[SDL] Custom libSDL dependencies inconsistent?

[Gianfranco Berardi]

I apologize for the lack of brevity. I'll try to summarize here, but the 
rest should give context to what I am trying to do.

When I build a custom libSDL (1.2.11) using gcc-4.1 and configure 
options to reduce dependencies, I get a library with reduced 
dependencies but with a dependency on GLIBC_2.4, which prevents me from 
using it on an older computer. When I use gcc-3.3, I can use it on an 
older computer, but for some reason I have dependencies on libX11 and 
libXext. Why does it configure differently just because CC is defined as 
gcc-3.3? See output of configure below.

The details:
I'm trying to build a game for GNU/Linux, and since I want to make sure 
that I don't have to tell someone "But it works on my system!", I'm 
trying to bundle all needed libraries with the distributable binary.

In order to do so, I need to get rid of as many dependencies as I can so 
the download will be as small as possible. I followed Troy Hepfner's 
tutorial on the subject at 
http://www.gamedev.net/reference/programming/features/linuxprogramming2/page3.asp 
which was great. I managed to reduce the dependencies to only a few 
libraries, which I provided.

Except I had a problem. My dev system is Ubuntu 7.04, which uses 
gcc-4.1, and so the binaries I produce depend on GLIBC_2.4, which would 
be fine except people using older systems, like Debian Stable, couldn't 
run the game.

As I learned at http://trac.autopackage.org/wiki/LinuxProblems and other 
places, this is a common issue. I asked for help at 
http://happypenguin.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=20401 and eventually 
found that I could install gcc-3.3 on my system, which produced binaries 
that didn't depend on GLIBC_2.4.

But there was another problem. Now I see that libSDL depends on libX11 
and libXext. I checked the output of configure, and here is the relevant 
portion of the outut that I see if I use the following options:

OPTIONS="--prefix=$LIB_DIR --enable-X11-shared --disable-rpath 
--disable-ipod --disable-video-directfb --enable-sdl-dlopen"

** If it is using the default gcc on my system, which is gcc-4.1:

checking for ESD - version >= 0.2.8... yes
-- /usr/lib/libesd.so.* -> libesd.so.0
checking for NAS audio support... no
checking for X... libraries , headers
checking for gethostbyname... yes
checking for connect... yes
checking for remove... yes
checking for shmat... yes
checking for IceConnectionNumber in -lICE... yes
-- dynamic libX11 -> libX11.so.6
-- dynamic libX11ext -> libXext.so.6
checking for X11/extensions/Xrandr.h... no
checking for X11/extensions/dpms.h... yes
checking for framebuffer console support... yes
checking for PlayStation 2 GS support... no
checking for SVGAlib (1.4.0+) support... no
checking for libVGL support... no


** If I export CC=gcc-3.3:

checking for ESD - version >= 0.2.8... yes
-- /usr/lib/libesd.so.* -> libesd.so.0
checking for NAS audio support... no
checking for X... libraries , headers
checking for gethostbyname... yes
checking for connect... yes
checking for remove... yes
checking for shmat... yes
checking for IceConnectionNumber in -lICE... yes
checking for X11/extensions/Xrandr.h... no
checking for X11/extensions/dpms.h... yes
checking for framebuffer console support... yes
checking for PlayStation 2 GS support... no
checking for SVGAlib (1.4.0+) support... no

Why is there a difference?

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