I'm trying to use a Intel RealSense camera in a c# project.
While the example code seams to run just fine.
My own project in a different folder raises an exception.
Unable to load DLL
"realsense2:The specified module could not be found. (Exception from HRESULT:0x8007007E)."
I've now placed the realsense2.dll in lib folder and in debug folder.
I think its a unmanaged dll and the other "Intel.RealSense.dll" seams a .net interface dll . I placed both in lib and in debug folders I tried referencing the Intel.realsense.dll (.net api wrapper) in both locations (debug folder and in lib folder), but to no success.
From Intel forums I noted that sometimes the error gets raised when the CPU model isn't correct, but I kept those the same as the sample.
This must be some visual studio error (since the Intel example works).
But I miss where it goes wrong.
Step 1. Build the provided C++/C# samples using the instructions located in the main repo under /wrappers/csharp/readme.md
Generate the VS solution using cmake (run from librealsense root dir):
mkdir build
cd build
cmake .. -DBUILD_CSHARP_BINDINGS=ON -DBUILD_SHARED_LIBS=ON
The file realsense2.sln should be created in build folder, open the file with Visual Studio, C# examples and library will be available in the solution under Wrappers/csharp.
Both the native library and the .NET wrapper are built by default as part of the examples dependencies.
Step 2. Take a look at the working samples for reference. The default librealsense build on Windows is Debug/Win32 (For this config, built samples will be available at your_librealsense_dir/build/Debug)
In your C# project you need to have Intel.RealSense.dll added as a reference and copy realsense2.dll in your build directory ex: your_project_home/bin/x86/Debug
Note: Looking below, I think it's likely you have all these DLLs. Possibly you have a path issue. Check your EXE is running from the same folder the DLLs are in.
Here are the dependencies of realsense2.dll (x86) output by DUMPBIN:
These Windows ones:
KERNEL32.dll
USER32.dll
ole32.dll
OLEAUT32.dll
ADVAPI32.dll
SHLWAPI.dll
CFGMGR32.dll
SETUPAPI.dll
MF.dll
MFPlat.DLL
MFReadWrite.dll
WINUSB.DLL
And this VS 2017 one:
VCOMP140.DLL
Dependency Walker will tell you which ones you do or don't have.
Using c# in visual studio 2012, I've created a class library FileTube.dll
It uses 3 other dll's.
I want to make a single dll to contain those thus I can publish my library via nuget.
I have tried 3 approaches all failing:
approach 1: In vistual studio, I set the "Embed Interop Assembly" to true, I get this error:
Error 2 Cannot embed interop types from assembly 'DiffieHellman.dll' because it is missing the 'GuidAttribute' attribute DiffieHellman.dll
approach 2: I used ILMergeGUI. It generated the code to use for ILMerge which fails with the error:
Object reference not set to an instance of an object.
Here is the command:
"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft\ILMerge\ILMerge.exe"
/ndebug
/copyattrs
/targetplatform:4.0,"C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework64\v4.0.30319"
/out:"C:\temp\z.dll"
"C:\\FileTube\TestApp\bin\Debug\FileTube.dll"
"C:\\FileTube\TestApp\bin\Debug\DiffieHellman.dll"
"C:\\FileTube\TestApp\bin\Debug\Org.Mentalis.Security.dll"
"C:\\FileTube\TestApp\bin\Debug\Tamir.SharpSSH.dll"
approach 3:
I followed this tutorial
to use reflection to include the dll assemblies. The difference is that the tutorial has a main executable and is including dll in the executable while I'm trying to include dlls in my dll. so I added the reflection code to the class constructor of my main dll. It compiles but it would fail if I rename that external dll meaning that it's not really loading it.
Any ideas?
You have several options:
use ILMerge (free)
For howto see here and here
OR
use some tool like SmartAssembly (commercial)
it can embed and merge among other things (no need to change your source code)
OR
code that yourself in less than 10 lines (free but minimal source code change)
mark all needed dependencies as "embedded resource" - this way they are included in the EXE file... you need to setup an AssemblyResolve handler which at runtime reads from Resources and returns the needed DLLs to the .NET runtime...
(Answer copied from: How to merge multiple assemblies into one?)
This is a simple question. I just can't run my program if the Newtonsoft.Json.dll is not in the program folder. Why this? I've tried adding the reference, added the file to the project root, added to the resources folder, but nothing worked. How to run the program without the Newtonsoft.Json.dll in the program folder? I'm developing in a Windows Form Application.
UPDATE
Problem solved, thanks to spender for introducing me the ILMerge, a really really nice NuGet package that can combine third party dlls to a single executable binary file. For who wants to make a standalone application, just use ILMerge. Rapid, easy and extremely useful. See ya!
Usually, if your program uses a DLL, then you'll need that DLL in the app folder (or in the user path, or the GAC).
The conventional method of distributing multiple files is with an installer. You can write one using either WiX or the VS Installer Projects extension. Now all your output files get installed in one go along with all the other goodness that comes with an installed program. I have a strong preference for this method.
However, there are alternatives:
Download the source and copy the source into your main project, then it will be compiled into your main assembly (make sure you check that this is permitted by the license).
Use ILMerge to combine all your assemblies into a single binary.
If you don't want to reference dll in your program, you can install it to GAC on client machine but I don't understand which the context you want
If you just need some JSON serialization. Can you switch out your functionality with the JavascriptSerializer class which is installed with .Net?
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.web.script.serialization.javascriptserializer(v=vs.90).aspx
Our solution has several (10+) C# projects. Each has a reference to the CAB extension library, with the reference pointing to the DLLs in the library's release folders. Each project has between four and seven such references.
We'd like to make some changes to the library; but to debug the changes, we'll need to build a debug version of the library and refer to that. I'd like to add the library's projects to our solution and change each of the DLL references to a project reference.
Is it possible to perform a 'find and replace' on the existing references, or will I have to do it by hand?
There isn't such a feature in the VS IDE.
However, as a .csproj file is just an XML document it is possible to do such a global search and replace in a scripted fashion e.g. by changing one file to observe the before and after states then running sed over the remainder.
For a one-off, going to the extent of writing a script to load the XML and making the substitutions by DOM manipulation is probably overkill.
Take a look at Jared's answer to this SO thread. That approach will likely work for you.
If you download CI Factory, it just so happens that there is a nant function in there called FixUpThirdPartyRefs which you could use or tweak to help you do this. So you could just setup nant and use that function.
It is part of the power tools with CI Factory: http://www.cifactory.org/joomla/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=29&Itemid=41
Why don't you just replace DLLs in library's release folder with debug version temporary ? I assume that you have local development environment.
EDIT:
You could:
1. develop all time with debug version of library
2. make updating references in *.csproj more flexible
3. make file system location of library files more flexible
On point 3: If the path to your library dlls contains "release" and if debug and release library folder structure is the same than change from release could be made by just renaming folder "release" to "release.original" and "debug" to "release".
I would probably choose option 1 and all time develop with debug assemblies. Release build would use just for final testing and deploy to customer. Debug and release dlls are not that different.
Do you use ILMerge? Do you use ILMerge to merge multiple assemblies to ease deployment of dll's? Have you found problems with deployment/versioning in production after ILMerging assemblies together?
I'm looking for some advice in regards to using ILMerge to reduce deployment friction, if that is even possible.
I use ILMerge for almost all of my different applications. I have it integrated right into the release build process so what I end up with is one exe per application with no extra dll's.
You can't ILMerge any C++ assemblies that have native code.
You also can't ILMerge any assemblies that contain XAML for WPF (at least I haven't had any success with that). It complains at runtime that the resources cannot be located.
I did write a wrapper executable for ILMerge where I pass in the startup exe name for the project I want to merge, and an output exe name, and then it reflects the dependent assemblies and calls ILMerge with the appropriate command line parameters. It is much easier now when I add new assemblies to the project, I don't have to remember to update the build script.
Introduction
This post shows how to replace all .exe + .dll files with a single combined .exe. It also keeps the debugging .pdb file intact.
For Console Apps
Here is the basic Post Build String for Visual Studio 2010 SP1, using .NET 4.0. I am building a console .exe with all of the sub-.dll files included in it.
"$(SolutionDir)ILMerge\ILMerge.exe" /out:"$(TargetDir)$(TargetName).all.exe" "$(TargetDir)$(TargetName).exe" "$(TargetDir)*.dll" /target:exe /targetplatform:v4,C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework64\v4.0.30319 /wildcards
Basic hints
The output is a file "AssemblyName.all.exe" which combines all sub-dlls into one .exe.
Notice the ILMerge\ directory. You need to either copy the ILMerge utility into your solution directory (so you can distribute the source without having to worry about documenting the install of ILMerge), or change the this path to point to where ILMerge.exe resides.
Advanced hints
If you have problems with it not working, turn on Output, and select Show output from: Build. Check the exact command that Visual Studio actually generated, and check for errors.
Sample Build Script
This script replaces all .exe + .dll files with a single combined .exe. It also keeps the debugging .pdb file intact.
To use, paste this into your Post Build step, under the Build Events tab in a C# project, and make sure you adjust the path in the first line to point to ILMerge.exe:
rem Create a single .exe that combines the root .exe and all subassemblies.
"$(SolutionDir)ILMerge\ILMerge.exe" /out:"$(TargetDir)$(TargetName).all.exe" "$(TargetDir)$(TargetName).exe" "$(TargetDir)*.dll" /target:exe /targetplatform:v4,C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework64\v4.0.30319 /wildcards
rem Remove all subassemblies.
del *.dll
rem Remove all .pdb files (except the new, combined pdb we just created).
ren "$(TargetDir)$(TargetName).all.pdb" "$(TargetName).all.pdb.temp"
del *.pdb
ren "$(TargetDir)$(TargetName).all.pdb.temp" "$(TargetName).all.pdb"
rem Delete the original, non-combined .exe.
del "$(TargetDir)$(TargetName).exe"
rem Rename the combined .exe and .pdb to the original project name we started with.
ren "$(TargetDir)$(TargetName).all.pdb" "$(TargetName).pdb"
ren "$(TargetDir)$(TargetName).all.exe" "$(TargetName).exe"
exit 0
We use ILMerge on the Microsoft application blocks - instead of 12 seperate DLL files, we have a single file that we can upload to our client areas, plus the file system structure is alot neater.
After merging the files, I had to edit the visual studio project list, remove the 12 seperate assmeblies and add the single file as a reference, otherwise it would complain that it couldnt find the specific assembly. Im not too sure how this would work on post deployment though, could be worth giving it a try.
I know this is an old question, but we not only use ILMerge to reduce the number of dependencies but also to internalise the "internal" dependencies (eg automapper, restsharp, etc) that are used by the utility. This means they are completely abstracted away, and the project using the merged utility doesn't need to know about them. This again reduces the required references in the project, and allows it to use / update its own version of the same external library if required.
We use ILMerge on quite a few projects. The Web Service Software Factory, for example produces something like 8 assemblies as its output. We merge all of those DLLs into a single DLL so that the service host will only have to reference one DLL.
It makes life somewhat easier, but it's not a big deal either.
We had the same problem with combining WPF dependencies .... ILMerge doesn't appear to deal with these. Costura.Fody worked perfectly for us however and took about 5 minutes to get going... a very good experience.
Just install with Nuget (selecting the correct default project in the Package Manager Console). It introduces itself into the target project and the default settings worked immediately for us.
It merges the all DLLs marked "Copy Local" = true and produces a merged .EXE (alongside the standard output), which is nicely compressed in size (much less than the total output size).
The license is MIT as so you can modify/distribute as required.
https://github.com/Fody/Costura/
Note that for windows GUI programs (eg WinForms) you'll want to use the /target:winexe switch. The /target:exe switch creates a merged console application.
I'm just starting out using ILMerge as part of my CI build to combine a lot of finely grained WCF contracts into a single library. It works very well, however the new merged lib can't easily co-exist with its component libraries, or other libs that depend on those component libraries.
If, in a new project, you reference both your ILMerged lib and also a legacy library that depends on one of the inputs you gave to ILMerge, you'll find that you can't pass any type from the ILMerged lib to any method in the legacy library without doing some sort of type mapping (e.g. automapper or manual mapping). This is because once everything's compiled, the types are effectively qualified with an assembly name.
The names will also collide but you can fix that using extern alias.
My advice would be to avoid including in your merged assembly any publicly available lib that your merged assembly exposes (e.g. via a return type, method/constructor parameter, field, property, generic...) unless you know for sure that the user of your merged assembly does not and will never depend on the free-standing version of the same library.
We ran into problems when merging DLLs that have resources in the same namespace. In the merging process one of the resource namespaces was renamed and thus the resources couldn't be located. Maybe we're just doing something wrong there, still investigating the issue.
We just started using ILMerge in our solutions that are redistributed and used in our other projects and so far so good. Everything seems to work okay. We even obfuscated the packaged assembly directly.
We are considering doing the same with the MS Enterprise Library assemblies.
The only real issue I see with it is versioning of individual assemblies from the package.
I recently had issue where I had ilmerged assembly in the assembly i had some classes these were being called via reflection in Umbraco opensource CMS.
The information to make the call via reflection was taken from db table that had assembly name and namespace of class that implemented and interface. The issue was that the reflection call would fail when dll was il merged however if dll was separate it all worked fine. I think issue may be similar to the one longeasy is having?
It seems to me like the #1 ILMerge Best Practice is Don't Use ILMerge. Instead, use SmartAssembly. One reason for this is that the #2 ILMerge Best Practice is to always run PEVerify after you do an ILMerge, because ILMerge does not guarantee it will correctly merge assemblies into a valid executable.
Other ILMerge disadvantages:
when merging, it strips XML Comments (if I cared about this, I would use an obfuscation tool)
it doesn't correctly handle creating a corresponding .pdb file
Another tool worth paying attention to is Mono.Cecil and the Mono.Linker [2] tool.
[2]: http:// www.mono-project.com/Linker