gamedevlists-windows

[GD-Windows] Mysterious DLL's

[Chris R. <c....@gm...>]

Coming from a console background and being more of a 3D-programmer than
a systems coder, I had a quite confusing moment today. After finishing a
large chunk of rendering code I decided to try out my code on other
machines before checking in - with the result that every machine without
visual studio installed complained about missing dlls (msvcp71.dll and
msvcr71.dll in particular). A quick search for files showed that several
programs (photoshop, etc) all include their own copies of these and
other dlls in their own directories.=20

What is the sense of having a dynamically linked lib if every program
provides it's own copy? Back in the old days of my unix/linux background
I thought dll meant one image of the instruction code of the lib in
memory for multiple programs - by providing several copies of the same
library this benefit is destroyed.=20

Another question I had today was if I were to distribute my program, am
I to include my own copies of the same libraries as other programs do,
or is there any common practice I missed for dealing with these dlls?

I hope these questions are not too simple - MSDN had provided me with a
wealth of information regarding everything, except answers to my
specific questions.=20


many thanks,
Chris=20

RE: [GD-Windows] Mysterious DLL's

[Jon W. <hp...@mi...>]

There days, MS has pretty much capitulated on the "sharing" aspect.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnsetup/htm
l/dlldanger1.asp
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnsetup/htm
l/sidebyside.asp

Cheers,

			/ h+


-----Original Message-----
From: gam...@li...
[mailto:gam...@li...]On Behalf Of
Chris Raine
Sent: Wednesday, September 08, 2004 1:21 PM
To: gam...@li...
Subject: [GD-Windows] Mysterious DLL's


Coming from a console background and being more of a 3D-programmer than
a systems coder, I had a quite confusing moment today. After finishing a
large chunk of rendering code I decided to try out my code on other
machines before checking in - with the result that every machine without
visual studio installed complained about missing dlls (msvcp71.dll and
msvcr71.dll in particular). A quick search for files showed that several
programs (photoshop, etc) all include their own copies of these and
other dlls in their own directories.

What is the sense of having a dynamically linked lib if every program
provides it's own copy? Back in the old days of my unix/linux background
I thought dll meant one image of the instruction code of the lib in
memory for multiple programs - by providing several copies of the same
library this benefit is destroyed.

Another question I had today was if I were to distribute my program, am
I to include my own copies of the same libraries as other programs do,
or is there any common practice I missed for dealing with these dlls?

I hope these questions are not too simple - MSDN had provided me with a
wealth of information regarding everything, except answers to my
specific questions.


many thanks,
Chris

Re: [GD-Windows] Mysterious DLL's

[mike w. <mi...@ge...>]

yeah the big issue is when people install programs that use older 
versions of said dll's - if windows loads a previous 'older' version 
into memory, it causes all kinds of issues.

even though it MIGHT be the same dll name, it might not be the same date 
of build.

i recall this being a major problem with the vbrun300.dll and similar 
dll's 'way back when'. i worked tech support for a visual basic CRM 
application at the time and we had never ending problems with people 
having multiple copies of dll's all over the machine and windows not 
unloading them properly...

we do ship these particular dll's with our own engine runtime, simply 
for this very reason - there is a chance that someone doesn't have it, 
or simply doesn't have them in their system path, so better safe than 
sorry, ship it if your app needs it.

cheers
mike w
www.gekidodesigns.com

Jon Watte wrote:
> There days, MS has pretty much capitulated on the "sharing" aspect.
> 
> http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnsetup/htm
> l/dlldanger1.asp
> http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnsetup/htm
> l/sidebyside.asp
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> 			/ h+
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: gam...@li...
> [mailto:gam...@li...]On Behalf Of
> Chris Raine
> Sent: Wednesday, September 08, 2004 1:21 PM
> To: gam...@li...
> Subject: [GD-Windows] Mysterious DLL's
> 
> 
> Coming from a console background and being more of a 3D-programmer than
> a systems coder, I had a quite confusing moment today. After finishing a
> large chunk of rendering code I decided to try out my code on other
> machines before checking in - with the result that every machine without
> visual studio installed complained about missing dlls (msvcp71.dll and
> msvcr71.dll in particular). A quick search for files showed that several
> programs (photoshop, etc) all include their own copies of these and
> other dlls in their own directories.
> 
> What is the sense of having a dynamically linked lib if every program
> provides it's own copy? Back in the old days of my unix/linux background
> I thought dll meant one image of the instruction code of the lib in
> memory for multiple programs - by providing several copies of the same
> library this benefit is destroyed.
> 
> Another question I had today was if I were to distribute my program, am
> I to include my own copies of the same libraries as other programs do,
> or is there any common practice I missed for dealing with these dlls?
> 
> I hope these questions are not too simple - MSDN had provided me with a
> wealth of information regarding everything, except answers to my
> specific questions.
> 
> 
> many thanks,
> Chris
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> -------------------------------------------------------
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> _______________________________________________
> Gamedevlists-windows mailing list
> Gam...@li...
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/gamedevlists-windows
> Archives:
> http://sourceforge.net/mailarchive/forum.php?forum_id=555
> 
> 

RE: [GD-Windows] Mysterious DLL's

[George G. \(BattleGoat\) \(E-mail\) <ge...@ba...>]

In the old days this was a great idea, of course, but the customer support
issues have now far outweighed the benefits.  Memory is cheap, telephone
support is not :-)

And on top of incompatible dll update versions and other stability issues,
there is the whole new ballgame of security.

So to the original question - yes, everyone is intended to keep their own
DLLs, and in their own directories.

-- George.

- George Geczy
- Lead Programmer, BattleGoat Studios
- www.supremeruler2010.com
- "Designing the Next Generation of Intelligent Strategy Games"


> -----Original Message-----
> From: gam...@li...
> [mailto:gam...@li...]On Behalf Of
> Jon Watte
> Sent: Wednesday, September 08, 2004 4:30 PM
> To: gam...@li...
> Subject: RE: [GD-Windows] Mysterious DLL's
>
>
>
> There days, MS has pretty much capitulated on the "sharing" aspect.
>
> http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-
> us/dnsetup/htm
> l/dlldanger1.asp
> http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-
> us/dnsetup/htm
> l/sidebyside.asp
>
> Cheers,
>
> 			/ h+
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: gam...@li...
> [mailto:gam...@li...]On Behalf Of
> Chris Raine
> Sent: Wednesday, September 08, 2004 1:21 PM
> To: gam...@li...
> Subject: [GD-Windows] Mysterious DLL's
>
>
> Coming from a console background and being more of a
> 3D-programmer than
> a systems coder, I had a quite confusing moment today. After
> finishing a
> large chunk of rendering code I decided to try out my code on other
> machines before checking in - with the result that every
> machine without
> visual studio installed complained about missing dlls (msvcp71.dll and
> msvcr71.dll in particular). A quick search for files showed
> that several
> programs (photoshop, etc) all include their own copies of these and
> other dlls in their own directories.
>
> What is the sense of having a dynamically linked lib if every program
> provides it's own copy? Back in the old days of my unix/linux
> background
> I thought dll meant one image of the instruction code of the lib in
> memory for multiple programs - by providing several copies of the same
> library this benefit is destroyed.
>
> Another question I had today was if I were to distribute my
> program, am
> I to include my own copies of the same libraries as other programs do,
> or is there any common practice I missed for dealing with these dlls?
>
> I hope these questions are not too simple - MSDN had provided
> me with a
> wealth of information regarding everything, except answers to my
> specific questions.
>
>
> many thanks,
> Chris