Including a DLL as an Embedded Resource in a WPF project

Question

I'm following http://blogs.msdn.com/b/microsoft_press/archive/2010/02/03/jeffrey-richter-excerpt-2-from-clr-via-c-third-edition.aspx

I've added WPFToolkit.Extended.dll to my solution, and set its Build Action to Embedded Resource.

In App.OnStartup(StartupEventArgs e) I have the following code:

AppDomain.CurrentDomain.AssemblyResolve += (sender, args) =>
{
    String resourceName = "AssemblyLoadingAndReflection." + new AssemblyName(args.Name).Name + ".dll";
    String assemblyName = Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly().FullName;
    Stream stream = Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly().GetManifestResourceStream(resourceName);
    using (stream)
    {
        Byte[] assemblyData = new Byte[stream.Length];
        stream.Read(assemblyData, 0, assemblyData.Length);
        return Assembly.Load(assemblyData);
    }
};

The debugger hits this block of code twice.

First time:

resourceName is "AssemblyLoadingAndReflection.StatusUtil.resources.dll"
assemblyName is "StatusUtil, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=null"
stream is null

Second time:

resourceName is "AssemblyLoadingAndReflection.WPFToolkit.Extended.resources.dll"
assemblyName is "StatusUtil, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=null"
stream is null

The code throws an exception when it hits stream.Length, since it's null.

I can't use ILMerge because it's a WPF project.

Answer 1

You have to change the string "AssemblyLoadingAndReflection" to the name of your application assembly.

One thing you can do to make this code more generic by using some more reflection:

Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly().FullName.Split(',').First()

Don't forget to append a dot. This will of course not work if the dll is not in the resources of the application assembly.