Depending on how they are made, how the linker is configured, and the phase of the moon, static linking can help by just taking the required functions. Also I

Depending on how they are made, how the linker is configured, and the phase of the moon, static linking can help by just taking the required functions. Also I think we, as programmers, have taken the "don't reinvent the wheel" principle too far. The idea is to use 3rd party code to (1) save time writing, (2) reduce the risk of bugs, and (3) lower the maintainance burden. But this makes sense only if the benefits outweigh the corresponding costs of integration, which also (1) takes time, (2) might be done wrong (especially because you don't understand the part you added), and (3) creates a maintainance burden. Of these, only #1 is solved when your development environment makes adding new libs quick and easy.