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Chapter 7 Creating and Distributing Standalone Executables and DLLs
©
National Instruments Corporation 7-15 LabWindows/CVI Programmer Reference Manual
Forcing Modules that External Modules Refer to
into Your Executable or DLL
In the LabWindows/CVI development environment, external modules can link to modules in
the Instrument and Library menus regardless of whether you refer to them elsewhere in
your project. However, when you create a standalone executable, LabWindows/CVI includes
in the executable only modules that your project refers to directly. If an external module refers
to modules not included in the executable, calls to
RunExternalModule or
GetExternalModuleAddr on that external module fail.
To avoid this problem, you must force any missing modules into your executable or DLL.
You can do this when you create your executable or DLL by using the Add Files To
Executable or Add Files To DLL button to display a list of project
.lib, project .a,
Instrument, and Library files. Select the files you want to include in your executable or DLL.
If you select a
.lib or .a file, it is linked in its entirety.
Alternatively, you can link modules into your executable or DLL by including dummy
references to them in your program. For instance, if your external module references the
functions
FuncX and FuncY, include the following statement in your program:
void *dummyRefs[] = {(void *)FuncX, (void *)FuncY};
Using LoadExternalModule on Files in the Project
You can call LoadExternalModule on files listed in the project. You must pass the simple
filename to
LoadExternalModule. However, when you create an executable or DLL from
your project, you might have additional work to do:
• If you link your executable or DLL in LabWindows/CVI, the following rules apply for
files listed in the project:
–For
.c or .obj files, everything works automatically.
–For
.dll or .pth files (Windows 3.1 only), refer to the Rules for Using DLL Files
under Windows 3.1 section earlier in this chapter.
–For
.lib files, by default, Create Standalone Executable File or Create Dynamic
Link Library only links in the library modules that you reference statically in the
project. Therefore, you must force into the executable the modules that contain the
functions you call using
GetExternalModuleAddr.
To force these modules into the executable, include the library file in the project and
take one of the following actions:
• If you want to force the entire library file into the executable, use the Add Files
to Executable button in the Create Standalone Executable File dialog box, or
the Add Files to DLL button in the Create Dynamic Link Library dialog box.
00ProRef.book : 06chap07.fm Page 15 Monday, March 9, 1998 3:23 PM