I am using Visual Studio 2010 and I'm trying to create a .dll. My .dll uses an external library .lib. This Library also contains a collection of other libraries (.lib).
So: My main.lib is a container for the collection of libs - and as a result it is about 300mb big.
Now when I use the lib in my dll, its linking fine and it works correctly on my pc. But when I deploy my compiled program to another computer, then it couldn't load the .lib. It simply can't find it, even when I've put it into the directory of the .dll.
Now my question: Is there a way I can store all functionality of my .lib in a .dll? So that the .dll file will be about 300mb big but I don't need to deploy the .lib anymore?
Update:
Thank you all very much for your answers. To descripe my problem I want to show you this output of my program:
Unhandled Exception: System.Runtime.InteropServices.SEHException: External componennt has thrown an exception.
I've spent many hours of using google to solve this error. I've found out that it's a problem with a missing file (one of my "external components" (.dll)) couldn't find definitions of classes and so on or otherwise a problem with access rights.
I tried my best to fix this and with one try I had success and could use this program. I know that this is because I have put the main.lib into the right folder, so my program could find it. But now I don't know where to put this main.lib. So: my program is broken again and now I want to fix it... I hope this description helps. It's hard to describe it because I don't know exactly what the problem is...
Update 2:
Thanks to your help I solved my problem. At first I misunderstood the principle of how .dll's and .lib's are working. If anyone else has this problem and will be redirected to this post then #D Stanley's answer will help.
Thanks to #David Heffernan I've found out that it's not any missing .lib or something else which is causing this error. It's a problem in my native C++ Code (which is in the .lib). So I fixed this problem (which caused an exception) and now everything is working fine.
Thank you all for your help.
You can not statically link static libraries in other static libraries. What you should be doing instead is statically linking all those individual static libraries in your DLL. Does the linker not warn you about this?
Also, you can't deploy static libraries to another machine, as they can't be linked at run time.
If I understand your situation:
You have several static libraries (.lib)
They are linked together into one big static library (main.lib)
You want to use this library in your dynamic library (.dll)
I'm not certain what's happening locally, but lib files are not "loaded" at run-time - they are linked into either a dynamic library that is loaded at run time (hence the name "dynamic" or into the executable itself. So if your application is working now, then either you're already linking part of it into your dll or it's getting linked into the executable.
So to answer your question, yes, you can link your lib file into your dll - and it will include all of the necessary object code into it. Note that it may not be as big as the source library - that depends on how much of the original code is used by your library.
I also don't see how c# is part of your situation.
From your description it seems that you are linking with *.lib stubs that accompany DLLs for their static loading. You have those DLLs on your computer but not on other computers where you try to use your DLL. So to make everything work, find and copy those DLLs together with your DLL.
Related
I was given a task to edit an existing website however the client has no access to the source code anymore so I accessed what I could on the Virtual Machine. However, the only files I could get from the VM are the front-end files. I need to change something in the controllers so I was looking at reverse engineering the project DLL.
Is it possible to just decompile the current dll, create a new project, copy everything, compile a new working dll and just reupload the dll file to the server? From my experience as a programmer, dlls are given a GUID identifier that gets compiled with the solution when it is deployed. I think recreating the project will assign a different GUID for the new DLL. Will this be alright when it is uploaded to the server?
Any help and clarification is appreciated. Thanks.
Yes, the reuploaded DLL should be fine
But, in the case of strongly named assemblies anything that references that DLL won't be too happy. In which case; you'll need to do the same process with those and link against your new project. Which you'll probably want to do anyway so you aren't trapped by their behavior.
IIS itself won't care; it's just looking for an assembly with the entrypoint.
Here's an answer to a similar question: How do I decompile a .dll file?
It's more of a maybe... Try it and see if it works. You will need to know what framework and assemblies are tied into the library and what language it's programmed in.
Yes, rebuilding the DLL from scratch will work unless the "uploading" process has certain particularities we're unaware of (such as assigning GUIDs to DLLs).
In reality, however, depending on the language used automatic decompilation may not be so straightforward, and doing it manually is a complex and difficult task, so I would approach that task with caution.
At the moment of creating a project of type "Library of Classes, usually one can generate a dll when compiling, but how could I generate a dll without losing others that I already have included?
I explain with an example: It turns out that Nuget downloaded an S22.Imap dll with the one I worked with, later I generated the dll in the traditional way that I explained in the beginning, but when I wanted to work with dll in another computer, I got errors that were not I found functions that contained the S22.IMAP dll. So to solve this problem, I had to copy the dll of my project, S22.IMAP in an additional way in a specific path of the other computer.
My question is:
How could you generate a dll that includes the ones included in the project you were working with?
All the referred 3rd party dlls (S22.Imap.dll in your example) will be copied to the output folder together with your own dll file (let's say a.dll) when you build your project. That means you should always copy them together (S22 + a.dll) to the place you want to refer them, on another computer/folder/place.
If you really want to make them only one file (although it is not recommended), you can set the S22 one as some "nested resource". Then you will get only one a.dll file and the S22 one is inside the a.dll. See below page for some reference:
Embedding one dll inside another as an embedded resource and then calling it from my code
AND, ILMerge is some tool that can help you do so.
In general, you don't. A DLL is a dynamic linked library, and you would normally only combine static libraries during a build. Here is an answer on the difference between static and dynamic linking.
Typically you would include all the DLLs you need in the installer package. If you use Visual Studio to create the installer, it can detect the dependencies for you. When you run the installer, all of the necessary DLLs are deployed. Nearly all commercial .NET software follows this pattern.
It is possible to merge an assembly into another assembly using a tool called ILMerge. This would be a very unusual thing to do, and could cause issues with intellectual property and code signing, so it is not recommended.
I'm trying to connect the concept2 ergometer with a PM4 with a computer so I can use it's input in a game made in Unity3D.
The company of the ergometer provides a SDK that's in C++ (I don't have experience with C++).
I'm using this code to wrap the C++ code in C#.
Here I replace "RPPM3DDI.dll" with "PM3DDICP.dll" and "RPPM3Csafe.dll" with "PM3Csafe.dll".
When I run the code the program throws the following exception:
System.DllNotFoundExeption for DLL PM3DDICP.dll
I put the files of the SDK in the solution folder so that's not it I guess...
So I read (on stackoverflow) that there can be problems with the dependencies and I used DependencyWalker. I got a ton of messages of missing dependencies but it turns out that DependencyWalker is not being maintained and some changes in Windows are causing the missing dependency reports...
The goal is to get the speed that a person is rowing with and use it in Unity3d.
The questions now are:
How can I use this SDK when he can't find the dll file?
How can I locate the dependency issues among all the 'fake' missing dependencies?
I found the problem and I thought: maybe this answer is usefull for someone else too.
The problem was that I put the SDK files in the wrong folder (noob mistake I know...).
I needed to put the files in: Project folder -> bin -> Debug
I couldn't find this solution on the internet
I just downloaded UnRAR.dll from http://www.rarlab.com/rar_add.htm package includes C# sample project when I run in VS 2010 after selecting .rar file for extract I am getting below error message
and when I add reference unrar.dll I am getting below error
Please help / point me what I am missing?
UnRAR.dll is not a .NET assembly so it cannot be used as a project reference.
It is a native DLL so you'll have to use P/Invoke to access its methods or write a C++/CLI wrapper around it.
There's some sample code in this MSDN forum thread that should provide a decent starting place and show the necessary approach.
There also appears to be a fairly complete wrapper included in the Blue Mirror CD/DVD Indexer project.
It should also be noted the SevenZipSharp includes support for this out-of-the-box. I haven't used it myself, but it might be worth checking into.
The sample you are talking about use
[DllImport("unrar.dll")]
to access the functions inside the library.
This DLL should be visible when the test project runs.
So you should copy it into the BIN\DEBUG folder or in a
folder where your project runs.
I'm building a tool in managed code (mostly C++/CLI) in two versions, a 'normal user' version and a 'pro' version.
The fact that the core code is identical between the two versions has caused me a little trouble as I want to package the resulting tool as a single assembly (DLL) and I don't want to have to include the .cpp files for the common code in the projects of the two versions of the tools. I'd rather have a project for the common code and a project for each version of the tool and have each version of the tools project depend on the common code and link it in as desired.
In unmanaged C++ I'd do this by placing the common code in a static library and linking both versions of the tool to it. I don't seem to be able to get this to work in C++/CLI. It seems that I'm forced to build the common code into a DLL assembly and that results in more DLL's than I'd like.
So, in summary, I can't work out how to build the common code in one project and link it with each of the final product projects to produce two single DLL assemblies that both include the common code.
I'm probably doing something wrong but I tried to work out how to do this using netmodules and whatever and I just couldn't get it to work. In the end the only way I got it working was to tell the linker to link the build products of the common code assembly rather than the results which works but is a bit of a hack IMHO.
Anyway, does anyone have any suggestions for how I SHOULD be solving this problem?
Edited: I guess I should have mentioned the fact that the assemblies generated are not 100% managed code, they contain a mix of managed and unmanaged code as is, probably, quite common with assemblies produced with C++/CLI...
If you are annoyed at all the DLLs, download ILMerge. I use this to bundle together multiple DLL's into an easy-to-use .EXE for my clients.
If I'm understanding this correctly, you have a solution which contains two projects. One project for the "normal" user and one project for the "pro" user. Visual Studio allows you to add a "link" to another file source from another project. If your "pro" version has the real core code file, and in your "normal" version you add existing -> find the file in the "pro" project, and click the down arrow by the Add button and select "Add as Link". Now you have single file that is literally the same between two projects.
As said, ILmerge is one way. Personally, if you're bundling some exe with a lot of DLLs, I favor Netz.
You could use modules. You can link them into an assembly using the assembly linker, al.exe.
That's the downside of the .Net compilation process, you can't have things like static libraries and the header files that hold them together, everything is held in one big dll file and the only way to share information is to either build a common dll and reference it from other assemblies or to duplicate the code in each dll (possibly by copying/linking .cs files between projects).
Note that the 2nd way will declare different types, even though they have the same name. This will bite you on the ass with stuff like remoting (or anything that requires casting to specific shared interfaces between processes).
Remotesoft Salamander will hook you up. It's basically a native compiler and linker.
When using mono (or cygwin is an option) mkbundle may also be a valid choice.