Trouble with LibTool on ARM

[Michael McTails]

I believe I've run into an unusual Libtool issue on the ARM platform. 
I've been working on building a native GCC tool-chain for the NSLU2 
which is an ARM based device. Anyway, I've built a bunch of packages, 
but some of time (such as gettext, and libtool itself) fail with 
messages about .lo is not  a valid libtool object. Anyway, I thought it 
might be just compiler bugs causing libtool to fail, but I can't prove 
it was. Anyway, I included some of the failure messages, and 
information from the proc file system. One important note: The NSLU 
normally includes busybox and ash as it's sh replcement. I deleted that 
symlink and replaced it with bash, but both shell generated the same 
issues. --debug didn't give me any additional information.

config.status: executing depfiles commands
DATABANK:/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8 root# make
Making all in .
make[1]: Entering directory `/share/hdd/data/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8'
CONFIG_FILES=libtoolize CONFIG_HEADERS= /bin/sh ./config.status
config.status: creating libtoolize
config.status: executing depfiles commands
chmod +x libtoolize
make[1]: Leaving directory `/share/hdd/data/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8'
Making all in libltdl
make[1]: Entering directory 
`/share/hdd/data/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8/libltdl'
make  all-am
make[2]: Entering directory 
`/share/hdd/data/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8/libltdl'
/bin/sh ./libtool --mode=compile gcc -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -I. -I. -I.     -g 
-O2 -c -o ltdl.lo ltdl.c
 gcc -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -I. -I. -I. -g -O2 -c ltdl.c -o ltdl.o
/bin/sh ./libtool --mode=link gcc  -g -O2   -o libltdl.la -rpath 
/opt/lib -no-undefined -version-info 4:0:1 ltdl.lo -ldl
libtool: link: `ltdl.lo' is not a valid libtool object
make[2]: *** [libltdl.la] Error 1
make[2]: Leaving directory 
`/share/hdd/data/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8/libltdl'
make[1]: *** [all] Error 2
make[1]: Leaving directory 
`/share/hdd/data/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8/libltdl'
make: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
DATABANK:/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8 root# make check
Making check in .
make[1]: Entering directory `/share/hdd/data/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8'
make[1]: Nothing to be done for `check-am'.
make[1]: Leaving directory `/share/hdd/data/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8'
Making check in libltdl
make[1]: Entering directory 
`/share/hdd/data/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8/libltdl'
/bin/sh ./libtool --mode=link gcc  -g -O2   -o libltdl.la -rpath 
/opt/lib -no-undefined -version-info 4:0:1 ltdl.lo -ldl
libtool: link: `ltdl.lo' is not a valid libtool object
make[1]: *** [libltdl.la] Error 1
make[1]: Leaving directory 
`/share/hdd/data/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8/libltdl'
make: *** [check-recursive] Error 1
DATABANK:/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8 root# cat libltdl/ltdl.lo
# ltdl.lo - a libtool object file
# Generated by ltmain.sh - GNU libtool 1.5.8 (1.1220.2.117 2004/08/04 
14:12:05)
#
# Please DO NOT delete this file!
# It is necessary for linking the library.

# Name of the PIC object.
pic_object=none

# Name of the non-PIC object.
non_pic_object='ltdl.o'

DATABANK:/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8 root# cat /proc/cpuinfo
Processor       : XScale-IXP425/IXC1100 rev 1 (v5b)
BogoMIPS        : 131.48
Features        : swp half thumb fastmult edsp

Hardware        : Intel IXDP425 Development Platform
Revision        : 0000
Serial          : 0000000000000000
DATABANK:/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8 root# cat /proc/meminfo
        total:    used:    free:  shared: buffers:  cached:
Mem:  31571968 24666112  6905856        0   839680 19410944
Swap: 57569280  4005888 53563392
MemTotal:        30832 kB
MemFree:          6744 kB
MemShared:           0 kB
Buffers:           820 kB
Cached:          17844 kB
SwapCached:       1112 kB
Active:          14868 kB
Inactive:         5176 kB
HighTotal:           0 kB
HighFree:            0 kB
LowTotal:        30832 kB
LowFree:          6744 kB
SwapTotal:       56220 kB
SwapFree:        52308 kB
DATABANK:/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8 root# cat /proc/partitions
major minor  #blocks  name

   8     0   80042496 sda
   8     1   79859083 sda1
   8     2     120487 sda2
   8     3      56227 sda3
DATABANK:/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8 root# cat /proc/swaps
Filename                        Type            Size    Used    Priority
/dev/sda3                       partition       56220   3912    -1
DATABANK:/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8 root# sh --version
GNU bash, version 3.00.0(1)-release (armv5b-softfloat-linux-gnu)
Copyright (C) 2004 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
DATABANK:/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8 root#  ./libtool --version
ltmain.sh (GNU libtool) 1.5.8 (1.1220.2.117 2004/08/04 14:12:05)

Copyright (C) 2003  Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This is free software; see the source for copying conditions.  There is 
NO
warranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR 
PURPOSE.
DATABANK:/opt/src/libtool-1.5.8 root#