New version of g++ with an older version of libstdc++

Question

I am running Linux CentOS 7.3 which comes with g++ 4.8.5. I would like to use g++ 7.1.0 to compile some C++ software. But the C++ program compiled with g++ 7.1.0 is using the headers from the standard library that comes with g++ 7.1.0 and the libstdc++.so which also comes with it which make things really painful.

Is there a way to use g++ 7.1.0 and still use the standard library (both headers and libstdc++.so) from g++ 4.8.5 installed with CentOS?

Answer 1

Is there a way to use g++ 7.1.0 and still use the standard library (both headers and libstdc++.so) from g++ 4.8.5 installed with CentOS?

Don't do that (the ABI of libstdc++ from GCC 4.8 & GCC 7 are likely to be different). Instead consider perhaps linking the C++ standard library (from GCC 7.1) statically (and other libraries dynamically, notably those in C including libc.so , not C++).

BTW, how did you get g++-7.1 ? You could consider compiling GCC 7 (from its source code) on your CentOS 7 (or get some packaged version of it), then you'll have the right libstdc++

Read more about shared libraries, eg read Drepper's paper How To Write Shared Libraries and learn more about the -rpath option passed to ld (often using -Wl,-rpath to g++ ).

Answer 2

The libstdc++ ABI changed between gcc4 and gcc5 so that's not going to work. If you are using gcc7 you should install libstdc++ 7. You can have both versions installed at the same time

Answer 3

Developer Toolset is designed for this scenario, but it is currently at GCC version 6:

• https://www.softwarecollections.org/en/scls/rhscl/devtoolset-6/

Its C++ compiler has been configured in such a way that the programs it compiles are linked dynamically against the system libstdc++ , using a backwards-compatible ABI, and only the library code for new C++ features not yet supported by the system library is linked statically. This gives maximum compatibility and allows compiled applications to run without DTS.