Re: Why is memory footprint smaller when compiled static?

["Randy Brukardt" <randy@rrsoftware.com>]

Steven Deller wrote in message ...
>When you link statically, just what you need/use is included.  One
>caveat -- libraries, whether C or Ada, come in chunks (called object
>files) that often include many routines, so you get all of them even
>when you just want one.  Normally linkers can't do "dead code
>elimination", though some are getting almost smart enough to do that.


Come now. Janus/Ada's linker has eliminated unused subprograms pretty
much since it was created in the mid-80s. I doubt very much that we were
15 years ahead of the curve there... :-)

I realize that a lot of systems don't do this, and I've never understood
why: it isn't particularly hard nor very expensive, and it can save a
lot of space (it saves nearly 1 megabyte of code size in the Claw
Builder, for example).

           Randy Brukardt