1 <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
2 <!DOCTYPE pkgmetadata SYSTEM "http://www.gentoo.org/dtd/metadata.dtd">
4 <maintainer type="project">
5 <email>toolchain@gentoo.org</email>
6 <name>Gentoo Toolchain Project</name>
8 <longdescription lang="en">
9 Compilers for high level languages generate code that follow certain
10 conventions. These conventions are necessary, in part, for separate
11 compilation to work. One such convention is the "calling
12 convention". The "calling convention" is essentially a set of
13 assumptions made by the compiler about where function arguments will
14 be found on entry to a function. A "calling convention" also specifies
15 where the return value for a function is found.
17 Some programs may not know at the time of compilation what arguments
18 are to be passed to a function. For instance, an interpreter may be
19 told at run-time about the number and types of arguments used to call
20 a given function. Libffi can be used in such programs to provide a
21 bridge from the interpreter program to compiled code.
23 The libffi library provides a portable, high level programming
24 interface to various calling conventions. This allows a programmer to
25 call any function specified by a call interface description at run
28 Ffi stands for Foreign Function Interface. A foreign function
29 interface is the popular name for the interface that allows code
30 written in one language to call code written in another language. The
31 libffi library really only provides the lowest, machine dependent
32 layer of a fully featured foreign function interface. A layer must
33 exist above libffi that handles type conversions for values passed
34 between the two languages.
37 <flag name="pax_kernel">Use PaX emulated trampolines, for we can't use PROT_EXEC</flag>
38 <flag name="test-bhaible">Run extended regression tests (very slow).</flag>
41 <remote-id type="cpe">cpe:/a:libffi_project:libffi</remote-id>