How to load assemblies located in a folder in .net core console app

Question

I\'m making a console app on .Net Core platform and was wondering, how does one load assemblies (.dll files) and instantiate classes using C# dynamic features? It seems so m

Answer 1

I think this below will work for you, and hope this can help some MEF2 newbie like me.

    /// <summary>
    /// Gets the assemblies that belong to the application .exe subfolder.
    /// </summary>
    /// <returns>A list of assemblies.</returns>
    private static IEnumerable<Assembly> GetAssemblies()
    {
        string executableLocation = AppContext.BaseDirectory;
        string directoryToSearch = Path.Combine(Path.GetDirectoryName(executableLocation), "Plugins");
        foreach (string file in Directory.EnumerateFiles(directoryToSearch, "*.dll"))
        {
            Assembly assembly = null;
            try
            {
                //Load assembly using byte array
                byte[] rawAssembly = File.ReadAllBytes(file);
                assembly = Assembly.Load(rawAssembly);
            }
            catch (Exception)
            {
            }

            if (assembly != null)
            {
                yield return assembly;
            }
        }
    }

another one, but in .netstandard1.3, neither was available.

var assembiles = Directory.GetFiles(Assembly.GetEntryAssembly().Location, "*.dll", SearchOption.TopDirectoryOnly)
        .Select(AssemblyLoadContext.Default.LoadFromAssemblyPath);

Answer 2

Using .net core 1.1 / standard 1.6, I found that AssemblyLoader was not available, and

AssemblyLoadContext.Default.LoadFromAssemblyPath(assemblyPath)

gave me a "Could not load file or assembly xxx" error.

Finally this solution below worked for me - purely by adding a step to get the AssemblyName object. Hope it helps anyone who gets stuck:

var assemblyName = AssemblyLoadContext.GetAssemblyName(assemblyPath);
var assembly = Assembly.Load(assemblyName);