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-rw-r--r--Documentation/kbuild/makefiles.rst33
1 files changed, 13 insertions, 20 deletions
diff --git a/Documentation/kbuild/makefiles.rst b/Documentation/kbuild/makefiles.rst
index b89c88168d6a..d7e6534a8505 100644
--- a/Documentation/kbuild/makefiles.rst
+++ b/Documentation/kbuild/makefiles.rst
@@ -297,9 +297,19 @@ more details, with real examples.
If CONFIG_EXT2_FS is set to either 'y' (built-in) or 'm' (modular)
the corresponding obj- variable will be set, and kbuild will descend
down in the ext2 directory.
- Kbuild only uses this information to decide that it needs to visit
- the directory, it is the Makefile in the subdirectory that
- specifies what is modular and what is built-in.
+
+ Kbuild uses this information not only to decide that it needs to visit
+ the directory, but also to decide whether or not to link objects from
+ the directory into vmlinux.
+
+ When Kbuild descends into the directory with 'y', all built-in objects
+ from that directory are combined into the built-in.a, which will be
+ eventually linked into vmlinux.
+
+ When Kbuild descends into the directory with 'm', in contrast, nothing
+ from that directory will be linked into vmlinux. If the Makefile in
+ that directory specifies obj-y, those objects will be left orphan.
+ It is very likely a bug of the Makefile or of dependencies in Kconfig.
It is good practice to use a `CONFIG_` variable when assigning directory
names. This allows kbuild to totally skip the directory if the
@@ -1115,23 +1125,6 @@ When kbuild executes, the following steps are followed (roughly):
In this example, extra-y is used to list object files that
shall be built, but shall not be linked as part of built-in.a.
- header-test-y
-
- header-test-y specifies headers (`*.h`) in the current directory that
- should be compile tested to ensure they are self-contained,
- i.e. compilable as standalone units. If CONFIG_HEADER_TEST is enabled,
- this builds them as part of extra-y.
-
- header-test-pattern-y
-
- This works as a weaker version of header-test-y, and accepts wildcard
- patterns. The typical usage is::
-
- header-test-pattern-y += *.h
-
- This specifies all the files that matches to `*.h` in the current
- directory, but the files in 'header-test-' are excluded.
-
6.7 Commands useful for building a boot image
---------------------------------------------