What when assembly.GetReferencedAssemblies returns ".exe" dependency?

Question

there is a lot of examples how to load all dependencies from some assembly like:

var assembly = Assembly.ReflectionOnlyLoadFrom(assemblyPath);
foreach (var assemblyName in assembly.GetReferencedAssemblies()) {
  try {
    Assembly.ReflectionOnlyLoad(assemblyName.FullName);
  } catch {
    Assembly.ReflectionOnlyLoadFrom(Path.Combine(Path.GetDirectoryName(assemblyPath), assemblyName.Name + ".dll"));
  }
}

but what if one of dependencies is not ".dll" but ".exe" ? Do I need for that ".exe" assembly again to call recursivly GetReferencedAssemblies() in foreach loop ? Is there a danger of getting circular dependancy ?

br, Milan

score 4 · Answer 1 · answered Oct 19 '10 at 19:22

4

You should be able to use the exe just like any other dll. It just has this extra bonus that it can be executed standalone.

answered Oct 19 '10 at 19:22

Simon D.

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First question is how to recognize that some assemblyName is exe ? I get just its name e.g. "MyFile" but no extension. In my case I know that "MyFile" is exe but in general case I do not know its extension, so the last line in code example I gave will give exception. How to deal witht that, any idea ? another exception handler would be too much... – milan Oct 20 '10 at 09:06
Assembly.CodeBase should tell you the file name. System.IO.File... should enable you to get the extension, but I think you don't need the file-extension anymore, once you have the filename. – Simon D. Oct 21 '10 at 11:42

score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Oct 19 '10 at 19:21

2

An assembly that is a dll can just as well as an exe have references to other assemblies; there is no difference between them from that perspective.

answered Oct 19 '10 at 19:21

Fredrik Mörk

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Please see my comment on Simpzon answer. – milan Oct 20 '10 at 09:07

score 0 · Answer 3 · 2015-08-26T15:12:05.267

As mentioned, you may treat an .exe like a .dll in terms of referencing.

As for worrying about circular references, would those libraries compile if there was one? Just a thought.

Here's some quick recursive code to get all dependent assemblies:

    private static IEnumerable<Assembly> GetAllDependencies(Assembly assembly)
    {
        var dict = new Dictionary<string, AssemblyName>();
        dict.Add(assembly.GetName().FullName, assembly.GetName());
        dict = GetAllDependenciesRecursive(assembly.GetName(), dict);
        return dict.Select(d => Assembly.Load(d.Value)).ToArray();
    }

    private static Dictionary<string, AssemblyName> GetAllDependenciesRecursive(AssemblyName assemblyName, Dictionary<string, AssemblyName> existingRefList)
    {
        var assembly = Assembly.Load(assemblyName);
        List<AssemblyName> a = assembly.GetReferencedAssemblies().ToList();
        foreach (var refAssemblyName in a)
        {
            if (!existingRefList.ContainsKey(refAssemblyName.FullName))
            {
                existingRefList.Add(refAssemblyName.FullName, refAssemblyName);
                existingRefList = GetAllDependenciesRecursive(refAssemblyName, existingRefList);
            }
        }
        return existingRefList;
    }

Circular references **do** happen - see [this answer](http://stackoverflow.com/a/1305043/1364007) by [Marc Gravell](http://stackoverflow.com/users/23354/marc-gravell), an [MVP](https://mvp.microsoft.com/). — Wai Ha Lee, Jan 14 '16 at 13:32

score -1 · Answer 4 · answered Oct 19 '10 at 19:36

-1

GetReferencedAssemblies() does not return the entire dependency tree (dll or exe doesn't make a difference), so you will need a solution that traverses the tree. See this article http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/cc163641.aspx.

answered Oct 19 '10 at 19:36

insipid

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If GetReferencedAssemblies does not return all assemblies is there any option using reflection methods to retrieve all dependencies ? – milan Oct 20 '10 at 12:56
The article explains how to get all the dependencies using the GetReferencedAssemblies() method. As for a single method that returns the whole tree, I do not know of one myself. – insipid Oct 21 '10 at 13:51
Dead link. To bad you didn't actually put the content in the answer :( – Erik Philips Nov 03 '16 at 21:05

What when assembly.GetReferencedAssemblies returns ".exe" dependency?

4 Answers4