This is part of the generic multilib support for building cross compilers. As such, targets like "powerpc-elf" will have libstdc++ built many different ways: "-msoft-float" and not, etc. A different libstdc++ will be built for each of the different multilib versions. This option is on by default.

Forces old, set-jump/long-jump exception handling model. If at all possible, the new, frame unwinding exception handling routines should be used instead, as they significantly reduce both runtime memory usage and executable size. This option can change the library ABI.

Specify that run-time libraries should be installed in the compiler-specific subdirectory (i.e., ${libdir}/gcc-lib/${target_alias}/${gcc_version}) instead of ${libdir}. This option is useful if you intend to use several versions of gcc in parallel. In addition, libstdc++'s include files will be installed in ${libdir}/gcc-lib/${target_alias}/${gcc_version}/include/g++, unless you also specify --with-gxx-include-dir=dirname during configuration.

Adds support for named libstdc++ include directory. For instance, the following puts all the libstdc++ headers into a directory called "4.4-20090404" instead of the usual "c++/(version)".

   --with-gxx-include-dir=/foo/H-x86-gcc-3-c-gxx-inc/include/4.4-20090404

This is an abbreviated form of '--enable-cstdio=stdio' (described next).

Select a target-specific I/O package. At the moment, the only choice is to use 'stdio', a generic "C" abstraction. The default is 'stdio'. This option can change the library ABI.

This is an abbreviated form of '--enable-clocale=generic' (described next).

Select a target-specific underlying locale package. The choices are 'ieee_1003.1-2001' to specify an X/Open, Standard Unix (IEEE Std. 1003.1-2001) model based on langinfo/iconv/catgets, 'gnu' to specify a model based on functionality from the GNU C library (langinfo/iconv/gettext) (from glibc, the GNU C library), 'generic' to use a generic "C" abstraction which consists of "C" locale info, 'newlib' to specify the Newlib C library model which only differs from the 'generic' model in the handling of ctype, or 'darwin' which omits the wchar_t specializations needed by the 'generic' model.

If not explicitly specified, the configure process tries to guess the most suitable package from the choices above. The default is 'generic'. On glibc-based systems of sufficient vintage (2.3 and newer), 'gnu' is automatically selected. On newlib-based systems ('--with_newlib=yes') and OpenBSD, 'newlib' is automatically selected. On Mac OS X 'darwin' is automatically selected. This option can change the library ABI.

This is an abbreviated form of '--enable-libstdcxx-allocator=auto' (described next).

Select a target-specific underlying std::allocator. The choices are 'new' to specify a wrapper for new, 'malloc' to specify a wrapper for malloc, 'mt' for a fixed power of two allocator, 'pool' for the SGI pooled allocator or 'bitmap' for a bitmap allocator. See this page for more information on allocator extensions. This option can change the library ABI.

This allows the user to define the approach taken for C header compatibility with C++. Options are c, c_std, and c_global. These correspond to the source directory's include/c, include/c_std, and include/c_global, and may also include include/c_compatibility. The default is 'c_global'.

This is an abbreviated form of '--enable-threads=yes' (described next).

Select a threading library. A full description is given in the general compiler configuration instructions. This option can change the library ABI.

Enable C++11 threads support. If not explicitly specified, the configure process enables it if possible. This option can change the library ABI.

This is an abbreviated form of '--enable-libstdcxx-time=yes'(described next).

Enables link-type checks for the availability of the clock_gettime clocks, used in the implementation of [time.clock], and of the nanosleep and sched_yield functions, used in the implementation of [thread.thread.this] of the 2011 ISO C++ standard. The choice OPTION=yes checks for the availability of the facilities in libc and libposix4. In case it's needed the latter is also linked to libstdc++ as part of the build process. OPTION=rt also searches (and, if needed, links) librt. Note that the latter is not always desirable because, in glibc, for example, in turn it triggers the linking of libpthread too, which activates locking, a large overhead for single-thread programs. OPTION=no skips the tests completely. The default is OPTION=auto, which skips the checks and enables the features only for targets known to support them.

Build separate debug libraries in addition to what is normally built. By default, the debug libraries are compiled with CXXFLAGS='-g3 -O0 -fno-inline' , are installed in ${libdir}/debug, and have the same names and versioning information as the non-debug libraries. This option is off by default.

Note this make command, executed in the build directory, will do much the same thing, without the configuration difference and without building everything twice: make CXXFLAGS='-g3 -O0 -fno-inline' all

This option is only valid when --enable-debug is also specified, and applies to the debug builds only. With this option, you can pass a specific string of flags to the compiler to use when building the debug versions of libstdc++. FLAGS is a quoted string of options, like

  --enable-libstdcxx-debug-flags='-g3 -O1 -fno-inline'

With this option, you can pass a string of -f (functionality) flags to the compiler to use when building libstdc++. This option can change the library ABI. FLAGS is a quoted string of options, like

  --enable-cxx-flags='-fvtable-gc -fomit-frame-pointer -ansi'

Note that the flags don't necessarily have to all be -f flags, as shown, but usually those are the ones that will make sense for experimentation and configure-time overriding.

The advantage of --enable-cxx-flags over setting CXXFLAGS in the 'make' environment is that, if files are automatically rebuilt, the same flags will be used when compiling those files as well, so that everything matches.

Fun flags to try might include combinations of

  -fstrict-aliasing
  -fno-exceptions
  -ffunction-sections
  -fvtable-gc

and opposite forms (-fno-) of the same. Tell us (the libstdc++ mailing list) if you discover more!

The long long type was introduced in C99, along with many other functions for wide characters, and math classification macros, etc. If enabled, all C99 functions not specified by the C++ standard will be put into namespace __gnu_cxx, and then all these names will be injected into namespace std, so that C99 functions can be used "as if" they were in the C++ standard (as they will eventually be in some future revision of the standard, without a doubt). By default, C99 support is on, assuming the configure probes find all the necessary functions and bits necessary. This option can change the library ABI.

Template specializations for the wchar_t type are required for wide character conversion support. Disabling wide character specializations may be expedient for initial porting efforts, but builds only a subset of what is required by ISO, and is not recommended. By default, this option is on. This option can change the library ABI.

The long long type was introduced in C99. It is provided as a GNU extension to C++98 in g++. This flag builds support for "long long" into the library (specialized templates and the like for iostreams). This option is on by default: if enabled, users will have to either use the new-style "C" headers by default (i.e., <cmath> not <math.h>) or add appropriate compile-time flags to all compile lines to allow "C" visibility of this feature (on GNU/Linux, the flag is -D_ISOC99_SOURCE, which is added automatically via CPLUSPLUS_CPP_SPEC's addition of _GNU_SOURCE). This option can change the library ABI.

This option enables a special version of basic_string avoiding the optimization that allocates empty objects in static memory. Mostly useful together with shared memory allocators, see PR libstdc++/16612 for details.

This turns on additional compile-time checks for instantiated library templates, in the form of specialized templates, described here. They can help users discover when they break the rules of the STL, before their programs run.

In 3.1 and later, tries to turn on symbol versioning in the shared library (if a shared library has been requested). Values for 'style' that are currently supported are 'gnu', 'gnu-versioned-namespace', 'darwin', 'darwin-export', and 'sun'. Both gnu- options require that a recent version of the GNU linker be in use. Both darwin options are equivalent. With no style given, the configure script will try to guess correct defaults for the host system, probe to see if additional requirements are necessary and present for activation, and if so, will turn symbol versioning on. This option can change the library ABI.

In 4.2 and later, enables or disables visibility attributes. If enabled (as by default), and the compiler seems capable of passing the simple sanity checks thrown at it, adjusts items in namespace std, namespace std::tr1, namespace std::tr2, and namespace __gnu_cxx to have visibility ("default") so that -fvisibility options can be used without affecting the normal external-visibility of namespace std entities. Prior to 4.7 this option was spelled --enable-visibility.

In 3.4 and later, tries to turn on the generation of stdc++.h.gch, a pre-compiled file including all the standard C++ includes. If enabled (as by default), and the compiler seems capable of passing the simple sanity checks thrown at it, try to build stdc++.h.gch as part of the make process. In addition, this generated file is used later on (by appending --include bits/stdc++.h to CXXFLAGS) when running the testsuite.

Use extern template to pre-instantiate all required specializations for certain types defined in the standard libraries. These types include string and dependents like char_traits, the templatized IO classes, allocator, and others. Disabling means that implicit template generation will be used when compiling these types. By default, this option is on. This option can change the library ABI.

By default, a complete hosted C++ library is built. The C++ Standard also describes a freestanding environment, in which only a minimal set of headers are provided. This option builds such an environment.

By default, the library is configured to write descriptive messages to standard error for certain events such as calling a pure virtual function or the invocation of the standard terminate handler. Those messages cause the library to depend on the demangler and standard I/O facilities, which might be undesirable in a low-memory environment or when standard error is not available. This option disables those messages. This option does not change the library ABI.

Disable support for the new, C++11-conforming std::string implementation. This option changes the library ABI.

By default, the new std::string implementation will be declared and a macro must be defined to declare the old implementation instead. That default can be reversed by configuring the library with --with-default-libstdcxx-abi=c++98. This option does not change the library ABI.

Use -fvtable-verify=std to compile the C++ runtime with instrumentation for vtable verification. All virtual functions in the standard library will be verified at runtime. Types impacted include locale and iostream, and others. Disabling means that the C++ runtime is compiled without support for vtable verification. By default, this option is off.