Recommendations for building a windows dll

Question

I am trying to create a Windows dll out of a few visual c++ projects that I am working on. My larger goal is to create a dll that can be linked by clients without worrying(too much) about the nuances of how my dll was compiled.

• I would like to understand better if there are a few basic compiler flags that I should use that is broadly acceptable.
• Are there generally accepted procedures for how struct should be written if I need to export out of the Dll. Especially something that wouldn't be too sensitive to packing alignments. The client might have a 4byte packing, or something else for their own project. How to make sure that doesn't affect if my headers are 8byte aligned.
• Does creating a win32 dll or MFC dll matter.

I did structure my project such that classes are exported based on the ideas mentioned here: http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/28969/HowTo-Export-C-classes-from-a-DLL

Answer 1

Have a look at the Best Practices for Creating DLLs, this is basic stuff but often ignored issues that can lead to very ugly side effects.

Answer 2

Some point witch crosses my mind.

1. Do not use stl objects in public method signatures or structs.
2. If possible use only simple data types in your signatures.
3. If you have to export some structs, define the packing in the header.