Suggestion: cleaning up the address space.

[Kaz Kylheku]

On Mon, 3 Apr 2000, Colin McCormack wrote:

> Date: Mon, 03 Apr 2000 14:06:40 +1000
> From: Colin McCormack <colin@field.medicine.adelaide.edu.au>
> To: Ulrich Drepper <drepper@cygnus.com>
> Cc: Andreas Jaeger <aj@suse.de>,
     libc-alpha Mailinglist <libc-alpha@sourceware.cygnus.com>
> Subject: Suggestion: cleaning up the address space.
> 
> Hello,
> 
> Under i86, Linux, glibc maps itself to the magic address 0x40000000, and 
> dynamic loads grow up from there.
> 
> It would be more useful if dynamically loaded libs were to be allocated at the 
> very top of the available address space, and grow downward.

To what extent can code changes in glibc achieve this? It looks like a job that
requires hacking the dynamic loader. After all the shared library is
relocatable: the loader should be able to put in anywhere it pleases, no?

Are there any dependencies in glibc on this ``magic address''? I should hope not.