.net – the GAC in .NET

gacnet

Just looking for a short overview of GAC for a layman, not a link please.

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Right, so basically it's a way to keep DLLs globally accessible without worrying about conflicts. No more DLL Hell. Each architecture and version gets it's own place to live.

It also gets it own way to browse it in Explorer, so if you go to

C:\Windows\assembly

In windows explorer it lists all the DLLs.

But if you fire up cmd, you can see how it's really structured:

C:\Users\tritter>cd C:\Windows\assembly

C:\Windows\assembly>dir

 Directory of C:\Windows\assembly

07/20/2009  02:18 PM    <DIR>          GAC
06/17/2009  04:22 PM    <DIR>          GAC_32
06/17/2009  04:22 PM    <DIR>          GAC_64
06/17/2009  04:22 PM    <DIR>          GAC_MSIL
 ...snip...
               0 File(s)              0 bytes
               9 Dir(s)  90,538,311,680 bytes free

C:\Windows\assembly>cd GAC_64

C:\Windows\assembly\GAC_64>dir

 Directory of C:\Windows\assembly\GAC_64

06/17/2009  04:22 PM    <DIR>          .
06/17/2009  04:22 PM    <DIR>          ..
01/19/2008  09:54 AM    <DIR>          blbproxy
 ...snip...
01/19/2008  09:54 AM    <DIR>          srmlib
01/19/2008  06:11 AM    <DIR>          System.Data
01/19/2008  06:11 AM    <DIR>          System.Data.OracleClient
 ...snip...
               0 File(s)              0 bytes
              34 Dir(s)  90,538,311,680 bytes free

C:\Windows\assembly\GAC_64>cd System.Data

C:\Windows\assembly\GAC_64\System.Data>dir
 Directory of C:\Windows\assembly\GAC_64\System.Data

01/19/2008  06:11 AM    <DIR>          .
01/19/2008  06:11 AM    <DIR>          ..
04/11/2009  12:20 PM    <DIR>          2.0.0.0__b77a5c561934e089
               0 File(s)              0 bytes
               3 Dir(s)  90,538,311,680 bytes free

C:\Windows\assembly\GAC_64\System.Data>cd 2.0.0.0__b77a5c561934e089

C:\Windows\assembly\GAC_64\System.Data\2.0.0.0__b77a5c561934e089>dir

 Directory of C:\Windows\assembly\GAC_64\System.Data\2.0.0.0__b77a5c561934e089

04/11/2009  12:20 PM    <DIR>          .
04/11/2009  12:20 PM    <DIR>          ..
04/11/2009  12:12 PM         3,008,512 System.Data.dll
               1 File(s)      3,008,512 bytes
               2 Dir(s)  90,538,311,680 bytes free

C:\Windows\assembly\GAC_64\System.Data\2.0.0.0__b77a5c561934e089>

Here you can see version 2.0.0.0__b77a5c561934e089 of System.Data.

A DLL is identified by 5 parts:

Name
Version
Architecture
Culture
Public Key

Although the first 3 are generally the big ones.

This is the style that Microsoft tends to use in their examples.

It appears that the guidance in this area may have changed, as StyleCop now enforces the use of the C# specific aliases.

C# – the difference between const and readonly in C#

Apart from the apparent difference of

having to declare the value at the time of a definition for a const VS readonly values can be computed dynamically but need to be assigned before the constructor exits.. after that it is frozen.
const's are implicitly static. You use a ClassName.ConstantName notation to access them.

There is a subtle difference. Consider a class defined in AssemblyA.

public class Const_V_Readonly
{
  public const int I_CONST_VALUE = 2;
  public readonly int I_RO_VALUE;
  public Const_V_Readonly()
  {
     I_RO_VALUE = 3;
  }
}

AssemblyB references AssemblyA and uses these values in code. When this is compiled:

in the case of the const value, it is like a find-replace. The value 2 is 'baked into' the AssemblyB's IL. This means that if tomorrow I update I_CONST_VALUE to 20, AssemblyB would still have 2 till I recompile it.
in the case of the readonly value, it is like a ref to a memory location. The value is not baked into AssemblyB's IL. This means that if the memory location is updated, AssemblyB gets the new value without recompilation. So if I_RO_VALUE is updated to 30, you only need to build AssemblyA and all clients do not need to be recompiled.

So if you are confident that the value of the constant won't change, use a const.

public const int CM_IN_A_METER = 100;

But if you have a constant that may change (e.g. w.r.t. precision).. or when in doubt, use a readonly.

public readonly float PI = 3.14;

Update: Aku needs to get a mention because he pointed this out first. Also I need to plug where I learned this: Effective C# - Bill Wagner

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Related Solutions

C# – the difference between String and string in C#

This is the style that Microsoft tends to use in their examples.

C# – the difference between const and readonly in C#

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