Best way to strip off symbols

c++ c visual-c++ gcc symbols
Alphaneo picture Alphaneo · Apr 22, 2011 · Viewed 18.2k times · Source

Last week I released the Linux and windows version of an application.

And after the release we realized that the symbols were not stripped off, and my manager thinks (and I disagree) that it might allow the user to understand our algorithm.

Anyway, now, I will have to clean-up the symbols and re-release the application.

My question,

  1. What is the best way to strip symbols in Linux?
  2. What is the best way to strip symbols in Windows?

Answer

James McNellis picture James McNellis · Apr 22, 2011

With Visual C++ (and other Microsoft compilers) on Windows, symbols aren't part of the binaries. Instead, they are stored in separate files called "Program Database" files (.pdb files). Just don't provide the .pdb files.

With the GNU toolchain you would use strip to remove symbols from the binaries.

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