different between MRE and MDK installer

Question

Regarding Mono Mac installer, there are MRE installer and MDK installer, http://www.go-mono.com/mono-downloads/download.html

I am wondering what is difference between thees two installer?

Answer 1

MRE = Mono Runtime Environment

MDK = Mono Development Kit.

MDK = MRE + Extra tools, libraries, .NET PCL (Portable Class Library) profiles, etc.

If you have an application that you want to run that needs Mono you can install just the MRE.

If you are doing development, writing C# applications, whilst you can sometimes get away with just having the MRE installed, you may hit some missing features such as not having the .NET PCL profiles. So I would install the MDK if you are doing development.