referencing assembly in GAC

[Rod Snyder]

I have a dll that I want to reference in various projects; I have it
strongly named and used the gacutil to put it in the GAC. I can browse to
the assembly directory and see the dll, but in Visual Studio, when I use the
add reference dialog box, the assembly doesn't appear. I've tried searching
and adding a key to the registry to point to the directory but it still
doesn't appear.

Any advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Rod

 

[Ken Cox [Microsoft MVP]]

Hi Rod,

During development, such as getting IntelliSense support, you should
reference a copy that you put in another common directory or in each
project's BIN directory. At runtime, .NET will use the version in the GAC.

The GAC may look like a regular folder but it doesn't always act like one.

Ken

 

[Rod Snyder]

Ken:
Thanks for the response. This does help. I was able to get it strongly named
and into the gac using the gacutil.exe. However, what is the preferred way
of handling this on a production server where I don't have the sdk.

Rod

 

[Ken Cox [Microsoft MVP]]

Hi Rod,

On a production server, you should be able to copy a strong-named assembly
into the GAC using Windows Explorer. Most good setup kits also do an
installation into the GAC.

Ken