Re: [Mingw-users] How do I reduce EXE size and link external DLLs?

[Oscar F. <of...@wa...>]

"ironhead" <iro...@ro...> writes:

> Hey All,
>=20
> I=C2=92m new to MinGW and I have a few =C2=93newbie=C2=94 type questions.=
  I=C2=92ve
> compiled my source in MinGW with =C2=96fno-exceptions and =C2=96fno-built=
in and I
> ended up with an exe that=C2=92s 10 times bigger (2.45 MB) then when it=
=C2=92s
> compiled with MSVC 6.0 (224 KB).  I=C2=92m guessing there are other compi=
le
> options that I can try?

Have you tried

strip -s myexecutablefilename

?

Even when you don't compile with -g, gcc generates quite a bit of
baggage that is not needed for execution. 10 times larger seems a bit
excessive, though. Maybe you are linking some library statically?=20

> Also, the nature of my app is to allow for 3rd parties to add dll
> =C2=93plugins=C2=94 to extend the ability of the app.  These DLL=C2=92s a=
re coded in
> MSVC, Borland and Delphi.  I=C2=92ve read on the MinGW web site and in the
> list archives that you can convert DLLs so that MinGW can load them, but
> since the dll =C2=93plugins=C2=94 are loaded on the fly (i.e. the user sp=
ecifies
> which ones they want to load in a config file), converting them is not
> something I want to get into.  Is there a way to natively load them?

I assume you are talking about C exports, as you can't mix C++ code
generated by those compilers.

I think there is no serious problem here. After all, MinGW executables
are using MSVC dll's all the time. Have you tried to simply use those
dll's as you do from an MSVC exe? (You should not have problem with
MSVC. Borland is a different issue, but I guess you sorted that
already, as the problem with Borland is the same for MSVC as it is for
MinGW).

--=20
Oscar