Once the program has been successfully preprocessed and compiled, it is linked with the import library for DBLIB to form an executable file. When the database server is running, this executable file uses DBLIB to interact with the database server. The database server does not have to be running when the program is preprocessed.

For Windows, there are separate import libraries for Microsoft Visual C++, for Watcom C/C++, and for Borland C++.

Under Windows, the use of import libraries is one method for developing applications that call functions in DLLs. SQL Anywhere also provides an alternative, and recommended method which avoids the use of import libraries. For more information, see Loading DBLIB dynamically under Windows.