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Add a document for build IDs (WebAssembly#183)
Describe the `build_id` custom section and its use cases. Fixes WebAssembly#133
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# Build ID | ||
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A Build ID (or debug info ID) is a value that uniquely identifies a build. It | ||
is intended to capture the "meaning" or inputs of the build, and is usually | ||
associated with debug info. So for example, programs compiled from different | ||
sources would have different build IDs, even if their generated code happened to | ||
be the same. A common use case is when a build is created with debug info, and | ||
then the debug info is stripped before distribution and archived by the | ||
developer. If both the distributed and archived version retain the build ID, | ||
then they can be matched, and the distributed version can be debugged or | ||
symbolized. | ||
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Because the build ID is usually intended to identify debug info, tools that | ||
transform Wasm binaries will need to decide whether they will preserve, drop, or | ||
recompute the build ID. Generally speaking, if a transformation would invalidate | ||
debug info (for example, by rewriting the code section and changing the code | ||
offsets), then the tool should drop or recompute the build ID. If a tool updates | ||
or regenerates debug info along with its transformation, it should also | ||
generally update the build ID, since the debug info no longer | ||
matches. Conversely, adding custom sections to a binary would generally not | ||
require updating the build ID. | ||
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## Build ID Section | ||
The Build ID section is a [custom section](https://webassembly.github.io/spec/core/binary/modules.html#custom-section) | ||
and thus has no semantic effects and can be stripped at any time. It is named | ||
`build_id` and has no restriction on where in the binary it can appear. It | ||
consists of only 2 fields: | ||
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| Field | Type | Description | | ||
| ----------- | ----------- | ----------- | | ||
| length | `varuint32` | number of bytes that follow | | ||
| id | `bytes` | sequence of bytes | | ||
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Unlike most "string" fields in wasm binaries, the `id` field is arbitrary binary | ||
data and is not required to be valid UTF-8. | ||
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## Implementation Notes | ||
The exact size and method of generating the build ID is unspecified, other than | ||
that it should be unique. LLVM lld supports several different methods, including | ||
a hash (which includes at least all the code, data, and debug info sections of | ||
the output), a random (v4) UUID, and user-specified values. The default is to | ||
hash the output and create from it a name-based (v5) UUID, which is | ||
deterministic for a given set of inputs. |