Linking

Thinking of Linking

At this time MicroQuill officially supports Borland C++ (4.x 5.x) and Microsoft Visual C++ (2.x 6.x) for use with win32 SmartHeap. In addition, we are actively considering adding additional compilers to the "supported" list. Some of those "unsupported" compilers may also work with SmartHeap most of them probably will, given sufficient tweaking but we have no knowledge of them and cannot help you if you run into problems.

SmartHeap includes separate sets of libraries (debug and runtime DLL import) for each compiler, and a runtime static lib for Visual C++. Some earlier versions of SmartHeap also have a runtime static lib for Borland C++. Prior to the release of SmartHeap 3.31 the standard linking procedure involved identifying which SmartHeap lib your app should link with and manually adding that lib to your project. The specific instructions for doing this are given in the SmartHeap Getting Started guide.

With the release of ver. 3.31, users of Visual C++ now have the option of using the "Quick Start" linking procedure. In most cases Quick Start is the best way to link SmartHeap to a Visual C++ project, as well as the easiest. The advantages of Quick Start are

You don't need to figure out the correct SmartHeap lib to link with. Quick Start inspects your project defines and other compiler settings and determines this for you.
Quick Start ensures that SmartHeap gets correctly linked to your project. Using the old "manual" procedure, this did not always occur.
Quick Start greatly reduces the chance of encountering SmartHeap-related link errors.

For instructions on using Quick Start see Using SmartHeap with Microsoft Visual C++ in the Getting Started guide. To download an html version, click here. Note that if you use Quick Start you should not also manually add SmartHeap library names ("shlw32m.lib", etc) to the "Object/library Modules" line in the Settings/Link dialog.

In the rare case where Quick Start is suspected of causing a linker error, you can link SmartHeap the old-fashioned, "manual" way, by determining the correct SmartHeap lib and manually adding it in the link dialog. In this case you should remove the few Quick Startspecific changes from your project. We also recommend that you force a reference to SmartHeap to help ensure proper linkage. You can do this in the link dialog by changing the category to "Input" and typing

_SmartHeap_malloc

on the "Force symbol references" line.

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