I'm looking for a way to add scripting support with IronPython to an existing .net desktop application and need to be able to have code completion for IronPython there. Code completion should work for keywords, classes, variables, etc. as you type or via Ctrl-Space.
Any suggestions?
Unfortunately, I don't think such a thing exists specifically for IronPython. If you don't need it to be fancy you could something like Scintilla.NET and just run it in normal Python mode and get at least some completion (I think it just suggests things already in the editor buffer).
Providing full IntelliSense is a crazy hard problem, but you could check out the Python Tools for Visual Studio to see how they do it.
I have a C++/CLI library that I would like to use in a Silverlight application. It is supposed to be possible to write code for Silverlight in any .NET language, but so far I've only worked out how to compile C#. Silverlight does not seem to be able to use DLLs compiled for .NET.
I'm using Visual Studio 2010 and Silverlight 4. The only new projects available for Silverlight are C# projects. Porting the code to C# is not a practical option.
How do I compile C++/CLI code for Silverlight?
I think I may have gotten a VS2010 C++/CLI class library project to build with references to (only) Silverlight assemblies.
Update
Ok, it is possible. But it is not nice.
First, you must convince the C++ compiler to NOT load the .NET Framework, using an undocumented compiler switch. But that's not the worst part.
Set your C++/CLI project "Common Language Runtime Support" to /clr:safe
Next, under References, remove all references.
Next, in the C++/CLI project properties, under C++ > Command Line, enter /d1clr:nomscorlib /FU"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Silverlight\4.0.50917.0\mscorlib.dll"
Now, save the project and exit Visual Studio. Open the .vcxproj in a text editor, and change the framework version setting. You want it to be the same as a C# Silverlight project:
<TargetFrameworkIdentifier>Silverlight</TargetFrameworkIdentifier>
<TargetFrameworkVersion>v4.0</TargetFrameworkVersion>
<SilverlightVersion>$(TargetFrameworkVersion)</SilverlightVersion>
Now, reopen Visual Studio, and build the project. You'll get an error because the compiler auto-generated a file with #using<mscorlib> and the search path finds the .NET Framework version first.
Silverlight,Version=v4.0.AssemblyAttributes.cpp(1): fatal error C1197: cannot reference 'c:\windows\microsoft.net\framework\v4.0.30319\mscorlib.dll' as the program has already referenced 'c:\program files (x86)\microsoft silverlight\4.0.50917.0\mscorlib.dll'
Double-click the error to open the auto-generated file. Replace the path-less reference with e.g. (here's where you put your references, not in the project properties)
#using <c:\program files (x86)\microsoft silverlight\4.0.50917.0\mscorlib.dll>
#using <c:\program files (x86)\microsoft silverlight\4.0.50917.0\System.dll>
#using <c:\program files (x86)\microsoft silverlight\4.0.50917.0\System.Core.dll>
Luckily, the compiler leaves your changes in-place. So you should be good as long as no one cleans your temp directory.
Building should now succeed.
Then, you need to go add the DLL created by the C++/CLI project to your Silverlight application. Note that you can't set up a project reference, because VS2010 still isn't convinced that the C++/CLI is a Silverlight project. So you'll have to browse and add the reference as an assembly file. (And it won't automatically switch between Debug and Release to match the Silverlight application).
Final Notes
I got it to run an empty Silverlight application in Debug mode and stop at a breakpoint in the middle of C++/CLI code. Also the C++/CLI code successfully returned a value to C# and the local variable in C# received the correct value. So I guess it's working.
I went through a bunch more steps trying to make this work, but I don't think they affected the outcome. If you run into errors, though, let me know and I'll try to figure out what I omitted from this answer.
Ben Voigt, thanks for this, it worked for me too.
Also, if your C++ code does anything that is specific to the C++ language (i.e. not entirely IL portable) like using stack semantics for an array, you'll get the following error:
could not find assembly 'Microsoft.VisualC.dll' etc.
If you recompile with the full .NET Framework and then dump the IL code, you'll find references to "''.$ArrayType$$$BY06$$CB_W modopt" or something similar. This tells you where to change the code.
I found that after I installed the Silverlight SDK and it got added to "\Program Files(x86)\Reference Assemblies" I did not have to go through all of Ben Voigt's steps, just changing the project file was enough.
Another note, you can also use:
<TargetFrameworkProfile>WindowsPhone71</TargetFrameworkProfile>
if you want to target Windows Phone (install the SDK first).
Silverlight does not support native C++ libraries, nor any P/Invoke scenarios due to security concerns. If your library is pure .Net you might be able to decompile it with ILDASM and recompile for Silverlight with ILASM.
Silverlight is not a powerful development platform like .NET which is tightly integrated with operating system. First of all silverlight is supposed to run on any operating system, so there is no choice of Native API anywhere in silverlight.
Silverlight also does not support MSIL completely, so there is lot of problem in compiling and recomiping it at IL level.
Can you say more about what kind of C++/CLI code you have? Most Rich internet applications (Silverlight's target) do not include any of high powerful computation, instead they are plain simple HTML+JS alternatives. For powerful graphics, you can use Silverlight's PixelShadder support.
Reflector
What you can do alternatively is,
Compile your C++/CLI to regular .NET DLL, use Reflector to disassemble and generate C# source code from your dll, it may not be perfect, but you will have most of your logic converted back in C#.
I was able Ben Voigt's solution to work with some minor changes in Visual Studio 2013
Here is what I did different.
Unload the silverlight project that you want to reference it in. Right click and choose edit project.csproj
Copy the Target Framework Settings. For me this was
<TargetFrameworkIdentifier>Silverlight</TargetFrameworkIdentifier>
<TargetFrameworkVersion>v5.0</TargetFrameworkVersion>
<SilverlightVersion>$(TargetFrameworkVersion)</SilverlightVersion>
For the compiler switch /d1clr:nomscorlib This was not working for me. Also a reference to mscorlib for silverlight was automatically added to the complied output without specifying it on the command line options. This is how I got around it.
Open the project in Just Deompile
Load the Assembly Editor Plugin
Navigate the tree to the references
Delete the reference to the non silverlight mscorlib from the reflexil menu.
Right click on the top level of the tree for the assembly, and save as under the reflexil menu.
I haven't tested all of the functions, but the ones I have tested so far worked as expected.
Thank you Ben, your post has saved me a lot of time. I was thinking I was going to have to port my library:)
We are using Visual Studio 2008 to develop a winforms application stored in Visual Source Safe 2005.
If one of our team members changes a *.Designer.cs file without changing the form's source file the change doesn't appear during a "Get" operation. However, if in Visual Studio you run a compare on the *.Designer.cs file the differences are displayed in the difference viewer.
FYI: We are using the default Microsoft Visual SourceSafe plug in for Visual Studio.
Any ideas why the "Get" operation will not detect changes in the *.Designer.cs files and suggest we pull down the latest version?
Thanks for your help!
Designer files are not intended for manual manipulation. One of the chief incentives for adding partial classes to the popular .Net languages was to segregate the designer-generated code from manual user code, in fact. Manual manipulation of repeatedly-generated code (in pretty much any environment, not just visual studio) is asking for headaches.
What changes are you making to the designer file, and why is it not possible to make those changes to the non-designer source file?
Edit:
Is the project in the IDE properly bound and connected to the source control database (via File->Source Control->Change Source Control)? It should automatically be checking out the designer files when changes are made in the designer view.
I would try doing a Get manually through VSS Explorer (i.e. not through Visual Studio) and see if it works. If not, check to see if the file is pinned to a previous version.
Woe unto you for having to use SourceSafe. At my last job, we used SourceSafe and had a myriad of problems with it. We switched over to Surround SCM and were really happy with it. I'd never heard of it before that job.
To answer your question, any time I ran into a problem like this with SS, I'd do a "forced get": in the options dialog when you get latest, tell SourceSafe to get the latest version from the server regardless of whether it thinks the file is up to date.
Edit: I think the issue is the VS200X plugin for VSS. If you have the VSS standalone application you should be able to do a forced get from there. I now remember having to do this so often that I stopped using the VS200X plugin.
i am looking for obfuscator tool to secure the assembly. and i need to do reverse enginnering on that obfuscated assembly to invoke methods.
right now i tried with dotfuscator tool which is integrated with VS 2005,2008.
and i follow following steps.
1. Make obfuscated assembly using GUI tool.
2. Import in reflector.
3. i am able to see converted methods and variable name in reflector.
4. After that i try out to access methods using converted name and its working fine.
i need to secure assembly even user can see method name using reflector but developer can do re-engineering on opfuscated assembly.
Is there any tool available to make secure assembly ???
and i want to run obfuscator tool from command line witout opening GUI application.
Check the Command Line Option Summary in the PreEmptive Dotfuscator Documentation.
To run Dotfuscator without opening Visual Studio, you need to purchase it. The Community Edition requires Visual Studio be open.
I mean a tool that can extract certain contents from old .NET 1.1 WinForm code and put it in .designer file (make it looks like .net 2.0 WinForm code). This also involves an update to the project file (.csproj/.vbproj)..
If no existing tool yet, any tip or pointer on how to do this by programming?
It is possible to do using a macro, have a look at this article for the macro code.
If anyone else is looking to do this for VB.net (as I did) the only example I could find was this one in c# but it gave me a basis and we got it to work with a vb project.