[C++] Remove -g flag in release builds

[asfimport]

See SetupCxxFlags.cmake

Reporter: Wes McKinney / @wesm
Assignee: Wes McKinney / @wesm

Related issues:

• Arrow 0.3 release (blocks)

_{Note: This issue was originally created as ARROW-616. Please see the migration documentation for further details.}

[asfimport]

Wes McKinney / @wesm:
I'm pretty amazed by the difference in size of the binaries with and without debugging symbols.

With debugging symbols:

-rw-rw-r-- 1 wesm wesm 15334186 Apr  1 16:15 libarrow.a
-rw-rw-r-- 1 wesm wesm    24776 Apr  1 16:15 libarrow_benchmark_main.a
-rw-rw-r-- 1 wesm wesm  2143544 Apr  1 16:15 libarrow_io.a
lrwxrwxrwx 1 wesm wesm       16 Apr  1 16:15 libarrow_io.so -> libarrow_io.so.0*
lrwxrwxrwx 1 wesm wesm       20 Apr  1 16:15 libarrow_io.so.0 -> libarrow_io.so.0.0.0*
-rwxrwxr-x 1 wesm wesm  1094904 Apr  1 16:15 libarrow_io.so.0.0.0*
-rw-rw-r-- 1 wesm wesm 11654780 Apr  1 16:15 libarrow_ipc.a
lrwxrwxrwx 1 wesm wesm       17 Apr  1 16:15 libarrow_ipc.so -> libarrow_ipc.so.0*
lrwxrwxrwx 1 wesm wesm       21 Apr  1 16:15 libarrow_ipc.so.0 -> libarrow_ipc.so.0.0.0*
-rwxrwxr-x 1 wesm wesm  5633194 Apr  1 16:15 libarrow_ipc.so.0.0.0*
lrwxrwxrwx 1 wesm wesm       13 Apr  1 16:15 libarrow.so -> libarrow.so.0*
lrwxrwxrwx 1 wesm wesm       17 Apr  1 16:15 libarrow.so.0 -> libarrow.so.0.0.0*
-rwxrwxr-x 1 wesm wesm  7974868 Apr  1 16:15 libarrow.so.0.0.0*
-rw-rw-r-- 1 wesm wesm    36030 Apr  1 16:15 libarrow_test_main.a

without

-rw-rw-r-- 1 wesm wesm  1870514 Apr  1 16:16 libarrow.a
-rw-rw-r-- 1 wesm wesm     1984 Apr  1 16:16 libarrow_benchmark_main.a
-rw-rw-r-- 1 wesm wesm   322640 Apr  1 16:16 libarrow_io.a
lrwxrwxrwx 1 wesm wesm       16 Apr  1 16:16 libarrow_io.so -> libarrow_io.so.0*
lrwxrwxrwx 1 wesm wesm       20 Apr  1 16:16 libarrow_io.so.0 -> libarrow_io.so.0.0.0*
-rwxrwxr-x 1 wesm wesm   184888 Apr  1 16:16 libarrow_io.so.0.0.0*
-rw-rw-r-- 1 wesm wesm  1133796 Apr  1 16:16 libarrow_ipc.a
lrwxrwxrwx 1 wesm wesm       17 Apr  1 16:16 libarrow_ipc.so -> libarrow_ipc.so.0*
lrwxrwxrwx 1 wesm wesm       21 Apr  1 16:16 libarrow_ipc.so.0 -> libarrow_ipc.so.0.0.0*
-rwxrwxr-x 1 wesm wesm   599186 Apr  1 16:16 libarrow_ipc.so.0.0.0*
lrwxrwxrwx 1 wesm wesm       13 Apr  1 16:16 libarrow.so -> libarrow.so.0*
lrwxrwxrwx 1 wesm wesm       17 Apr  1 16:16 libarrow.so.0 -> libarrow.so.0.0.0*
-rwxrwxr-x 1 wesm wesm   904100 Apr  1 16:16 libarrow.so.0.0.0*
-rw-rw-r-- 1 wesm wesm     2350 Apr  1 16:16 libarrow_test_main.a

My understanding is that the debug symbols don't impact performance, and we lose the ability to debug core dumps from release builds without them. Any thoughts or opinions?

[asfimport]

Wes McKinney / @wesm:
Since conda packages for Arrow C++ libraries are now growing to about 15MB, I think it may be good to strip debug symbols by default in release builds. They can be added back with ARROW_CXXFLAGS – @xhochy do you have opinions one way or the other? The Linux wheels for 0.2.0 were about 13MB, so these would get smaller, too (https://pypi.python.org/pypi/pyarrow)

[asfimport]

Uwe Korn / @xhochy:
Feel free to remove them, it's not that hard at least for me to produce wheels again that contain debug symbols that I could then hand out to users if there is a problem.

[asfimport]

Wes McKinney / @wesm:
PR: #574

[asfimport]

Wes McKinney / @wesm:
Issue resolved by pull request 574
#574