dynamic-linking

I want to start with a simple linking usage to explain my problem. Lets assume that there is a library z which could be compiled to shared library libz.dll(D:/libs/z/shared/libz.dll) or to static library libz.a (D:/libs/z/static/libz.a). Let I want to link against it, then I do this: gcc -o main.exe main.o -LD:/libs/z/static -lz According to this documentation , gcc would search for libz.a, which is archive files whose members are object files I also can do the following: gcc -o main.exe main.o -LD:/libs/z/shared -lz It is not mentioned in the documentation above that -l flag will search for

This page - http://labs.qt.nokia.com/2011/10/28/rpath-and-runpath/ - says about order for library search in ld.so: Unless loading object has RUNPATH: RPATH of the loading object, then the RPATH of its loader (unless it has a RUNPATH), ..., until the end of the chain, which is either the executable or an object loaded by dlopen Unless executable has RUNPATH: RPATH of the executable LD_LIBRARY_PATH RUNPATH of the loading object ld.so.cache default dirs And then suggest: When you ship binaries, either use RPATH and not RUNPATH or ensure LD_LIBRARY_PATH is set before they are run. So, using RPATH