When I look at libgpc.a with the "size" tool, I see that the file.o section has a rather large DATA section.
[G4:gcc-lib/powerpc-apple-darwin/3.3.2] adriaan% size libgpc.a __TEXT __DATA __OBJC others dec hex 14949 2992 0 0 17941 4615 libgpc.a(rts.o) 34176 49780 0 0 83956 147f4 libgpc.a(file.o) 5668 128 0 0 5796 16a4 libgpc.a(rts-va.o) 440 37 0 0 477 1dd libgpc.a(rtsc.o) 10368 93 0 0 10461 28dd libgpc.a(string.o) 21299 4074 0 0 25373 631d libgpc.a(error.o) 6457 109 0 0 6566 19a6 libgpc.a(string2.o) 21039 385 0 0 21424 53b0 libgpc.a(time.o) 2880 5106 0 0 7986 1f32 libgpc.a(random.o) 31866 6454 0 0 38320 95b0 libgpc.a(filename.o) 4929 141 0 0 5070 13ce libgpc.a(files.o) 5848 2149 0 0 7997 1f3d libgpc.a(getopt.o) 2216 37 0 0 2253 8cd libgpc.a(numtodec.o) 4560 281 0 0 4841 12e9 libgpc.a(sets.o) 2272 69 0 0 2341 925 libgpc.a(heap.o) 4928 81 0 0 5009 1391 libgpc.a(math.o) 1568 33 0 0 1601 641 libgpc.a(endian.o) 580 5 0 0 585 249 libgpc.a(move.o) 7470 430 0 0 7900 1edc libgpc.a(init.o) 64 33 0 0 97 61 libgpc.a(gpc.o)
Disassembly shows a 50 KB data chunk in file.o filled with (mainly) zero's. Looks to me like a waste of space.
Regards,
Adriaan van Os