============================================================================ How to use `abi-compliance-checker' to test FLTK ABI compatibility (Linux) ============================================================================ This howto uses directories in /git/ as example directories. Please adjust versions and directory names as appropriate on your system. In this howto we compare FLTK 1.3.4-1 (last 1.3.x release as of Jan 02, 2019) with the current version (1.3.5) before it will be released. (1) Download 'abi-compliance-checker' from GitHub: $ cd /git $ git clone https://github.com/lvc/abi-compliance-checker.git Download directory: /git/abi-compliance-checker/ (2) Use two different Git checkout (working) directories to build libs, for instance (as used in this example): (new) /git/fltk-1.3 current version = 1.3.5 (old) /git/fltk-1.3.4-1 previous version = 1.3.4-1 [1] [1] The second working directory can be created from the first git working tree ( /git/fltk-1.3 ) with these commands: $ cd /git/fltk-1.3 $ git worktree add /git/fltk-1.3.4-1 release-1.3.4-1 This creates the worktree in /git/fltk-1.3.4-1 and checks the tag 'release-1.3.4-1' out. (3) Create two xml descriptions to test library compatibility in an arbitrary working directory (here: /git/workdir): --- fltk-1.3.4-1.xml --- 1.3.4-1 /git/fltk-1.3.4-1/FL/ win32.H mac.H /git/fltk-1.3.4-1/src/ /git/fltk-1.3.4-1/cairo/ --- end of file --- --- fltk-1.3.5.xml --- 1.3.5 /git/fltk-1.3/FL/ win32.H mac.H /git/fltk-1.3/src/ /git/fltk-1.3/cairo/ --- end of file --- (4) Configure and build both libraries with the same options. You *must* include '--enable-cairo' to build and compare the Cairo libs and '--enable-shared' to build the shared libs: $ make clean $ ./configure --enable-cairo --enable-shared --enable-debug $ make Note: you must *not* use '--with-abiversion' because we need to build the default ABI version. (5) Run `abi-compliance-checker.pl': $ cd /git/workdir $ /git/abi-compliance-checker/abi-compliance-checker.pl \ -lib fltk -old fltk-1.3.4-1.xml -new fltk-1.3.5.xml Preparing, please wait ... Using GCC 7 (x86_64-linux-gnu, target: x86_64) WARNING: May not work properly with GCC 4.8.[0-2], 6.* and higher due to bug #78040 in GCC. Please try other GCC versions with the help of --gcc-path=PATH option or create ABI dumps by ABI Dumper tool instead to avoid using GCC. Test selected GCC version first by -test option. ------------------------------------------------------------------ --> ignore warning (but run `abi-compliance-checker.pl -test') ------------------------------------------------------------------ Checking header(s) 1.3.4-1 ... WARNING: can't find 'ctags' program Checking header(s) 1.3.5 ... WARNING: can't find 'ctags' program ------------------------------------------------------------------ --> ignore warning (or install 'ctags' and repeat) ------------------------------------------------------------------ Comparing ABIs ... Comparing APIs ... Creating compatibility report ... Binary compatibility: 100% Source compatibility: 100% Total binary compatibility problems: 0, warnings: 0 Total source compatibility problems: 0, warnings: 1 Report: compat_reports/fltk/1.3.4-1_to_1.3.5/compat_report.html (6) Check the generated report (last line above) with a browser: $ firefox compat_reports/fltk/1.3.4-1_to_1.3.5/compat_report.html (7) You may want to remove the additional worktree created above with: $ cd /git/fltk-1.3 $ git worktree remove --force /git/fltk-1.3.4-1 (8) Done. Note 1: The report as given above issued 100% ABI compatibility. The only warning was the different patch version number. Note 2: There are other recommended methods to use abi-compliance-checker together with abi-dumper, but this is not (yet) covered here (see abi-compliance-checker documentation).