Is it not allowed create a static library without a .c file in it?

Question

I have two files -> fact.h and main.c in the /home/snyp1/new folder. main.c has the main function which calls the fact(int x) function in fact.h. I am creating a .a archive with the ar command ->

snyp1@Snyp:~/new$ ar -r -s libfact.a fact.o
ar: creating libfact.a
fact.h  fact.o  libfact.a  main.c
snyp1@Snyp:~/new$ gcc main.c -L/home/snyp1/new -lfact -o main
/home/snyp1/new/libfact.a: could not read symbols: Archive has no index; run ranlib to add one
collect2: ld returned 1 exit status
snyp1@Snyp:~/new$ ranlib libfact.a
snyp1@Snyp:~/new$ gcc main.c -L/home/snyp1/new -lfact -o main
/home/snyp1/new/libfact.a: could not read symbols: Archive has no index; run ranlib to add one
collect2: ld returned 1 exit status

I am on ubuntu 12.04. Please let me know whats wrong. (Also, if I don't use the -L/.../new, gcc will say it can't find "lfact", maybe its because its not in /usr/local/lib)

EDIT: OK I have found the cause. Its due to the fact that I was using fact.h to build the fact.o and then putting it in the library, it wasn't working as expected. So I now changed it into file.c and is working fine now. I should have provided that information, I'm sorry. Though I don't know why this kind of problem should arise. Aren't libraries possible to make without at least one .c file in it?

Answer 1

I was using fact.h to build the fact.o and then putting it in the library, it wasn't working as expected.

Do you mean you were compiling fact.h to produce fact.o?

If so, that wasn't doing what you expect. When you invoke gcc on a header file it produces a precompiled header, not an object file. So although you got a file called foo.o it wasn't a valid object file. If you had just run gcc -c fact.h it would have produced a precompiled header fact.gch, but presumably you ran gcc -c fact.h -o fact.o which causes the file to be called fact.o even though it's still a precompiled header. file fact.o would have shown that:

$ file fact.o
fact.o: GCC precompiled header (version 013) for C

You could have forced GCC to treat the file as C code, not a header, by running gcc -x c -c fact.h -o fact.o (the -x c says to treat the input as C code instead of inferring the type from the file extension) but it's probably simpler and less confusing to just name your file correctly instead of trying to compile a header.

Aren't libraries possible to make without at least one .c file in it?

They need at least one object file (i.e. .o file) but you didn't have a valid object, you had a precompiled header misleadingly named as .o, but it was not actually an object file.

if I don't use the -L/.../new, gcc will say it can't find "lfact", maybe its because its not in /usr/local/lib

The linker doesn't only look in /usr/local/lib, there are other default places it looks, but yes, that's basically the problem. Note that you can also say -L. if the library is in the current directory, that's easier than giving an absolute path.

Answer 2

I'm not sure ar supports a dash on anything other than the first option. Try

ar -rs libfact.a fact.o

or just

ar rs libfact.a fact.o

Mind you, I don't know why running ranlib didn't work though.