[Distutils] Question about DOS/Windows static libs

[James C. Ahlstrom]

Greg Ward wrote:

> So: is this true?  Does a static library under Windows need to be built
> with library and library search directories?  Or is this an unnecessary
> appendage that can be jettisoned?

AFAIK, Windows is just like Unix.  You specify a list of libraries to
use to find undefined symbols.  In Unix you add "-lsomething" to the
linker
command line, and in
Windows you add "something.lib" to a list.

The list of lib search directories is used to find the file
"something.lib" in case the full path is not specified.

Only undefined symbols cause code to be linked from these libraries.
If the libs are not needed, no code from them is linked.  Windows
uses a lengthy list of libraries, the whole OS is a bunch of DLL's.

JimA