getting a type from the class name

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Andy Fish - 25 Aug 2005 18:42 GMT

Hi,

If I want to get a reference to a type given its name, it seems it either
has to be in the same assembly, or I have to know the assembly name. Is
there no way to simply look at all running assemblies for a type of that
name?

Basically I'm looking for the equivalent of Java's Class.ForName() and I
don't understand why there doesn't seem to be one.

TIA

Andy

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Jon Skeet [C# MVP] - 25 Aug 2005 19:25 GMT

> If I want to get a reference to a type given its name, it seems it either
> has to be in the same assembly, or I have to know the assembly name. Is
[quoted text clipped - 3 lines]
> Basically I'm looking for the equivalent of Java's Class.ForName() and I
> don't understand why there doesn't seem to be one.

Well, there isn't quite the same ClassLoader idea as in Java. An
AppDomain is similar, but not quite the same.

Anyway, you can ask an Assembly for all its referenced assemblies, and
then load each of those which hasn't already been loaded, and ask each
in turn for the type you're after.

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getting a type from the class name

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