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/MANIFEST (Create side-by-side assembly manifest)

  • Article

Specifies whether the linker should create a side-by-side manifest file.

Syntax

/MANIFEST[:{EMBED[,ID=resource_id]|NO}]

Remarks

The /MANIFEST linker option tells the linker to create a side-by-side manifest file. For more information about manifest files, see Manifest files reference.

The default is /MANIFEST.

The /MANIFEST:EMBED option specifies that the linker should embed the manifest file in the image as a resource of type RT_MANIFEST. The optional ID parameter sets the resource ID to use for the manifest. Use a resource_id value of 1 for an executable file. Use a value of 2 for a DLL to enable it to specify private dependencies. If the ID parameter isn't specified, the default value is 2 if the /DLL option is set; otherwise, the default value is 1.

Beginning with Visual Studio 2008, manifest files for executables contain a section that specifies User Account Control (UAC) information. If you specify /MANIFEST but don't specify either /MANIFESTUAC or /DLL, a default UAC fragment that has the UAC level set to asInvoker is inserted into the manifest. For more information about UAC levels, see /MANIFESTUAC (Embeds UAC information in manifest).

To change the default behavior for UAC, set one of these options:

  • Specify the /MANIFESTUAC option and set the UAC level to the desired value.

  • Or, specify the /MANIFESTUAC:NO option if you don't want to generate a UAC fragment in the manifest.

If you don't specify /MANIFEST but do specify /MANIFESTDEPENDENCY attributes, a manifest file is created. A manifest file isn't created if you specify /MANIFEST:NO.

If you specify /MANIFEST, the name of the manifest file is the same as the full name of your output file, but with .manifest appended to the file name. For example, if your output file name is MyFile.exe, the manifest file name is MyFile.exe.manifest. If you specify /MANIFESTFILE:name, the name of the manifest is what you specify in name.

To set this linker option in the Visual Studio development environment

  1. Open the project's Property Pages dialog box. For more information, see Set compiler and build properties.

  2. Select the Configuration Properties > Linker > Manifest File property page.

  3. Modify the Generate Manifest property. Choose OK or Apply to save your changes.

To set this linker option programmatically

  1. See GenerateManifest.

See also

Manifest files reference
/MANIFESTDEPENDENCY (Specify manifest dependencies)
/MANIFESTFILE (Name manifest file)
/MANIFESTUAC (Embeds UAC information in manifest)
MSVC linker reference
MSVC linker options