Merge ResX file at runtime?

Question

I'm generating/constructing from code a custom .Net managed resource file (a .resx file)

In C# or VB.Net, how I could design a method capable to merge, join or embbed my custom .resx file into a .net assembly (more or less in the same way that VS compiler does by default)?

So, in one hand I have a Application.exe (already compiled), and in the other hand I have a resources.resx, my intention is to "merge" the resx into the compiled assembly.

Any sort of info will be gratefull, because I didn't found nothing about it.

PS: The only requisite is not use 3rd party tools such as ILMerge.

Answer 1

You won't be able to merge resources into an already compiled file without external tools (either hand-rolled or already existing). That may be why you didn't find any info about it. It is possible to merge the file by hand but I'd recommend another approach.

If possible you could try generating your resource file before the compilation occurs, for example by using a text template in Visual Studio. Then when compiling the usual behavior would be applied to the generated resx file which would be lifted in the assembly.

If generating the resource file before compilation is not possible, you will have to use an external tool

Answer 2

I finally solved through a little different approach, after I created the ResX file what I do is compile a .net assembly at runtime and asigning that ResX file as an embeded resource of the assembly to be compiled, so, the result is a compiled .net dll that can be merged or whatever I want and I can extract the ResX file at any moment from that dll, nice!.

If someone knows a simpler/easier alternative than this, feel free to post an answer (for help or just for the remaining bounty)

Here is the example code:

Imports System.CodeDom.Compiler
Imports System.IO
Imports System.Reflection

Public Class Form1

Private Sub Test() Handles MyBase.Shown

    ' Create the ResX file.
    Dim resX As New ResXManager(Path.Combine(Application.StartupPath, "C:\MyResources.resx"))
    With resX
        .Create(replace:=True)
        .AddResource(Of String)("String Resource", "Hello World!", "String Comment")
    End With

    ' Compile an assembly.dll that contains the ResX file as an embedded resource.
    Dim codeProvider As CodeDomProvider = CodeDomProvider.CreateProvider("VB") ' or New VBCodeProvider()
    Dim parameters As CompilerParameters = New CompilerParameters()
    With parameters
        .GenerateExecutable = False
        .OutputAssembly = "C:\Assembly.dll"
        .EmbeddedResources.Add("C:\MyResources.resx")
    End With
    Dim results As CompilerResults = codeProvider.CompileAssemblyFromSource(parameters, "Public class ResourceClass : End Class")

    ' Read the assembly.
    Dim assembly As Assembly = assembly.LoadFile("c:\Assembly.dll")

    ' Extract/read the ResX file from assembly.
    Dim embeddedFileName As String = "MyResources.resx"
    Dim targetFilePath As String = "C:\NewMyResources.resx"
    Using s As Stream = assembly.GetManifestResourceStream(embeddedFileName)
        Dim buffer As Byte() = New Byte(CInt(s.Length - 1)) {}
        Dim read As Integer = s.Read(buffer, 0, CInt(s.Length))
        Using fs As New FileStream(targetFilePath, FileMode.Create)
            fs.Write(buffer, 0, buffer.Length)
        End Using
    End Using

End Sub

End Class

I've taken some help to do this from here:

Generating DLL assembly dynamically at run time

Read embedded file from assembly