init%.200s", shortname);
+#else
+        sprintf(funcname, "init%.200s", shortname);
+#endif
 
        if (fp != NULL) {
                int i;