The existing text wrongly implied that symbol look up first occurred in the object and then in main, and did not mention whether dependencies of main where used for symbol resolution. Verified by experiment: $ cat prog.c #define _GNU_SOURCE #include <link.h> #include <dlfcn.h> #include <stdio.h> #include <stdlib.h> #include <unistd.h> void /* A function defined in both main and lib_x1 */ prog_x1(void) { printf("Called %s::%s\n", __FILE__, __func__); } /* The following function is forced into prog's dynamic symbol table because of the static link-time reference in lib_m1.so */ void /* A function defined in both main and lib_y1 */ prog_y1_exp(void) { printf("Called %s::%s\n", __FILE__, __func__); } /* The following function is not forced into prog's dynamic symbol table */ void /* A function defined in both main and lib_y1 */ prog_y1_noexp(void) { printf("Called %s::%s\n", __FILE__, __func__); } static int callback(struct dl_phdr_info *info, size_t size, void *data) { printf("\tName = %s\n", info->dlpi_name); return 0; } int main(int argc, char *argv[]) { void *xHandle, *yHandle; void (*funcp)(void); char *err; xHandle = dlopen("./lib_x1.so", RTLD_NOW | RTLD_GLOBAL); if (xHandle == NULL) { fprintf(stderr, "dlopen: %s\n", dlerror()); exit(EXIT_FAILURE); } yHandle = dlopen("./lib_y1.so", RTLD_NOW | RTLD_GLOBAL); if (yHandle == NULL) { fprintf(stderr, "dlopen: %s\n", dlerror()); exit(EXIT_FAILURE); } /* Optionally display the link map() */ if (argc > 1) { printf("Link map as shown from dl_iterate_phdr() callbacks:\n"); dl_iterate_phdr(callback, NULL); printf("\n"); } (void) dlerror(); /* Clear dlerror() */ #pragma GCC diagnostic push #pragma GCC diagnostic ignored "-Wpedantic" funcp = (void (*)(void)) dlsym(yHandle, "y1_enter"); #pragma GCC diagnostic pop err = dlerror(); if (err != NULL) { fprintf(stderr, "dlsym: %s", err); exit(EXIT_FAILURE); } (*funcp)(); exit(EXIT_SUCCESS); } $ cat lib_m1.c #include <stdio.h> void /* A function defined in both lib_m1 and lib_y1 */ m1_y1(void) { printf("Called %s::%s\n", __FILE__, __func__); } #if 1 void dummy(void) { extern void prog_y1_exp(void); prog_y1_exp(); /* Forces prog_y1_exp into prog's dynamic symbol table, so that it will be visible also to lib_y1.so */ } #endif $ cat lib_x1.c #include <stdio.h> void /* A function defined in both main and lib_x1 */ prog_x1(void) { printf("Called %s::%s\n", __FILE__, __func__); } void /* A function defined in both lib_x1 and lib_y1 */ x1_y1(void) { printf("Called %s::%s\n", __FILE__, __func__); } $ cat lib_y1.c #include <stdio.h> void /* A function defined in both lib_x1 and lib_y1 */ x1_y1(void) { printf("Called %s::%s\n", __FILE__, __func__); } void /* A function defined in both main and lib_y1 */ prog_y1_exp(void) { printf("Called %s::%s\n", __FILE__, __func__); } void /* A function defined in both lib_m1 and lib_y1 */ m1_y1(void) { printf("Called %s::%s\n", __FILE__, __func__); } void /* A function defined in both main and lib_y1 */ prog_y1_noexp(void) { printf("Called %s::%s\n", __FILE__, __func__); } void y1_enter(void) { extern void y2(void); printf("Called %s\n\n", __func__); prog_x1(); prog_y1_exp(); prog_y1_noexp(); x1_y1(); m1_y1(); y2(); } $ cat lib_y2.c #include <stdio.h> void y2(void) { printf("Called %s::%s\n", __FILE__, __func__); } $ cat Build.sh #!/bin/sh CFLAGS="-Wno-implicit-function-declaration -Wl,--no-as-needed" cc $CFLAGS -g -fPIC -shared -o lib_x1.so lib_x1.c cc $CFLAGS -g -fPIC -shared -o lib_y2.so lib_y2.c cc $CFLAGS -g -fPIC -shared -o lib_y1.so lib_y1.c ./lib_y2.so cc $CFLAGS -g -fPIC -shared -o lib_m1.so lib_m1.c #ED="-Wl,--export-dynamic" cc $CFLAGS $ED -Wl,--rpath,$PWD -o prog prog.c -ldl lib_m1.so $ sh Build.sh $ ./prog x Link map as shown from dl_iterate_phdr() callbacks: Name = Name = linux-vdso.so.1 Name = /lib64/libdl.so.2 Name = /home/mtk/tlpi/code/shlibs/dlopen_sym_res_expt/lib_m1.so Name = /lib64/libc.so.6 Name = /lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 Name = ./lib_x1.so Name = ./lib_y1.so Name = ./lib_y2.so Called y1_enter Called lib_x1.c::prog_x1 Called prog.c::prog_y1_exp Called lib_y1.c::prog_y1_noexp Called lib_x1.c::x1_y1 Called lib_m1.c::m1_y1 Called lib_y2.c::y2 Signed-off-by: Michael Kerrisk <mtk.manpages@gmail.com>