We are using Delphi 10.4.2 Sydney. I would like to create a single unit (or possibly multiple units) that houses all the utility functions we use in our various software products. The idea is we would just include this unit in every project we start and then we can rely on it being there and use these functions freely in all our code. These would probably be mostly class routines and such.

I'm concerned though that some of our projects might only use a single routine in this large unit. The size of our apps is important and we want to keep that size to a minimum. I am not familiar with how Delphi's compiler works or how much space adding a superfluous unit might add or any other issues with this.

Is there perhaps a way to create a Unit where only the functions we actually use will contribute to the final build's size? Is this even something to worry about? How are common utilities library usually handled in Delphi?

CodePudding user response：

The Delphi Linker is supposedly smart enough to detect unused functions and will not include the code for them in the executable it generates. This also applies to class methods. (*1) So, go ahead and create these units.

You can easily check whether code was generated for a method by looking for the blue dots during debugging.

(*1: That feature can be a major pain in the lower back when you want to call such a function from the Evaluate/Modify dialog during debugging.)

CodePudding user response：

Put the units into a separate package project. If you build your exe as a monolithic exe (so packages are linked in) then the compiler should only link in the units that are actually referenced, not the entire package.