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I'm a unix backend dev that has a small roll in maintaining a visual studio project. The vast majority of my code runs on Linux, with a small Windows footprint. There is a proprietary project-specific rule in play here that states all system dependencies must be dynamically linked, but all other dependencies not already installed on the systems, which I thankfully don't control, must be static. In other words, I can use boost, poco, mysql++, zeromq, etc, but those have to be linked statically. I also can't create my own DLLs. My Linux brain is guessing that rule is my Windows problem.

I have a large static library as part of the projects with lots of common code linked into other programs. That static library is compiled /MD, which appears to be what I have to do on Windows to dynamically link system libraries. However, I need that library linked into other programs statically. When I add a reference to the library in VS 2017 to other projects, nothing happens and the symbols aren't resolved and I get lots of link errors. To fix that, I hard-coded my library into the various other projects via Linker->Input->Additional Dependencies and that "works" after a fashion, the code links and runs but VS doesn't resolve the static library dependency. While I can go forward with this solution, it's hardly ideal. Rebuilding the solution always results in failure (or links in old code into a new build) because the big static library always takes the longest and none of the other projects know to wait for that build to complete. The workaround is to build the static library first, then build the entire project.

Does anyone better versed in Visual Studio know the best way to proceed?

Can someone help me understand why this got down-voted? This isn't a troll and I'm hardly a student trying to get someone to do my homework, it's a real problem I'm trying to figure out in a professional setting. I thought that was the whole point to stackoverflow?

Eric McWhorter
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    Unrelated: I think the rule is to prevent DLL Hell. Ultimately it's everybody's problem, regardless of OS. Anytime a program can be mis-matched with the incorrect library version, you have the potential for trouble. – user4581301 Mar 01 '19 at 16:30
  • https://stackoverflow.com/questions/757418/should-i-compile-with-md-or-mt#757537 – Robert Andrzejuk Mar 01 '19 at 17:39
  • https://stackoverflow.com/questions/23882112/how-to-add-the-static-libraries-to-the-project-in-visual-studio – Robert Andrzejuk Mar 01 '19 at 17:42

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So this was something simple. When I went to add the reference I didn't actually click on the check box. Robert Andrzejuk's second comment helped, I had read that before but didn't notice the little check box the first time.

On the add a reference page (right click project in solution browser, Add->References...), the check box next to the item has to be selected. Add reference widget

Robert Andrzejuk
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Eric McWhorter
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