using #include directives in Platform Builder DAT files

Question

So I know I can use #include in BIB and REG files to pull in other files like this:

#include $(_PLATFORMROOT)\MYPLATFORM\FILES\MYBIB.BIB

but it seems that I can’t get DAT files to behave the same way. Am I missing something here? I have a component that has a fairly large DAT file and I’d rather not have users forced to paste the whole thing into their PROJECT.DAT file, but instead have a simple one-line include to pull it in.

Answer 1

It appears from further testing and from feedback from other developers who use Platform Builder that this is indeed a limitation of the SYSGEN process. The DAT file parser simply does not support #include directives. A few hacks were suggested to get a similar behavior, the "best" of which I think is to append the DAT contents using the PostFmergeObj.bat file and just give the customer 2 files to place in their BSP\FILES folder (the batch file PostFmergeObj.bat and the DAT file that gets appended to their platoform's INITOBJ.DAT file). A similar technique is outlined here for filtering pieces out of a DAT file.

Hopefully the next release of PB will have a better DAT parser.