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How are .NET assembly references "translated" to file paths?

Answer 1

+3 A:

Hey,

It looks in the global assembly cache (GAC) in c:\windows\assembly. It has to be installed in the gac using the gacutil utility to install, which is often installed via the installation process of the program...

Brian 2010-08-17 15:45:12

As of .NET 4.0, there's another GAC located at `C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\assembly` for .NET 4.0 components. I don't think Exchange would be there, but for other assemblies, this is a good second place to look.

Ben McCormack 2010-08-17 15:46:59

It could also be in the bin folder of the application as well :) But in regards to OWA, I don;t know where MS put it. Side note, if you are missing DLLs on an OWA installation, I think more things have gone wrong than a simple whoops, I deleted that DLL accidentally.

Tommy 2010-08-17 15:47:20

I've compared owa/bin between both a working SBS 2008 server and the tanked one; no differences. GAC in C:\windows\assembly looks the same too.

gravyface 2010-08-17 16:18:18

@Tommy: no deletion, server went down hard after a power failure a few days ago, came back up, no OWA or ActiveSync. I think there was a pending update/deletion or something with WSUS that never got executed properly after it went down, but nothing in the logs about install errors, just that there were updates installed 4 or 5 days prior to the crash.

gravyface 2010-08-17 16:21:38

what's odd is that comparing the working GAC with the non-working GAC, neither have an assembly called "Microsoft.Exchange.Data" nor is their one in the `owa/bin` folder. There is one in the Exchange Server\bin directory, however, but I don't know if it's even looking in there or not. Might be time for procmon.

gravyface 2010-08-17 16:27:06

It examines the existence of the DLL, plus checks the public key token and version, so make sure those match too, but if the DLL isn't there, that's not a good sign.

Brian 2010-08-17 16:42:41

Marking this as correct answer to the question (unfortunately problem still exists).

gravyface 2010-08-17 18:15:29

Hey, someone else had to copy the DLL locally to the application bin directory, maybe that might be part of the problem: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/forums/en-US/exchangesvrdevelopment/thread/47305c2a-7831-487f-a31d-498559d850d0/

Brian 2010-08-17 18:48:54

Answer 2

A:

In a web site the web server will look in both the GAC and the bin directory. And easy way to see what's in your GAC is to right click add reference and see if the dll is listed in the .NET tab.

To add a dll to the GAC look here for a guide.

Hope this helps.

madcapnmckay 2010-08-17 15:47:50

An easier way is to just navigate to `C:\windows\assembly` or `C:\winnt\assembly`

fletcher 2010-08-17 15:53:54

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How are .NET assembly references "translated" to file paths?

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