Compile for windows on linux using MonoDevelop

Question

I want to know, because I can't find anything on google, If I use MonoDevelop to compile an application on Linux, can I send the generated executable to a Windows computer and expect it to run? file outputs this:

PE32 executable for MS Windows (console) Intel 80386 32-bit Mono/.Net assembly

so I would expect it to run on Windows out-of-the box. But I sent it to a friend for testing, and it said 'this is not a valid win32 application'. So, what do I need to do? It is just a basic hello world console application in C#.

Answer 1

You have to have the exact version of Mono installed on the target machine or a matching version of .NET Framework (i.e. if you compiled against Mono 2.10.x, you'll most probably need .NET 4.0). Otherwise you'll get that exact error message.