When I try to access a page (default.aspx) in a web site in IIS 7.0 (developed using VSTS 2010 + .Net 4.0 on Windows Server 2008), I met with the following error message. Any ideas what is wrong? What means
BadImageFormatException?
BTW: I am running Windows Server 2008 64 bit (not R2) and not activated Windows Server 2008 yet, could it be a root cause?
[BadImageFormatException: Could not load file or assembly 'test.foo' or one of its dependencies. Try to load bad formatted program. ] System.Reflection.RuntimeAssembly._nLoad(AssemblyName fileName, String codeBase, Evidence assemblySecurity, RuntimeAssembly locationHint, StackCrawlMark& stackMark, Boolean throwOnFileNotFound, Boolean forIntrospection, Boolean suppressSecurityChecks) +0 System.Reflection.RuntimeAssembly.InternalLoadAssemblyName(AssemblyName assemblyRef, Evidence assemblySecurity, StackCrawlMark& stackMark, Boolean forIntrospection, Boolean suppressSecurityChecks) +567 System.Reflection.RuntimeAssembly.InternalLoad(String assemblyString, Evidence assemblySecurity, StackCrawlMark& stackMark, Boolean forIntrospection) +192 System.Reflection.Assembly.Load(String assemblyString) +35 System.Web.Configuration.CompilationSection.LoadAssemblyHelper(String assemblyName, Boolean starDirective) +118 [ConfigurationErrorsException: Could not load file or assembly 'test.foo' or one of its dependencies. Try to load bad formatted program. ] System.Web.Configuration.CompilationSection.LoadAssemblyHelper(String assemblyName, Boolean starDirective) +11392147 System.Web.Configuration.CompilationSection.LoadAllAssembliesFromAppDomainBinDirectory() +484 System.Web.Configuration.AssemblyInfo.get_AssemblyInternal() +127 System.Web.Compilation.BuildManager.GetReferencedAssemblies(CompilationSection compConfig) +334 System.Web.Compilation.BuildManager.CallPreStartInitMethods() +280 System.Web.Hosting.HostingEnvironment.Initialize(ApplicationManager appManager, IApplicationHost appHost, IConfigMapPathFactory configMapPathFactory, HostingEnvironmentParameters hostingParameters, PolicyLevel policyLevel, Exception appDomainCreationException) +1087 [HttpException (0x80004005): Could not load file or assembly 'test.foo' or one of its dependencies. Try to load bad formatted program. ] System.Web.HttpRuntime.FirstRequestInit(HttpContext context) +11524352 System.Web.HttpRuntime.EnsureFirstRequestInit(HttpContext context) +141 System.Web.HttpRuntime.ProcessRequestNotificationPrivate(IIS7WorkerRequest wr, HttpContext context) +4782309
Best Answer
The
BadImageFormatException
is raised when the assembly file can be found, but is not a proper assembly, or is corrupted. For instance, if you FTP'ed the files to the server and the transfer was interrupted, the DLL file may have been transferred only partially, causing this error to happen.On 64 bit vs 32 bit: when you use P/Invoke or COM Interop, some blogger reports that switching to a specific target compilation may help your situation. This means: if you interface with a 32 bit dll, make sure that you compile for
x86
, forcing it to run under WoW32, otherwise you'll receive this exception. This fix is confirmed here and here.Alternatively, you can set your whole system to default 32-bit by running the command:
from the
Framework64
directory.A common solution is to rebuild the file, or to at least re-publish it.