problem referncing common assemblies from several WS projects (NO GAC!)

[raniz]

Hello

My problem is with being able to reference some common assemblies from
several different WEB SERVICE projects WITHOUT registering these assemblies
in the GAC.

The problem stems from the fact that a web service project demands
Assemblies referenced by it to be copied into its directory - usually the
"bin" directory under the iis application. and that requires me to duplicate
these common assemblies in each project, which raises the problem of keeping
them updated (as opposed to winform application that allows referencing
without local copy.

Consideration for this architecture are:
1. I would like to split the services between several dlls in order to gain
better survivability for the services.
2. I would like to avoid using the GAC because of deployment (and team
development) difficulties, and enjoy x-copy capabilities.
3. The common assemblies are to be used not only by the web services but
also by other winforms applications that add their path in compilation
(therefore have no "WS style" problems).

Does anyone have a suggestion? is it possible at all?

Tnx Rani

 

[Jay B. Harlow [MVP - Outlook]]

Raniz,
In my WinForm application I call AppDomain.AppendPrivatePath to add
additional paths to search to load assemblies. I use this to get better
organization of the support dlls for the application.

My directory structure looks similar to:
\program files\my app\my app.exe
\program files\my app\plugins\plugin1.dll
\program files\my app\plugins\plugin2.dll
\program files\my app\bin\framework.dll

My sub main is similar to:
Public Shared Sub Main()
AppDomain.CurrentDomain.AppendPrivatePath("bin")
AppDomain.CurrentDomain.AppendPrivatePath("plugins")

Application.Run(new MainForm)
End Sub

For WinForms it work great, I have not tried it from a web app. I would
think if you copied your common dlls to a common folder, then gave each web
app access to this common folder (virtual folder in app maybe?) Not sure how
I would specifically implement this in ASP.NET, but it may give you ideas.
Also not sure of security issues, for my WinForms app, all the folders are
children of the main executables folder...

I have only used this in VS.NET 2003 (.NET 1.1). I would expect it to also
work in VS.NET 2.002 (.NET 1.0).

Hope this helps
Jay