Re: Integrating libraries or exe's complied on different compilers

From:

Pete Becker <pete@versatilecoding.com>

Newsgroups:

comp.lang.c++

Date:

Sun, 16 Nov 2008 14:10:25 -0500

Message-ID:

<2008111614102516807-pete@versatilecodingcom>

On 2008-11-16 13:18:36 -0500, Ian Collins <ian-news@hotmail.com> said:

Pete Becker wrote:

On 2008-11-16 02:38:53 -0500, Ian Collins <ian-news@hotmail.com> said:

red floyd wrote:

Ian Collins wrote:

red floyd wrote:

Ian Collins wrote:

shyam.lingegowda@gmail.com wrote:

Hi all,

If I have two c++ programs and I compile that using two different
compilers on Unix. Is it possible for these two exe's to communicate
with one another. Since the way the exe's are generated by two
different compilers are different is it possible to communicate at
all. Is there any alternative for the same. What about libraries
compiled with two different compilers. If someone can give some
feedback on the same it will be of great help.

Assuming communicate == link then the only safe way is through
functions
with extern "C" linkage.

Even that's not safe, because they may have different ABIs into the
Standard Library

Which systems would that apply to?

Windows? Possibly any Unix that has both a proprietary compiler and
gcc?

Unless the platform is really FUBAR, all C compilers for that platform
follow the platform's ABI conventions. Otherwise they wouldn't be able
to use any of the platform's standard headers.

The point was that different implementations of the standard library may
have, for example, different implementations of std::string.

If the only interaction between modules is through extern "C"
interfaces, why would that matter?

Because extern "C" doesn't preclude the use of C++ classes.

extern "C" void f(std::string*);

--
Pete
Roundhouse Consulting, Ltd. (www.versatilecoding.com) Author of "The
Standard C++ Library Extensions: a Tutorial and Reference
(www.petebecker.com/tr1book)