Re: [Caml-list] static linking

[Mark Shinwell <mshinwell@janestreet.com>]

On 6 June 2014 16:43, Andreea Costea <andre.costea@gmail.com> wrote:
> I'm trying to build a rather big system written in Ocaml, using ocamlbuild.
> I managed to set all the needed flags nicely, so that the resulted binaries
> can run on any Unix machine, independent on their Ocaml distribution.
> However, on certain machines I have problems with the compatibility between
> the C libraries. Hence, I tried using "-ccopt -static"  for the -lflags and
> -cflags, respectively, in order to produce the desired statically linked
> binaries while building the project.

My advice would be to reconsider carefully why you want to statically
link.  Read this:
http://www.akkadia.org/drepper/no_static_linking.html

The most important point is: if you're using a glibc or eglibc-based
system, you should not statically link the C library.  (The advice is
probably similar for other platforms.)

You don't say exactly which libraries are causing the compatibility
problems, but if it is indeed glibc, then one solution might be to
spin up some virtual machines to use when you need to build your
system against older versions.

Mark