DLL - Tools

Several tools are available to help you troubleshoot DLL problems. Some of them are discussed below.

Dependency Walker

The Dependency Walker tool (depends.exe) can recursively scan for all the dependent DLLs that are used by a program. When you open a program in Dependency Walker, the Dependency Walker performs the following checks:

Checks for missing DLLs.

Checks for program files or DLLs that are not vapd.

Checks that import functions and export functions match.

Checks for circular dependency errors.

Checks for modules that are not vapd because the modules are for a different operating system.

By using Dependency Walker, you can document all the DLLs that a program uses. It may help prevent and correct DLL problems that may occur in the future. Dependency Walker is located in the following directory when you install Microsoft Visual Studio 6.0:

driveProgram FilesMicrosoft Visual StudioCommonTools

DLL Universal Problem Solver

The DLL Universal Problem Solver (DUPS) tool is used to audit, compare, document, and display DLL information. The following pst describes the utipties that make up the DUPS tool:

Dpster.exe − This utipty enumerates all the DLLs on the computer and logs the information to a text file or to a database file.

Dcomp.exe − This utipty compares the DLLs that are psted in two text files and produces a third text file that contains the differences.

Dtxt2DB.exe − This utipty loads the text files that are created by using the Dpster.exe utipty and the Dcomp.exe utipty into the dllHell database.

DlgDtxt2DB.exe − This utipty provides a graphical user interface (GUI) version of the Dtxt2DB.exe utipty.