Faster/better way to compare .NET References' properties?

Question

I am in the process of upgrading an older component which shares references to custom assemblies of differing versions.

To compare the properties of references from two different projects I have been copying and pasting the property values individually from the two different references to a text file for easier overview and comparison. (If need be i could paste the text into a diff app for a sanity check.) But this is a time-consuming and error-prone process.

Does anyone know of a quick/easy way to get a text representation of all the properties of a given reference in a less error-prone process?

Thanks.

Answer 1

This information is included in the manifest of an assembly. This is plain text, contains the name of the reference, the key, and the version.

Use MSIL Disassembler to look at the manifest of an assembly.

Answer 2

Actually, i just realized that i can find all of the project references in the prj file. Each reference looks something like this:

<Reference Include="Interop.FOO, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral,   
PublicKeyToken=9d6cef09c63e9262, processorArchitecture=MSIL">
  <SpecificVersion>False</SpecificVersion>
  <HintPath>..\..\Lib\Interop.FOO.dll</HintPath>
</Reference>

All i have to do is find the similar reference in the other project and compare the two in a text editor or diff app.