Crux
====
I propose for ld to check that all the files it needs to read are available,
including object files and libraries, at present ld exits after finding any
single object file or library missing. Which doesn't indicate the extent of the
missing files.

-- Would a patch be considered for review which added checks that all files exist?

Detailed information
==========
The present behaviour looks like ld drops out with exit(1) when it finds the
first missing library or object file, example follows:

$ g++ -Wall -shared -o t -lFooBar -lMissing -l12346789 -lMathsArc main.cpp
/usr/bin/ld: cannot find -lFooBar
collect2: ld returned 1 exit status

g++ does check that object files exist, but not libraries it appears. If I call
collect2 directly, it calls ld and we can see the missing test.o object file:

$  /usr/lib/gcc/i486-linux-gnu/4.1.2/collect2 --eh-frame-hdr -m elf_i386 -shared
-o t /usr/lib/gcc/i486-linux-gnu/4.1.2/../../../../lib/crti.o
/usr/lib/gcc/i486-linux-gnu/4.1.2/crtbeginS.o
-L/usr/lib/gcc/i486-linux-gnu/4.1.2 -L/usr/lib/gcc/i486-linux-gnu/4.1.2
-L/usr/lib/gcc/i486-linux-gnu/4.1.2/../../../../lib -L/lib/../lib
-L/usr/lib/../lib test.o test2.o -lFooBar -lMissing -l12346789 -lMathsArc
/tmp/ccIyZv2e.o -lstdc++ -lm -lgcc_s -lc -lgcc_s -lfoo
/usr/lib/gcc/i486-linux-gnu/4.1.2/crtendS.o
/usr/lib/gcc/i486-linux-gnu/4.1.2/../../../../lib/crtn.o
/usr/bin/ld: test.o: No such file: No such file or directory
collect2: ld returned 1 exit status

The proposed revision would change the first example's output to be as follows:

$ g++ -Wall -shared -o t -lFooBar -lMissing -l12346789 -lMathsArc main.cpp
/usr/bin/ld: cannot find -lMissing
/usr/bin/ld: cannot find -l12346789
/usr/bin/ld: cannot find -lMathsArc

collect2: ld returned 1 exit status