ELF - .symtab section

3
votes

How to force GCC to include the .symtab section for ELF executables/shared libraries? I have already tried using -static and -ggdb but it didn't work.

EDIT: readelf -l yields the following:

 Section to Segment mapping:
 Segment Sections...
  00     
  01     .interp 
  02     .interp .note.ABI-tag .note.gnu.build-id .gnu.hash .dynsym .dynstr .gnu.version .gnu.version_r .rela.dyn .rela.plt .init .plt .text .fini .rodata .eh_frame_hdr .eh_frame 
  03     .init_array .fini_array .dynamic .got .got.plt .data .bss 
  04     .dynamic 
  05     .note.ABI-tag .note.gnu.build-id 
  06     .eh_frame_hdr 
  07     
  08     .init_array .fini_array .dynamic .got
1
x86elf
What makes you think there isn't one in the file? Possibly it is the tool you are using to display the files? Use readelf instead of objdump for example - Michael Petch
Try using -S with readelf. And to decode symtab use -Ss - Michael Petch

1 Answers

5
votes

By default .symtab is included, you don't need to do anything to get it.

readelf -l yields the following:

That command is used to list segments. Since you are interested in sections, you should use

readelf -WS $binary

instead.

Your binary could still be missing the .symtab section. If it does, the most common cause is a "stray" -s (strip) option on the link line (or running strip on the binary from a Makefile).