Ian Lance Taylor (author of the gold linker) wrote a wonderful 20 part essay to how linkers work: http://www.airs.com/blog/archives/38
I'd also recommend reading the rest of his blog, at least the programming section. It's very insightful.
I'd also recommend reading the rest of his blog, at least the programming section. It's very insightful.
Moreover, he's written "gold", which does what "ld" does but has an actually comprehensible source code :), and speed, or so I heard.