I just looked at the release notes for NTL 5.5 (http://www.shoup.net/ntl/doc/tour-changes.html). There are only two things. One is fixing gmp's xgcd function (which should not matter to Sage since Sage now uses mpir and not gmp, right? and wasn't that very thing one reason for the gmp/mpir split, in fact?) The other is just about some new configure variables.
Based on this I don't think there's any hurry to upgrade. But what this does show is that NTL's author, Victor Shoup, is still actively maintaining NTL, so might be willing to take up the suggestion concerning building shared libraries. John 2009/6/21 Dr. David Kirkby <david.kir...@onetel.net>: > > In the patches directory of ntl-5.4.2.p7 there are two files which I'd > consider makefiles (i.e. make would understand them) > > -rw-r----- 1 kirkby 1093 443 Mar 24 2008 ntl_makefile > -rw-r--r-- 1 kirkby 1093 17194 May 11 2008 mfile > > As you can see from the file sizes, there are significant differences > between the ones that gets uses (mfile) and the one I think is not used > at all (ntl_makefile) > > One difference is the way the shared library is created. > > > The simplist (ntl_makefile) one says: > > libntl.so: $(OBJ) > $(CXX) -fPIC -shared -o libntl.so $(OBJ) > > > That looks a pretty logical syntax to me. > > > Now when one looks at the makefile that actually gets used, the bit for > compiling the shared library is a lot more complex. Some of that > complexity is obviously added so that the version number of the ntl is > put in the library. But other bits I think are unnecessary and results > in the name of the output file being specified twice (luckily the same > name!) > > What's more, it stops the shared library building if gcc 4.4.0 uses > Sun's linker, as it complains the output filename has been specified twice. > > This is what the new 'makefile' says: > > libntl.so: DIRNAME > - rm -f $(OBJ) # clean, preserving tuning parameters > make shobj > $(LINK_CXX) -fPIC -shared -Wl,-soname,lib`cat DIRNAME`.so -o > lib`cat DIRNAME`.so $(OBJ) $(GMP_LIBDIR) $(GMP_LIB) > ln -s lib`cat DIRNAME`.so libntl.so > > > I created a patch which simply removes the "-Wl,-soname,lib`cat > DIRNAME`.so" This allows ntl to build on Solaris irrespective of whether > gcc uses the GNU linker (part of binutils) or the Sun linker in > /usr/ccs/bin/ld. > > I suspect the GNU linker is more lax than the Sun one, so does not care > the fact the name is specified twice. > > Before creating a ticket, I thought I'd discuss this. > > Note I've only tested my change on Solaris. I've used two versions of > gcc - one built with the GNU assembler and linker on 't2', the other > built with the Sun linker and assembler on my own Sun (Blade 2000). The > revised .spkg works on either. > > I have NOT made it Solaris-specific, as I don;t believe the syntax is > correct. It's better to fix it on all platforms at once in that case. > > I could just sumbit my patch for review. But since there is a later > version of ntl available, I could update that at the same time, so > instead of having ntl-5.4.2.p7, I create ntl-5.5.1. > > I assume updating the version of ntl though would need a lot more > testing, than what is needed if removing less than a dozen lines from a > makefile. > > Comments ?? > > > > Dave > > > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ To post to this group, send email to sage-devel@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to sage-devel-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sage-devel URLs: http://www.sagemath.org -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
