I am looking over Delphi Package file documentation and I noticed that the equivalent of BPL files for other OS are dylib and so for Mac and Linux respectfully.
I am not sure if Delphi has an equivalent for Header files (.h/.hxx).
In Mac if I want to share a project (built with c/c++) without exposing the source code I would share dylib files and h/hxx files.
In Delpih for example if I want to share a library without exposing the source code. Other post mention you must provide a .dcu and .bpl file.
This leads me to believe that the equivalent of a header file in Delphi must be a dcu file but the description from the docs
does not sound like that of a header file.
Perhaps I am not understanding correctly?
DCU files in native Delphi act as a compiled unit file containing both interface (like a header file) and implementation (like an object file).
BPL files serve as reusable, dynamically linkable packages, similar to .dll, .dylib, or .so files you mention.
Unlike C or C++, there is no separate "header file" in Delphi; the interface section in the unit (in the original .pas file) and the resulting .dcu file handle this role.
If you have a DLL only (with no source code), you can provide function declarations to other Delphi projects by creating an interface unit. This is somewhat similar to C's .h and would look something like:
unit SomeDLLInterface;
interface
function Example(a, b: Integer): Integer; stdcall; external 'MyLibrary.dll';
procedure DoSomething(msg: PChar); stdcall; external 'MyLibrary.dll';
implementation
end.