libcrypt-2.5.7 oddities

[AshleyPinner]

Port of issue #11 from Sourceforge - http://sourceforge.net/p/mcrypt/bugs/11/

I am using an old SPARCstation 10 (Solaris 2.5.1) as a 
web server and am trying to compile the latest stable 
release of libmcrypt with gcc 3.0.4 and Sun's own linker.
Previous releases (libmcrypt 2.5.3) worked fine, but this 
one (2.5.7) crashes out in the ciphertest linking stage:
gcc -g -O2 -o .libs/ciphertest 
cipher_test.o ../lib/.libs/libmcrypt.so -R/usr/local/lib
makes ld spit several pages of unreferenced symbols 
from the libmcrypt library. Now I returned to the ../lib 
directory, issued "make clean" and rebuilt the library 
using the same algorithm and mode object files. This 
time, I got a much smaller library, but the ciphertest 
compiled. However, it fails everything when executed.
Since I used the same compiler "last time", and can't 
imagine any system changes has occurred since then, 
either it is bit rot or something in the build process has 
been changed. I have tried to rebuild the library from 
scratch, both with fresh sources and already processed.
As I understand only one major security issue has been 
addressed since August 2002, maybe I can stick to the 
older version of the library for now? If there is some 
useful output from configure or make one needs to 
determine if an error occurs, I can be reached on e-mail 
or something.
Anders Carlsson, anders.carlsson@mds.mdh.se 
(I don't spamblock, as I get enough of spam anyway)

[AshleyPinner]

I experience the same error on Solaris 9
gcc 3.3.2
libmcrypt 2.5.7
error:
wake_LTX__mcrypt_decrypt ../lib/.libs/libmcrypt.so
ld: fatal: Symbol referencing errors. No output written 
to .libs/ciphertest
collect2: ld returned 1 exit status
Error code 1
make: Fatal error: Command failed for target ciphertest' Current working directory /export/home/chriss/upd/libmcrypt- 2.5.7/src *** Error code 1 make: Fatal error: Command failed for targetall-recursive'
Current working directory /export/home/chriss/upd/libmcrypt-
2.5.7 Error code 1
make: Fatal error: Command failed for target `all'```

[AshleyPinner]

I am also getting the same error with Sol9, GCC 3.2.2, and all the requisite GNU utils.

[AshleyPinner]

Under Solaris 2.8, using Sun's cc (Forte 6.2) I have no
problems.
I ran configure with these environment vars:
CC=cc CFLAGS="-xO2 -xlibmil -xarch=v8plusa"
and with just the --prefix option.

[AshleyPinner]

Same case here under Solaris 9 and gcc 3.3.2.
./configure ; make 
stops on ld errors (multiple pages).
another shot on
./configure ; make
and the compilations succeeds! But
make check
fails miserably and the compiled library does not indeed
contain any cryptographic algorithm.
The solution is hidden in the details.
Try to set /usr/xpg4/bin before /bin in your path.
Apparently, 2.5.7 contains in the Changelog some information
for "mcrypt_symb.c" created only when needed using sed; an
older post somewhere in the lists suggested that (obviously)
/bin/sed is kind of broken in Solaris (or does not work as
expected).
To verify the correctness of my hypothesis ... Removed all
sources of libmcrypt-2.5.7 (dir and .tar.gz), re-downloaded
the files, changed my path as /usr/xpg4/bin to be before
/bin and everything worked just fine, including
./configure ; make
make checks
I think it should be referenced somewhere or else the
./configure script should do a much better work as to verify
that detected sed works as expected.

[AshleyPinner]

This is under investigation and, yes, there is significant
bit-rot in the build system. I am working on replacing the
entire build engine, as the current one has so may problems.

[AshleyPinner]

cd /var/tmp
rm -rf libmcrypt-2.5.7
gunzip -c /ul/src/crypto/libmcrypt-2.5.7.tar.gz | tar -xvf -
cd libmcrypt-2.5.7
./configure --prefix=/usr/local
gmake
cd lib
gmake clean
gmake
cd ..
gmake
gmake install