I am trying to do the following. App A is the "mother app". It stays open. App B is just a .DLL where I write some classes that are derived from an interface specified in App A.
Then, from App A, I will "import" classes from App B and run methods within them. I want to be able to dynamically change App B (change code and recompile) and use the new code in App A.
I have a post-compile command in App B that copies the new .DLL to the App A directory. App A creates a new AppDomain and uses ShadowCopying. I thought this would be sufficient, but when I try to recompile & copy App B's new .DLL, it says that the file is in use and can't be overwritten.
Here is the code I have as of now:
App A (TestServer in code):
namespace TestServer
{
public interface IRunnable
{
void Run();
}
class Program
{
static void Main(string[] args)
{
AppDomainSetup setup = new AppDomainSetup();
setup.ApplicationName = "DemoApp";
setup.ApplicationBase = Environment.CurrentDirectory;
setup.ShadowCopyDirectories = Environment.CurrentDirectory;
setup.ShadowCopyFiles = "true";
int _domain = 1;
while (true)
{
string typeName = Console.ReadLine();
AppDomain appDomain = AppDomain.CreateDomain("DemoDomain" + _domain, null, setup);
IRunnable runner = appDomain.CreateInstanceFromAndUnwrap("TestClient.dll", typeName) as IRunnable;
runner.Run();
AppDomain.Unload(appDomain);
_domain++;
}
}
}
}
App B (TestClient in code):
namespace TestClient
{
public class TestRunner : TestServer.IRunnable
{
public void Run()
{
Console.WriteLine("RUNNING");
}
}
public class Bob : TestServer.IRunnable
{
public void Run()
{
Console.WriteLine("BOB");
}
}
}
I have read that if you use stuff from other app domains, those app domains could automatically load the .DLL or something along those lines. In this case, I fear that using the Interface is causing the base AppDomain to load the .DLL thereby locking it up.
How can I resolve this issue / is there a better setup??
NOTE: I have update my code and it still yields the same result.