From d1792f72bf92ac06be7a4785567e2c7bf78c0496 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Nick Clifton Date: Tue, 16 May 2023 16:04:58 +0100 Subject: [PATCH] Document how to use the linker to create a resource only DLL. PR 30359 * ld.texi (WIN32): Document how to create a resource only DLL. --- ld/ChangeLog | 5 +++++ ld/ld.texi | 33 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 2 files changed, 38 insertions(+) diff --git a/ld/ChangeLog b/ld/ChangeLog index 788410a026a..ae1b34af0c0 100644 --- a/ld/ChangeLog +++ b/ld/ChangeLog @@ -1,3 +1,8 @@ +2023-05-16 Nick Clifton + + PR 30359 + * ld.texi (WIN32): Document how to create a resource only DLL. + 2023-05-16 Nick Clifton * ld.texi (-Ur): Clarify the actions of this option. diff --git a/ld/ld.texi b/ld/ld.texi index fdcc8c50e4d..252a0ac9c3f 100644 --- a/ld/ld.texi +++ b/ld/ld.texi @@ -8556,6 +8556,39 @@ archive. The cygwin and mingw ports of @command{ld} have specific support for creating such libraries provided with the @samp{--out-implib} command-line option. +@item Resource only DLLs +It is possible to create a DLL that only contains resources, ie just a +@samp{.rsrc} section, but in order to do so a custom linker script +must be used. This is because the built-in default linker scripts +will always create @samp{.text} amd @samp {.idata} sections, even if +there is no input to go into them. + +The script should look like this, although the @code{OUTPUT_FORMAT} +should be changed to match the desired format. + +@example +OUTPUT_FORMAT(pei-i386) +SECTIONS +@{ + . = SIZEOF_HEADERS; + . = ALIGN(__section_alignment__); + .rsrc __image_base__ + __section_alignment__ : ALIGN(4) + @{ + KEEP (*(.rsrc)) + KEEP (*(.rsrc$*)) + @} + /DISCARD/ : @{ *(*) @} +@} +@end example + +With this script saved to a file called, eg @file{rsrc.ld}, a command +line like this can be used to create the resource only DLL +@file{rsrc.dll} from an input file called @file{rsrc.o}: + +@smallexample +ld -dll --subsystem windows -e 0 -s rsrc.o -o rsrc.dll -T rsrc.ld +@end smallexample + @item exporting DLL symbols @cindex exporting DLL symbols The cygwin/mingw @command{ld} has several ways to export symbols for dll's. -- 2.30.2