Creating and calling functions is one of the most fundamental tasks in C++ programming. The function declaration serves as the primary description of a function’s interface – or contract – with callers, thereby making it the most important piece of code documentation. A good function declaration should convey as much information as possible. I’m sure …
Let’s say you have an ObjectARX module with an implicit dependency on another DLL. Your installer puts both your ARX module and the dependent DLL into a private application folder. Windows must be able to resolve the implicit DLL dependency at load time, otherwise it will fail to load your ARX module. Alas, Windows will …
Continue reading ‘Using /delayload to specify dependent DLL path’ »
I often encounter cases in ObjectARX programming where numerous boolean flags need to be persisted as part of an AutoCAD database object. For filing and for passing around to other functions, it’s most efficient to package those bit flags into a single unsigned integer. Below is an example that demonstrates how to use a union …
If you’re developing ARX modules that need to be registered as a COM server, you’re faced with some decisions about how to register them. In the old days before anyone cared about user permissions, registration could be safely accomplished at runtime, even via AutoLISP. Unfortunately runtime COM server registration just doesn’t work reliably any more under …
Continue reading ‘Registering an ARX/BRX module as a COM server’ »
The MFC version that ships with Visual Studio 2010 is known to cause major explosions in file size when you link statically. To avoid that problem, I use the Visual Studio 2008 build tools for such cases. I recently got quite a surprise when I rebuilt one such MFC application and discovered that the executable had ballooned from 400kb to 2MB …