using linux shared library on AIX

Question

Is there a way to use a linux shared library(.so) on AIX? I don't have source code of the library.

Answer 1

I don't know anything about AIX. Based on some quick searches, I would say probably not.

First, the shared library would have to be in the commonly-used ELF format supported by Linux and others. Based on some quick Google searching, it seems AIX probably used COFF instead. So that's strike one.

Then, of course, the architectures would have to match. You haven't specified what architecture you are using, so I checked the list of supported architectures in AIX. Unfortunately, I don't expect any of them to be popular choices for running Linux (PowerPC being the only really potentially plausible one). So that's strike two.

Finally, you'd probably need to be lucky regarding the ABIs used by the shared library. Every function that the library calls in libc and other dependencies would have to exist also in Linux with the exact same ABI. Most POSIX functions are indeed probably matches, but it only takes one missing function to get a link failure... So that's strike three.