For business reasons, I want to create a C# application that would take a C++ file / snippet as input, compile it (probably invoking a C++ compiler under the hood) and output compilation results.
Do you know how this could be done?
Thanks in advance.
Using CL.exe
Look in to the Process class.
It provides all of the functionality required to start an external application, including a compiler.
Now, depending on the compiler you choose, you will need to specify the start arguments of the process carefully in order to compile in a predictable way.
Most compilers support command-line parameters.
You just need to build the right command and execute it through the shell like advised here.
che
If you want to not just build a single file, but a whole .vcproj file - check the command line parameters for devenv.exe. If I remember correct it is:
devenv.exe /build my.vcproj
You can shell out to any number of command-line C++ compilers (like gcc) using Process.Start.
You could do this by calling any C++ compiler on the command line. I'm sure the compilation results can be redirected so that you can grab it after the compile finished.
If you are trying to achieve something like SnippetCompiler for C++, you might want to look at one of the C/C++ scripting languages. I have always liked CInt.
Sure its possible, it is actually common practice nmake and other make-like utilities call the compiler all the time.
OTOH if you are thinking of deploying this solution to a customer you may be in for a bit of rough ride cause of all the details like settings, location where files are, how to react on the result, license, which c++ compiler to deploy etc.
Another option which is much simpler (IMHO) is instead of C++ to invoke the C# compiler directly from your C# program for compiling a C# snippet. Files can then stay in memory and you don't need to save any files before you compile. There are numerous examples on the web that show how to do that. Another advantage with this solution is that you already have the C# compiler there so there is no need to install a C++ compiler as well.
Related
What I need to do:
1. Create an application in that allows a user to define a function
Now, I need to compile it to .dll . After compilation, the .dll should be loaded into another C# application which will call that function.
Firstly, you don't need to compile C to use pointers; C# has those too... and the odds are, if you can compile and load an unsafe DLL file, you can use the unsafe keyword to leverage them. Your solution will likely be much cleaner if you stick to using one language.
As for the error message, it's not clear whether you're using Turbo C++ (which is no more a C compiler than a rock is a hammer) or Tiny C, but either way __declspec(dllexport) is a Microsoft extension. Perhaps you could try using Microsofts compiler (which isn't a very nice compiler, either), if you wish to use a Microsoft extension... Particularly if you're going to attempt to use such a DLL from another Microsoft product; They're going to expect a compatible ABI!
Is there a way to compile a C++ file from C#, assuming the compiler (G++ or VC++) is installed on the computer?
You should be able to take the same compiler call that you would make in the command line and recreate it using the Process class. The MSDN page has examples of how to use Process.
Yes you would just invoke the c++ compiler with the proper arguments. However there are tools custom built to do just this Make and msbuild for example so I would doubt that a new tool would better serve you.
I understand I can use either the CodeDOM or Mono for compiling and executing C# code on the fly. Which of these are suggested given the security concerns of executing code and flexibility?
EDIT: I need to create an editor in which any user can enter code and choose to execute it. My concern is that if they have malicious code (accessing the file system for example) then I need to take precautions to prevent this from happening. How would I do this using CodeDOM or Mono?
For maximum flexibility, Mono C# compiler should be the choice.
I don't think both provide any security protection inside, as that should be something you do in your own code.
You could use CodeDom anyways, compile and run the code in another AppDomain. My suggestion would be to insert the code as a CodeSnippetStatement into a CodeMemberMethod, that way they can't break out or are constrained by what you provide.
I am designing a desktop application in C#, which automatically generates code
based on the requirement provided.
Now I want to check the syntax of the code that is generated.
In the earlier stages we can feed the system some possibilities.
Is there some thing i can do here rather than feeding the system for
every possibility?
Thanks.
Providing you generate the code yourself, the best way to ensure it's syntactically correct is to generate a syntactically correct code at the first place.
Otherwise, besides creating a custom C# parser and semantic analyzer (a “half-compiler”), you can consider calling the command-line C# compiler, which is part of the .NET framework, and analyze its textual output.
The command-line C# compiler usage and output is described here in MSDN. Have a look on Process.Start on how to start a new process from your code.
The easiest way to check the syntax of generated code would be to compile it. Let the compiler handle this for you.
Since you're generating it, once you get it correctly generated, it should be fine (provided the design is done nicely).
Just run the command-line C# compiler, csc.exe, and look at it's output. The syntax is "csc Desktop\MyProgram.cs". For a .dll, the syntax is "csc.exe /target:library Desktop\MyProgram.cs". The csc.exe executable is usually located in Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\\csc.exe.
I am writing a fairly simple code gen tool, and I need the ability to convert MSIL (or MethodInfo) objects to their C# source. I realize Reflector does a great job of this, but it has the obnoxious "feature" of being UI only.
I know I could just generate the C# strings directly, using string.Format to insert the variable portions, but I'd really prefer to be able to generate methods programatically (e.g. a delegate or MethodInfo object), then pass those methods to a writer which would convert them to C#.
It seems a little silly that the System libraries make it so easy to go from a C# source code string to a compiled (and executable) method at runtime, but impossible to go from an object to source code--even for simple things.
Any ideas?
This add-in for Reflector lets you output to a file, and it is possible to run Reflector from the command line. It's probably simpler to get that to do what you want than to roll your own decompiler.
Anakrino is another decompiler with a command line option, but it hasn't been updated since .NET 1.1. It's open source, though, so you might be able to base your solution on it.
The code generators which I wrote as part of our application use String.Format, and although I am not entirely happy with String.Format (Lisp macros beat it any time of the day) it does the job all right. The C# compiler is going to re-check all your generated methods anyway, so you gain nothing by round-tripping through Reflection.Emit and the (still unwritten) MSIL-to-C# decompiler.
PS: why not use CodeDOM if you want to use something heavyweight?