Soname
Encyclopedia
In Unix operating systems
, a soname is a field of data in a shared object file. The soname is a string
, which is used as a "logical name" describing the functionality of the object
(typically, that name is equal to the filename
of the library, or to a prefix thereof).
The soname is often used to provide version backwards-compatibility information. For instance, if versions 1.0 through 1.9 of the shared library libx provide identical interface, they would all have the same soname, e.g. libx.so.1. If the system only includes version 1.3 of that shared object, with filename libx.so.1.3, the soname field of the shared object tells the system that it can be used to fill the dependency for a binary which was originally compiled using version 1.2.
Given any shared object file, one can use the following code to get the information from within the library file:
objdump libx.so.1.3 -p | grep SONAME
Unix
Unix is a multitasking, multi-user computer operating system originally developed in 1969 by a group of AT&T employees at Bell Labs, including Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, Brian Kernighan, Douglas McIlroy, and Joe Ossanna...
, a soname is a field of data in a shared object file. The soname is a string
String (computer science)
In formal languages, which are used in mathematical logic and theoretical computer science, a string is a finite sequence of symbols that are chosen from a set or alphabet....
, which is used as a "logical name" describing the functionality of the object
(typically, that name is equal to the filename
Filename
The filename is metadata about a file; a string used to uniquely identify a file stored on the file system. Different file systems impose different restrictions on length and allowed characters on filenames.A filename includes one or more of these components:...
of the library, or to a prefix thereof).
The soname is often used to provide version backwards-compatibility information. For instance, if versions 1.0 through 1.9 of the shared library libx provide identical interface, they would all have the same soname, e.g. libx.so.1. If the system only includes version 1.3 of that shared object, with filename libx.so.1.3, the soname field of the shared object tells the system that it can be used to fill the dependency for a binary which was originally compiled using version 1.2.
Given any shared object file, one can use the following code to get the information from within the library file:
objdump libx.so.1.3 -p | grep SONAME