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From: decomyn@penguin.uss.tek.com
Newsgroups: comp.lang.pascal
Subject: Re: Compiling OPro (was Tips on handling large files)
Message-ID: <6626@tekgen.BV.TEK.COM>
Date: 27 Sep 90 20:07:13 GMT
References: <24635@adm.BRL.MIL>
Sender: news@tekgen.BV.TEK.COM
Reply-To: decomyn@penguin.uss.tek.com (Vergil William de Comyn)
Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Beaverton,  OR.
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In article <24635@adm.BRL.MIL> CDCKAB%EMUVM1.BITNET@cunyvm.cuny.edu ( Karl Brendel) writes:
>I have emailed this information to him, but post it here for the sake of
>the list, at the risk of mostly stating the obvious:
 [ ... stuff deleted ... ]

>5) Undocumented, as far as I know: Some users have reported better
>success by placing their main program into a unit file, which becomes
>the only one used by a dummy main program. I.e., instead of
>
[... more stuff deleted so my news program doesn't complain ... ]

>The claim is that structure like this reduces the RAM requirements of
>the linker. I have not tried it myself, and I fail to see how it will be
>easier to compile MAINUNIT.PAS than it was to compile MAIN.PAS, but I
>present it as the suggestion of others.

Just a guess -- the compiler probably doesn't link in the required SYSTEM
unit start-up code until it compiles the main program.  If the program is
placed into a UNIT with a dummy main, most of the heavy-duty linking and
compiling will be finished by the time the dummy main compiles -- this could
do it if the amount of free space you have is marginal.

>+-------------------------------------------------------------------------+
>| Karl Brendel                                Centers for Disease Control |
>| CDCKAB@EMUVM1.BITNET                        Epidemiology Program Office |

Brendt Hess
decomyn@penguin.uss.tek.com