Building Python 3.12.11 on Linux makes 2 copes of very large libpython3.12.a file

[stevecj]

Bug report

Bug description:

When I build Python 3.12.11 from source code on Linux, the result includes 2 copies of the libpython3.12.a file which is about 56 megabytes in size!

File locations

• <prefix>/lib/libpython3.12.a
• <prefix>/lib/python3.12/config-3.12-x86_64-linux-gnu/libpython3.12.a

I presume one of those is supposed to be a symbolic link to the other, or maybe the entire <prefix>/lib/python3.12/config-3.12-x86_64-linux-gnu directory is not supposed to be included in the installation?

Is this something that everyone is experiencing, or am I likely doing something wrong that is causing this to happen for me?

CPython versions tested on:

3.12

Operating systems tested on:

Linux

[stevecj]

Looking at the files in a Python installation via pyenv, I only see the copy of libpython3.12.a in the config-3.12-x86_64-linux-gnu subdirectory, so maybe it's the copy in lib that does not belong?

[stevecj]

I am configuring with

./configure py_cv_module__tkinter=n/a py_cv_module__sqlite3=n/a --prefix=/var/local/hubwork/hubbins_dist_rhel8/for_server/prefix --with-ensurepip=install --enable-ipv6 --with-system-ffi --with-system-expat --with-dbmliborder=gdbm:bdb:ndbm --enable-optimizations