Xojo - Stripping code before building an application… not always

General
1

ListBox:

I created a Custom ListBox Class (sLB),
I added a EditCopy MenuHandler, and put code there,
I added a ListBox and set its super to sLB,
After a nap, I Copy the sLB.Copy MenuHandler and Paste it into that window,

I ran the project, tested the Copy MenuItem and it worked fine.

Now, days / month / years later (I forgot), in another window, I set the ListBox super to sLB, tested it and it worked as expected.

After another nap (that is what oldsters are best at), I had a crazy idea: whet if I had the same code two times in my project ? What will happens if I cleared a duplicate from the project, build the application and see what happens on the application footprint (size) ?

Result: the newly created application footprint is smaller than the previous one.

So, this duplicate code is not stripped at stand-alone creation.

FWIW.

PS: if I can make an error once, I can do it twice, thrice or more. I searched and, yes, I’ve done it years ago !
I deleted that EditCopy MenuItem (in another window with a sLB), build a new Stand-Alone and it have a lower footprint (than the two previous one).

Oh, yes, I am talking about a 4KB difference (3 x KB here) in the footprint. And most of you do not care for a difference of some MB, so why do I care for so few KBs ? Sometimes I wonder…

2

Code stripping is not an exact science. Often the human knows better than the computer. Especially in the case of menu handlers.

3

stripping is NOT done at the level of “method”

4

A real shame: I placed three copies of the same code in my project !

Then, I am surprised because Xojo does not remove two of them in the stand alone.

Worst: because I do not know how internally code stripping is done, all I can do is to try to explain the way I found (follow) to duplicate (triplicate) the same code (in the same menu event handler) in a project …

5

Tsk tsk tsk : not OOP.

Is it really that important to have a 4Kb difference in a 6Meg (average size) executable ? On a 500 GIGABYTES average customer hard disk ? A 4,000 bytes small fish in an ocean of 500,000,000,000 bytes…

6

It depends on how anal you are… Personally I love to do what I can to make my application footprints smaller.

I was really shocked when I had to update and re-write Shine for 64-Bit, it lost 10mb in weight! Accomplishes the same task, just uses different API, different methods and of course Xojo’s 64-Bit compiler.

7

[quote=247072:@Sam Rowlands]It depends on how anal you are… Personally I love to do what I can to make my application footprints smaller.

I was really shocked when I had to update and re-write Shine for 64-Bit, it lost 10mb in weight! Accomplishes the same task, just uses different API, different methods and of course Xojo’s 64-Bit compiler.[/quote]

For me, the most important is to complete first a functional and as bug free as possible app.

Then, of course, optimization is an art that can be quite enjoyable. I am impressed by your reported shrinking in 64 bit. Very often it is the opposite.

8

Sam: yes, I am in that boat.

Michel: I already stated what you wrote. This is in the last paragraph of the original text.

Also: you are correct when you wrote about a fully functional feature as bug free as possible