How can I reference a dll in the GAC from Visual Studio

Question

This assembly is in the GAC  Microsoft SqlServer Management RegisteredServers dll  How can I add a reference to this assembly in Visual Studio   I can view the file in c  windows assembly

User · Answer

As the others said  most of the time you won t want to do that because it doesn t copy the assembly to your project and it won t deploy with your project  However  if you re like me  and trying to add a reference that all target machines have in their GAC but it s not a  NET Framework assembly    Open the windows Run dialog  Windows Key   r  Type C  Windows assembly gac msil  This is some sort of weird hack that lets you browse your GAC  You can only get to it through the run dialog  Hopefully my spreading this info doesn t eventually cause Microsoft to patch it and block it   Too paranoid   P  Find your assembly and copy its path from the address bar  Open the Add Reference dialog in Visual Studio and choose the Browse tab  Paste in the path to your GAC assembly    I don t know if there s an easier way  but I haven t found it  I also frequently use step 1-3 to place  pdb files with their GAC assemblies to make sure they re not lost when I later need to use Remote Debugger

User · Answer

The only way that worked for me  is by copying the dll into your desktop or something  add reference to it  then delete the dll from your desktop   Visual Studio will refresh itself  and will finally reference the dll from the GAC on itself

User · Answer

Assuming you alredy tried to  Add Reference     as explained above and did not succeed  you can have a look here  They say you have to meet some prerequisites   -  NET 3 5 SP1  - Windows Installer 4 5  EDIT  According to this post it is a known issue   And this could be the solution you re looking for

User · Answer

I ve created a tool which is completely free   that will help you to achieve your goal  Muse VSReferences will allow you to add a Global Assembly Cache reference to the project from Add GAC Reference menu item   Hope this helps Muse VSExtensions

User · Answer

Registering assmblies into the GAC does not then place a reference to the assembly in the add references dialog  You still need to reference the assembly by path for your project  the main difference being you do not need to use the copy local option  your app will find it at runtime   In this particular case  you just need to reference your assembly by path  browse  or if you really want to have it in the add reference dialog there is a registry setting where you can add additional paths   Note  if you ship your app to someone who does not have this assembly installed you will need to ship it  and in this case you really need to use the SharedManagementObjects msi redistributable

User · Answer

In VS  right click your project  select  Add Reference      and you will see all the namespaces that exist in your GAC  Choose Microsoft SqlServer Management RegisteredServers and click OK  and you should be good to go  EDIT   That is the way you want to do this most of the time  However  after a bit of poking around I found this issue on MS Connect  MS says it is a known deployment issue  and they don t have a work around  The guy says if he copies the dll from the GAC folder and drops it in his bin  it works

User · Answer

Registering assmblies into the GAC does not then place a reference to the assembly in the add references dialog  You still need to reference the assembly by path for your project  the main difference being you do not need to use the copy local option  your app will find it at runtime   In this particular case  you just need to reference your assembly by path  browse  or if you really want to have it in the add reference dialog there is a registry setting where you can add additional paths   Note  if you ship your app to someone who does not have this assembly installed you will need to ship it  and in this case you really need to use the SharedManagementObjects msi redistributable

User · Answer

The relevant files and references can be found here   http   msdn microsoft com en-us library cc283981 aspx  Note the links off it about implementation etc

User · Answer

I found this extension for VS 2013 Vitevic GAC Reference

User · Answer

Registering assmblies into the GAC does not then place a reference to the assembly in the add references dialog  You still need to reference the assembly by path for your project  the main difference being you do not need to use the copy local option  your app will find it at runtime   In this particular case  you just need to reference your assembly by path  browse  or if you really want to have it in the add reference dialog there is a registry setting where you can add additional paths   Note  if you ship your app to someone who does not have this assembly installed you will need to ship it  and in this case you really need to use the SharedManagementObjects msi redistributable

User · Answer

May be it s too late to answer  but i found a very simple way to do this without a hack     Put your dll in GAC  for 3 5 Drag Drop inside  C  Windows assembly    GoTo Projects --  Properties Click Reference Path  for 3 5 it s  C  Windows assembly    and Build   Hope it helps

User · Answer

I found this extension for VS 2013 Vitevic GAC Reference

User · Answer

In VS  right click your project  select  Add Reference      and you will see all the namespaces that exist in your GAC  Choose Microsoft SqlServer Management RegisteredServers and click OK  and you should be good to go  EDIT   That is the way you want to do this most of the time  However  after a bit of poking around I found this issue on MS Connect  MS says it is a known deployment issue  and they don t have a work around  The guy says if he copies the dll from the GAC folder and drops it in his bin  it works

User · Answer

In VS  right click your project  select  Add Reference      and you will see all the namespaces that exist in your GAC  Choose Microsoft SqlServer Management RegisteredServers and click OK  and you should be good to go  EDIT   That is the way you want to do this most of the time  However  after a bit of poking around I found this issue on MS Connect  MS says it is a known deployment issue  and they don t have a work around  The guy says if he copies the dll from the GAC folder and drops it in his bin  it works

User · Answer

Assuming you alredy tried to  Add Reference     as explained above and did not succeed  you can have a look here  They say you have to meet some prerequisites   -  NET 3 5 SP1  - Windows Installer 4 5  EDIT  According to this post it is a known issue   And this could be the solution you re looking for

User · Answer

The only way that worked for me  is by copying the dll into your desktop or something  add reference to it  then delete the dll from your desktop   Visual Studio will refresh itself  and will finally reference the dll from the GAC on itself

User · Answer

May be it s too late to answer  but i found a very simple way to do this without a hack     Put your dll in GAC  for 3 5 Drag Drop inside  C  Windows assembly    GoTo Projects --  Properties Click Reference Path  for 3 5 it s  C  Windows assembly    and Build   Hope it helps

User · Answer

I ve created a tool which is completely free   that will help you to achieve your goal  Muse VSReferences will allow you to add a Global Assembly Cache reference to the project from Add GAC Reference menu item   Hope this helps Muse VSExtensions

User · Answer

In VS  right click your project  select  Add Reference      and you will see all the namespaces that exist in your GAC  Choose Microsoft SqlServer Management RegisteredServers and click OK  and you should be good to go  EDIT   That is the way you want to do this most of the time  However  after a bit of poking around I found this issue on MS Connect  MS says it is a known deployment issue  and they don t have a work around  The guy says if he copies the dll from the GAC folder and drops it in his bin  it works

User · Answer

Assuming you alredy tried to  Add Reference     as explained above and did not succeed  you can have a look here  They say you have to meet some prerequisites   -  NET 3 5 SP1  - Windows Installer 4 5  EDIT  According to this post it is a known issue   And this could be the solution you re looking for

User · Answer

Assuming you alredy tried to  Add Reference     as explained above and did not succeed  you can have a look here  They say you have to meet some prerequisites   -  NET 3 5 SP1  - Windows Installer 4 5  EDIT  According to this post it is a known issue   And this could be the solution you re looking for

User · Answer

In VS2010  from the Add Rerences window you can click  Browse  and navigate to C  Windows Assembly and add references to the assemblies that you want  Please note that the files may be grouped under different folders like GAC  GAC 32  GAC 64  GAC MSIL etc

User · Answer

Registering assmblies into the GAC does not then place a reference to the assembly in the add references dialog  You still need to reference the assembly by path for your project  the main difference being you do not need to use the copy local option  your app will find it at runtime   In this particular case  you just need to reference your assembly by path  browse  or if you really want to have it in the add reference dialog there is a registry setting where you can add additional paths   Note  if you ship your app to someone who does not have this assembly installed you will need to ship it  and in this case you really need to use the SharedManagementObjects msi redistributable

User · Answer

In VS2010  from the Add Rerences window you can click  Browse  and navigate to C  Windows Assembly and add references to the assemblies that you want  Please note that the files may be grouped under different folders like GAC  GAC 32  GAC 64  GAC MSIL etc

User · Answer

As the others said  most of the time you won t want to do that because it doesn t copy the assembly to your project and it won t deploy with your project  However  if you re like me  and trying to add a reference that all target machines have in their GAC but it s not a  NET Framework assembly    Open the windows Run dialog  Windows Key   r  Type C  Windows assembly gac msil  This is some sort of weird hack that lets you browse your GAC  You can only get to it through the run dialog  Hopefully my spreading this info doesn t eventually cause Microsoft to patch it and block it   Too paranoid   P  Find your assembly and copy its path from the address bar  Open the Add Reference dialog in Visual Studio and choose the Browse tab  Paste in the path to your GAC assembly    I don t know if there s an easier way  but I haven t found it  I also frequently use step 1-3 to place  pdb files with their GAC assemblies to make sure they re not lost when I later need to use Remote Debugger

User · Answer

The relevant files and references can be found here   http   msdn microsoft com en-us library cc283981 aspx  Note the links off it about implementation etc

[visual-studio] How can I reference a dll in the GAC from Visual Studio?

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