Rules for linking unrecognized sections

If a link editor encounters sections whose headers contain OS-specific values it does not recognize in the sh_type or sh_flags fields, the link editor should combine those sections as described below. If the section's sh_flags bits include the attribute SHF_OS_NONCONFORMING, then the section requires special knowledge to be correctly processed, and the link editor should reject the object containing the section with an error.

Unrecognized sections that do not have the SHF_OS_NONCONFORMING attribute, are combined in a two-phase process. As the link editor combines sections using this process, it must honor the alignment constraints of the input sections (asserted by the sh_addralign field), padding between sections with zero bytes, if necessary, and producing a combination with the maximum alignment constraint of its component input sections.

1. In the first phase, input sections that match in name, type and attribute flags should be concatenated into single sections. The concatenation order should satisfy the requirements of any known input section attributes (for example, SHF_MERGE and SHF_LINK_ORDER). When not otherwise constrained, sections should be emitted in input order.

2. In the second phase, sections should be assigned to segments or other units based on their attribute flags. Sections of each particular unrecognized type should be assigned to the same unit unless prevented by incompatible flags, and within a unit, sections of the same unrecognized type should be placed together if possible.