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Is there some way in Windows to prevent unloading of our dll via FreeLibrary? I.e. to "pin" it in memory for the life of the process?
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If your asking if you can safely unload/unmap a DLL loaded in a process from code in the DLL itself, the answer is no - there isn't really a safe way to do this. Think about it this way: Unloading a DLL is done by decrementing it's reference count using FreeLibrary().
DLL files may be explicitly loaded at run-time, a process referred to simply as run-time dynamic linking by Microsoft, by using the LoadLibrary (or LoadLibraryEx ) API function. The GetProcAddress API function is used to look up exported symbols by name, and FreeLibrary – to unload the DLL.
Each DLL and exe you create has a its own heap, i.e. _crtheap. The allocations and de-allocations has to happen from respective heap. That a dynamically allocated from DLL, cannot be de-allocated from executable and vice-versa.
I know it's an old thread, but there is a 'proper' way to do this:
Call GetModuleHandleEx with the GET_MODULE_HANDLE_EX_FLAG_PIN flag.
From MSDN:
The module stays loaded until the process is terminated, no matter how many times FreeLibrary is called.
Just in case anyone else finds this thread...
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