Here’s a snippet from my build output in Visual Studio 2010:
1>—— Build started: Project: Engine, Configuration: Release_PG
Win32 —— 1>icl : warning #10187: PGOPTI instrumentation disables
multifile optimizations 1>icl : warning #10188: PGOPTI instrumentation
disables IP optimizations
1> !BasketNovel.cpp 1> Compiling
precompiled.h – this should happen just once per project. 1> 1>
Compiling BasketNovel.h. 1>1> Camera.cpp 1> Compiling
precompiled.h – this should happen just once per project. 1> 1>
Compiling BasketNovel.h. 1>1> Console.cpp 1> Compiling
precompiled.h – this should happen just once per project. 1> 1>
Compiling BasketNovel.h. 1>1> Entity.cpp 1> Compiling
precompiled.h – this should happen just once per project. 1> 1>
Compiling BasketNovel.h. 1>1> Font.cpp
From what I see, the compiler’s building my .cpp files in alphabetical order. I’m not really familiar with build concepts. Is this a normal behaviour?
Note: I am using the Intel C++ compiler.
The order of compilation is not really important. The important step that builds your end-product (executable, library, etc) is the linking step, where the pieces from the compilation step will be linked together.