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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-05-26T06:44:24+00:00

When we want to use Win32 API, we’d specify the import libraries that have

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When we want to use Win32 API, we’d specify the import libraries that have the API functions we want to use. For example, if I want to use the HttpCreateServerSession function to create a server session, I need to specify httpapi.lib in the linker input setting.

Why there’s no httpapi_d.lib (the debug version)? Why we can use Win32 release version import libraries in our debug version project without any compile/link warning/error?

Normally, when we implement a DLL, we will create both debug and release versions of the import library for people who want to use our DLL. Why Microsoft can provide only the release version? Thanks.

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    Import libraries contain only function stubs, and as such, don’t need to have any debug symbols (you’d have a different library if you were linking to a different, debug DLL — but you normally don’t, even though you build your program as Debug variant). If you want debug symbols for a system DLL, use the MS symbol server (see e.g. WinDbg documentation on how).

    Also, it’s not a linker error to link “debug DLL” with a “release program”, because “debug” and “release” concepts don’t exist at this level (you might get errors related to different ABI, but that’s not quite the same).

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