Re: Control panel applet question
* Sam Hobbs:
"Alf P. Steinbach" <alfps@start.no> wrote in message
news:Et-dncAwy4vFtQzVnZ2dnUVZ_uydnZ2d@posted.comnet...
* Sam Hobbs:
Wrong. I avoid saying "wrong" but I don't know how to emphasize the error
here. What you are describing is implicit and explicit linking. Implicit
linking is where the linker uses a lib file and then during execution the
dll is located by Windows without requiring us to specify the dll file in
our code. Explicit linking uses LoadLibrary with the dll file name as a
parameter in our code.
Please note that it's not necessary to use a lib file (import library) to
link to a DLL, except with Microsoft's current tools.
Of corse. Microsoft invented DLLs.
If you refer to pure terminology, the term "DLL", then perhaps, but other than
that, AFAIK shared libraries originated with the Multics system.
In the old days we used module definition files. GNU tools still don't
require an import library. Import libraries are tool functionality.
Module definition files are a compile-time thing and Import libraries are
used only at link-time. The compiler does not use lib files in any way
except to pass them on the the linker. The linker never reads def files
without complaining that it cannor understand them.
I'm sorry, that's not correct in any way; it's just meaningless. However I'm not
going to use time on this by cobbling up examples for you. If you can get hold
of early editions of Petzold's "Programming Windows" it does contain some
examples and discussion.
I'm sorry if you feel the terminology to be wrong. But it exists. :-) And
one might make a case that using LoadLibrary explicitly is not linking at
all; it isn't usually referred to as linking (except perhaps by Microsoft
doc ;-) ).
To the extent that a function calls another function, it is linking.
Yes, Microsoft is free to call anything anything they want. :-) But there is a
more forceful argument in the direction it seems you want to go, namely that a
DLL may itself use other DLLs. And in that case loading the DLL involves dynamic
linking, although not relevant at the abstraction level of the loading app.
Please note that terminology is just that, terminology.
As long as one understands the communication, the terms don't matter much;
insisting that only a mostly misleading and seldom used term is "right" is not
very intelligent.
Uhm, I'm absolutely not sure that Windows defined the COFF format, if
that's what you're hinting at here. Checking... Nope, the COFF format
originated with Unix (System V).
DLLs don't have a special format in the manner you describe.
That's incorrect on two counts. First, IIRC I haven't described or discussed the
format of DLLs. Second, they are COFF format (more precisely, PE format).
Windows
executable files use the COFF format, whether they are executed directly by
Windows (an exe file) or linked to dymamically as a DLL. So the fact that
the COFF format was created in Unix for executable files does not prove that
dynamic linking existed in Unix prio to the existance in Windows.
That reasoning seems to be valid. However you're arguing against something that
hasn't been stated or implied. Moreover, shared libraries existed before Unix.
Cheers,
- Alf
--
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