Creating C# Type from full name

Question

I'm trying to get a Type object from type full name i'm doing the folowing:

Assembly asm = Assembly.GetEntryAssembly();  
string toNativeTypeName="any type full name";
Type t = asm.GetType(toNativeTypeName);

I get null, why?

the assembly is my executable (.net executable) and the type name is: System.Xml.XmlNode

Answer 1

Well, if that really is the type's full name (i.e. including namespace) and it's in that assembly, then it should work. Could you give an example where it doesn't? As you're using Assembly.GetType rather than Type.GetType you shouldn't include the assembly name in the type name.

Note that the name for a generic type isn't what you might expect it to be. For instance, you'd use:

assembly.GetType("System.Collections.Generic.List`1");

to get the generic list type, then use Type.MakeGenericType to provide type arguments.

Of course, that's only relevant when the type is generic. If that's not the problem, I'd double check that the type really is in your entry assembly.

EDIT: Oh, and be aware that nested types will be "Container+Nested" rather than "Container.Nested" if that's relevant...