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Invisible <voi### [at] dev null> wrote:
> >> 1. How does it know which files depend on which other files?
> >
> > If you write an #include line, you create a dependency to that file.
> > It's that simple.
> True. But presumably if you #include a file that defines a function
> prototype, you also need to compile and link whatever file it is that
> contains the source code for that function?
Of course you have to add all the source files to the project. The IDE
then compiles and links them.
The dependencies are not for deciding what should be compiled and linked
into the final executable, or how the compilation should be done. The
dependencies exist simply to make compilation faster when changes are done
to the source files. If you have a 10-million lines-of-code program and
you modify one line, you don't want to re-compile everything. You only want
to re-compile the minimum amount necessary to get the updated executable.
That's what dependencies are for. This is all done automatically by the IDE
(or makefile).
> (Except for the OS header
> files; I have literally *no clue* how that works...)
System library implementations have already been pre-compiled and come
with the system (or the compiler in some cases). Often they are dynamically
loadable, but you can link them statically to your executable if you want.
Dependencies to most system libraries are automatically added to the
program by the compiler without you having to do anything about it. When
the dependency is not there by default, you simply have to specify which
system library you want to use in your IDE or by telling the compiler
(in the Unix side that would be those -l command-line parameters).
To put it in simple terms: In the Windows side that's where a program
depending on a DLL file comes from. A DLL is simply a precompiled library
(which the OS loads dynamically when a program needs it).
> True... But I'm still wondering how VS does this in the absence of
> header files.
Does what?
--
- Warp
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