Microsoft KB Archive/12262

Minimum Load Size in EXE File Header ID Number: Q12262

3.00 4.00 5.00 MS-DOS

Question:

What is measured by the “minimum load size” figure in EXEMOD’s output?

Response:

The “minimum load size” reported by EXEMOD is the minimum amount of memory required for the program to load. It is equal to the size of the load module (contents of the .EXE file minus the bookkeeping overhead) plus the number of paragraphs indicated by the MINALLOC field. The following is a more precise example:

MLS = ([04-05] - 1) * 512 + [02-03] - [08-09] * 16 + [0A-0B] * 16

where [xx-yy] means the contents of the .EXE file from byte xx to byte yy. The fields used are as follows:

[02-03] - Number of bytes in last 512-byte page in the .EXE file. [04-05] - Size of the file in 512-byte pages. [08-09] - Size of the header in 16-byte paragraphs. [0A-0B] - Minimum number of additional paragraphs needed.

This information is available in the MS-DOS programmer’s reference.