Global string unsets itself in shared library

Question

How can a global variable in a shared library unset itself? I was experimenting with a very simple library where I noticed that a global std::string does not hold its value. Here's the full code I have:

in libfoo.cxx:

#include <string>
#include <iostream>

using namespace std;

static string name;

__attribute__((constructor))
static void init() {
  ios_base::Init init_ios;

  name = "LIBFOO";
  cout << "init name: " << name << endl;
}

extern "C" const char *get_name() {
  return name.c_str();
}

in libfoo.h:

#ifndef LIBFOO_H
#define LIBFOO_H

extern "C" const char *get_name();

#endif

In test.cxx:

#include <iostream>
#include "libfoo.h"

int main() {
  std::cout << "main name: " << get_name() << std::endl;
}

Build:

g++ -o libfoo.so -shared -fPIC libfoo.cxx
g++ -o test test.c -L. -lfoo

Run:

LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$PWD ./test

Output:

init name: LIBFOO
main name: 

Where did the value of name go? How could the variable unset itself?

Answer 1

You are stepping on muddy ground here as order of constructors of different types (C++ ctors vs. attribute ctors) isn't well defined and may very across compilers (see e.g. c-static-initialization-vs-attribute-constructor ). So my guess is that firstly you assign to name and then the default constructor runs, resetting it to empty string. You can verify this by stepping through init code under gdb.