[quote]a. does myClass /have/ to derive from TObject?
b. does myClass /have/ to use the ClassDef and ClassImp macros?
[/quote]No neither are compulsory (but both are a performance improvement) See the link Pepe pointed to for more details.
[quote]c. Is the process for generating the dictionary to run this command?[/quote]Yes.
[quote]d) What do I do with these files? Do I /have/ to create a shared library with them?[/quote]Yes (see Pepe’s answer for details)
[quote]a) how is the process different from MyClass?[/quote]It is technically not different. However newer version of ROOT are capable of auto generating those dictionary and libraries.
Cheers,
Philippe.