How to Recursively Load Assembly References into a Separate AppDomain?

Recursively load the assembly and its references in a standalone AppDomain

When loading an assembly into a new AppDomain, be sure to load all of its references recursively to prevent FileNotFoundException errors. This article explores the steps to accomplish this complex task.

First, create a standalone AppDomain with a custom ApplicationBase. Then, use AssemblyName.GetAssemblyName to load the root assembly. However, this alone is not enough; you need to manually load the assembly's reference.

To do this, use ReflectionOnlyLoadFrom to get a list of referenced assemblies without actually loading them. For each reference, use domain.Load(refAsmName) to load it into the AppDomain.

However, there is a caveat here. To execute a proxy object in an external application domain, you need to call CreateInstanceAndUnwrap. This method ensures that the object executes in the target AppDomain.

Code example illustrating this process:

<code class="language-csharp">class Program
{
    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        AppDomainSetup domaininfo = new AppDomainSetup();
        domaininfo.ApplicationBase = System.Environment.CurrentDirectory;
        Evidence adevidence = AppDomain.CurrentDomain.Evidence;
        AppDomain domain = AppDomain.CreateDomain("MyDomain", adevidence, domaininfo);

        Type type = typeof(Proxy);
        var value = (Proxy)domain.CreateInstanceAndUnwrap(
            type.Assembly.FullName,
            type.FullName);

        var assembly = value.GetAssembly(args[0]);
        // AppDomain.Unload(domain);
    }
}

public class Proxy : MarshalByRefObject
{
    public Assembly GetAssembly(string assemblyPath)
    {
        try
        {
            return Assembly.LoadFile(assemblyPath);
        }
        catch (Exception)
        {
            return null;
            // throw new InvalidOperationException(ex);
        }
    }
}</code>

Remember that when using LoadFile instead of LoadFrom you must load any dependencies yourself to avoid FileNotFound exceptions.

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