By building the posix library as shared object with an ABI, we
effectively decouple posix-using programs from the library
implementation (which happens to depend on several os-level APIs such as
the VFS).
Libc components cannot use regular calls to select() as this may suspend
their execution. In this case incoming RPCs will be deferred until
select() returns and the component returns to the entrypoint dispatch
loop. The Libc::Signal_handler solves this problem with a its select()
that either returns the currently ready file descriptors immediately or
calls the registered handler function during libc resume.
This commit extends an easy-to-use mechanism to allow Genode component
code to enter/leave the libc application context. This is needed
whenever low-level component code (like signal handlers or RPC
functions) need to interact with potentially blocking libc I/O
functions.
Please note that this commit contains the API-level design only. The
actual context switching code 'execute_in_application_context' is
missing.
Libc::Env is the Genode::Env interface extended to cover access
to the XML content of the 'config' ROM and a VFS instance. This
deduplicates the burden of components to attain and manage
these resources.
Fix#2217
Ref #1987
This patch make the ABI mechanism available to shared libraries other
than Genode's dynamic linker. It thereby allows us to introduce
intermediate ABIs at the granularity of shared libraries. This is useful
for slow-moving ABIs such as the libc's interface but it will also
become handy for the package management.
To implement the feature, the build system had to be streamlined a bit.
In particular, archive dependencies and shared-lib dependencies are now
handled separately, and the global list of 'SHARED_LIBS' is no more.
Now, the variable with the same name holds the per-target list of shared
libraries used by the target.