Mixing C# & VB In The Same Project - c#

Can you mix vb and c# files in the same project for a class library? Is there some setting that makes it possible?
I tried and none of the intellisense works quite right, although the background compiler seems to handle it well enough (aside from the fact that I, then, had 2 classes in the same namespace with the same name and it didn't complain).
We're trying to convert from VB to C# but haven't finished converting all the code. I have some new code I need to write, but didn't really want to make a new project just for it.

No, you can't. An assembly/project (each project compiles to 1 assembly usually) has to be one language. However, you can use multiple assemblies, and each can be coded in a different language because they are all compiled to CIL.
It compiled fine and didn't complain because a VB.NET project will only actually compile the .vb files and a C# project will only actually compile the .cs files. It was ignoring the other ones, therefore you did not receive errors.
Edit: If you add a .vb file to a C# project, select the file in the Solution Explorer panel and then look at the Properties panel, you'll notice that the Build Action is 'Content', not 'Compile'. It is treated as a simple text file and doesn't even get embedded in the compiled assembly as a binary resource.
Edit: With asp.net websites you may add c# web user control to vb.net website

Well, actually I inherited a project some years ago from a colleague who had decided to mix VB and C# webforms within the same project. That worked but is far from fun to maintain.
I decided that new code should be C# classes and to get them to work I had to add a subnode to the compilation part of web.config
<codeSubDirectories>
<add directoryName="VB"/>
<add directoryName="CS"/>
</codeSubDirectories>
The all VB code goes into a subfolder in the App_Code called VB and the C# code into the CS subfolder. This will produce two .dll files. It works, but code is compiled in the same order as listed in "codeSubDirectories" and therefore i.e Interfaces should be in the VB folder if used in both C# and VB.
I have both a reference to a VB and a C# compiler in
<system.codedom>
<compilers>
The project is currently updated to framework 3.5 and it still works (but still no fun to maintain..)

You can not mix vb and c# within the same project - if you notice in visual studio the project files are either .vbproj or .csproj. You can within a solution - have 1 proj in vb and 1 in c#.
Looks like according to this you can potentially use them both in a web project in the App_Code directory:
http://pietschsoft.com/post/2006/03/30/ASPNET-20-Use-VBNET-and-C-within-the-App_Code-folder.aspx

It might be possible with some custom MSBuild development. The supplied .targets force the projects to be single language - but there's no runtime or tooling restriction preventing this.
Both the VB and CS compilers can output to modules - the CLR's version of .obj files. Using the assembly linker, you could take the modules from the VB and CS code and produce a single assembly.
Not that this would be a trival effort, but it probably would work.

Walkthrough: Using Multiple Programming Languages in a Web Site Project http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms366714.aspx
By default, the App_Code folder does not allow multiple programming languages. However, in a Web site project you can modify your folder structure and configuration settings to support multiple programming languages such as Visual Basic and C#. This allows ASP.NET to create multiple assemblies, one for each language. For more information, see Shared Code Folders in ASP.NET Web Projects. Developers commonly include multiple programming languages in Web applications to support multiple development teams that operate independently and prefer different programming languages.

Yes its possible.adding c# and vb.net projects into a single solution.
step1: File->Add->Existing Project
Step2: Project->Add reference->dll or exe of project which u added before.
step3: In vb.net form where u want to use c# forms->import namespace of project.

Although Visual Studio does not support this (you can do some tricks and get MSBuild to compile both, but not from within Visual Studio), SharpDevelop does. You can have both in the same solution (as long as you are running Visual Studio Professional and above), so the easiest solution if you want to keep using Visual Studio is to seperate your VB code into a different project and access it that way.

Why don't you just compile your VB code into a library(.dll).Reference it later from your code and that's it. Managed dlls contain MSIL to which both c# and vb are compiled.

Right-click the Project. Choose Add Asp.Net Folder.
Under The Folder, create two folders one named VBCodeFiles and the Other CSCodeFiles
In Web.Config add a new element under compilation
<compilation debug="true" targetFramework="4.5.1">
<codeSubDirectories>
<add directoryName="VBCodeFiles"/>
<add directoryName="CSCodeFiles"/>
</codeSubDirectories>
</compilation>
Now, Create an cshtml page.
Add a reference to the VBCodeFiles.Namespace.MyClassName using
#using DMH.VBCodeFiles.Utils.RCMHD
#model MyClassname
Where MyClassName is an class object found in the namespace above.
now write out the object in razor using a cshtml file.
<p>#Model.FirstName</p>
Please note, the directoryName="CSCodeFiles" is redundant if this is a C# Project and the directoryName="VBCodeFiles" is redundant if this is a VB.Net project.

I don't see how you can compile a project with the C# compiler (or the VB compiler) and not have it balk at the wrong language for the compiler.
Keep your C# code in a separate project from your VB project. You can include these projects into the same solution.

You need one project per language. I'm quite confident I saw a tool that merged assemblies, if you find that tool you should be good to go. If you need to use both languages in the same class, you should be able to write half of it in say VB.net and then write the rest in C# by inheriting the VB.net class.

At the risk of echoing every other answer, no, you cannot mix them in the same project.
That aside, if you just finished converting VB to C#, why would you write new code in VB?

For .net 2.0 this works. It DOES compile both in the same project if you create sub directories of in app code with the related language code. As of yet, I am looking for whether this should work in 3.5 or not though.

As others have said, you can't put both in one project. However, if you just have a small piece of C# or VB code that you want to include in a project in the other language, there are automatic conversion tools. They're not perfect, but they do most things pretty well. Also, SharpDevelop has a conversion utility built in.

No, not in the same project.but you can use them in the same solution.
though you need to take care that your code is CLS compliant. That means you must not have used such functionality/feature that is not understand by other language. For example VB does not understand unsigned ints.

In our scenario, its a single VB.NET project (Windows Desktop application) in a single solution. However we wanted to take advantage of C# features like signed/unsigned integers and XML literals and string features in VB.NET. So depending on the features, at runtime we build the code file, compile using respective Rosalyn compiler (VB/CS) into DLL and dynamically load into current assembly. Of course we had to work on delinking, unloading, reloading, naming etc of the dynamic DLLs and the memory management were we largely used dynamic GUID for naming to avoid conflict.
It works fine where app user may connect to any DB from our desktop app, write SQL query, convert the connection to LINQ connection and write LINQ queries too which all requires dynamic building of source code, compiling into DLL and attaching to current assembly.

Yes, You can add both of the file in web site only.If the project is a web application it will not allow different type of file.

Related

Why do C# and VB projects have a different manifest resource structures?

My project is a C# NET Framework 4.8 web app that utilizes a Resources folder (with files built as Embedded Resources) to fetch templates at runtime.
Recently I converted it from VB to C# using a very nice Code Converter. While it worked fine, now it seems the structure of the manifest resources has changed, as shown by Assembly.GetManifestResourceNames().
For example, what used to be App.IssueNotification.html is now listed as App.Resources.EmailTemplates.IssueNotification.html .. matching the folder structure in the solution, but forcing me to make changes.
My questions are
What is this VB/C# difference actually called? Is there documentation?
Is there a setting or flag to use the "flatten" resource names like VB does so I don't need to update my code?
You can use vb library inside C# projects, is not an option for you to do it so?, this way you would not need to convert the project you can just easily access to it as an any .dll (library)

Build every Microsoft Visual C# 2012 file in separate .dll

I'm making mods for some game that are created through C# .dll files. I started a C# .dll project in my Microsoft Visual C# 2012. However, I want to make several .dll files - specifically one per .cs file.
How would I do that? I want to avoid making too many projects while every project contains just one file.
What purpose of this? To easily decompile and replace some class? I don't see any profit from this.
Use .cs-files and dynamic (re-)compilation and (re-)loading when needed. Several projects do this. It's quite comfortable way. But not troubleless...
Or make some API that will define what MOD must do and what MOD can do. Most projects that use mod's do this.

I need to use a method in a VB file in my C# program, how can I call this method?

I have a file coded in VB that I need to reference and use in my C# program. I am having trouble getting my C# program to recognize my .vb file so that I can send variables to it through C# windows form methods. How can I get these 2 files to work together? do I need to include a using statement combined with a system method? What do you suggest?
Create a VB.NET new project
Add your VB file into it.
Compile the project and get the DLL from bin folder.
Add a reference to this DLL in your C# project.
Now you can access the functions of VB file.
Alternately, you can add both your C# and this new VB project in a single solution and add a reference to VB project in your C# project. This is the preferred solution from debugging point of view.
You may want to try freely available conversion tools that can convert your VB.NET code to C# code (and vice versa) that will get you rid of all of the above. I regularly use the excellent conversion tool called Econ NetVert available here.
I just noted that you have added VB6 as one of the tags in your question. Is the code in question in VB6? If so, you may first need to upgrade it to VB.NET. I know there was a wizard in VS2003 that could do this for you. Not sure if there's any other equivalent tool or method in VS2010 or VS2012 now-a-days.

compile code in VB are the same as C#?

Let's say that I have an entire project build in C# and other project build VB and I made a reference to this VB project Because this two projects need to interact between each other. Is this possible? the compiled code of this two project could live together??. Also if i made the same project VB and C# the compiled version are the same??
They both compile into intermediate language (IL), and you can use a VB.NET library with C# and vice versa.
If you want to examine the compiled versions of both languages I recommend you download ILSpy - you can open up any .NET assembly with it. There are a tiny few things that are possible in the one but not in the other, and IL has features not implemented in either :)
.net / clr uses an intermediate language.
also referred as IL.
it is similiar to Java's ByteCode
code program written in c# and vb may differ in a the resulting IL-Code but,
the executional result is the same.
Yes, you can mix projects written in different languages.
There are some subtle differences in how the C# and VB compiler produce code from the source code, but most code will be identical once it's compiled.
One of those subtle differences for example is that local variables in VB are initialised to zero, while local variables in C# are not initialised.
Create empty solution
Right click solution name in solution explorer, add existing project, add VB project
Right click solution name in solution explorer, add existing project, add C# project
Solution Explorer>VB project>"My Project">References>Add... button>Projects>Select the C# project>OK
Now you can access public methods in the other project.

Is it possible to run VB .NET and C# in different pages on a .NET web app?

Is it possible to run VB .NET and C# in different pages on a .NET web app?
Picking up a legacy VB .NET project but need to add pages to it, is it possible to write these in C# or can you only have one language per project?
Reply, actually it is possible to run both VB and C# in an ASP.NET project. Please see this post on Tim Heuer's blog. http://timheuer.com/blog/archive/2007/02/28/14002.aspx
Add the following lines to the web.config
<configuration>
<system.web>
<compilation>
<codeSubDirectories>
<add directoryName="VB_Code"/>
<add directoryName="CS_Code"/>
</codeSubDirectories>
</compilation>
</system.web>
Create a sub-folder in the App_Code folder for each language you want to support.
For Example:
/App_Code/VB_Code
/App_Code/CS_Code
Place your VB.NET code in the VB_Code folder and place C# code in the CS_Code folder
If this is an ASP.NET project then yes, you can, but only for ASP.NET elements like pages and master pages. You would only have to change the Language attribute on the main directive (like <%#Page) to C# (or add one if it does not exist). This works because each page is compiled into a separate assembly by the ASP.NET service.
You will not be able to switch languages like this for code-behind files though, since those are all pre-compiled into the same assembly.
However, if I were working on this project with you, I'd be inclined to LART you for doing something like this...
You can use more than one, but it's not trivial, and the hassle required isn't probably worth the gain. After all, pretty much everything you can do in C# can also be done in VB, only the syntax is uglier.
Mixing C# and VB on a per-assembly level, within the same solution, and referencing each other, is really easy though, so if you need to add an entirely new module, you can write it in C# and reference it from the existing VB application.

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