Referencing COM DLL's from VS 2003 & 2005

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Monty - 22 Mar 2007 11:07 GMT

I have a legacy COM application that has PIA's for it's DLL's that are
registered in the GAC. In VS 2003, I would add a reference to my project by
browsing to the DLL file in the install directory of my legacy app, and it
would automatically refer to the version in the GAC (this is good). In 2005,
when I add a reference to the DLL it creates an interop file for me (same
machine, same setup). How can I get 2005 to act like 2003 in this scenario?
If I add a reference directly to the PIA, it will let me declare an object
but will not let me instantiate the object.

TIA,
Monty

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Walter Wang [MSFT] - 23 Mar 2007 08:18 GMT

Hi Monty,

As far as I know, this behavior is not changed in VS2005. Did you call
"regasm" to register the PIA in your setup? Since you're installing the PIA
into GAC, there's no need to specify "/codebase" parameter to "regasm".

I've just tested it again on my side using following steps:

1) Created a simple VB6 ActiveX DLL "TestPIA1.dll"
2) Setup command prompt with VS2003 environment; run "sn -k v7.key"
3) Run "tlbimp TestPIA1.dll /primary /keyfile:v7.key /out:i7.TestPIA1.dll"
4) Run "gacutil -i i7.TestPIA1.dll"
5) Run "regasm i7.TestPIA1.dll"
6) Now create a new VS2003 and VS2005 project, try to add the reference to
"TestPIA1.dll"; then view "TestPIA1" properties from reference list, both
VS2003 and VS2005 show they're referring to the GAC version such as
"C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC\i7.TestPIA1\1.0.0.0__6c3a0ce1cdd19afe\i7.TestPIA1.d
ll".

Would you please try above steps and let me know the result on your side?
Thanks.

Sincerely,
Walter Wang (wawang@online.microsoft.com, remove 'online.')
Microsoft Online Community Support

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Monty - 25 Mar 2007 05:31 GMT

Hi Walter, thanks for your diligence. I went back to VS2003 and re-added
those references and now they are showing them (in the Properties window) as
being the located in the directory where I browsed to them rather than the
ones in the GAC. I'm SURE I saw it showing their location as being in the
GAC previously! Maybe I shouldn't have had those old mushrooms in the
fridge?

Anyway, I created my own Interops for them and am using those. Thanks again,

Monty

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Walter Wang [MSFT] - 26 Mar 2007 03:50 GMT

Hi Monty,

Thanks for the update.

Using your own interop assembly should be fine as long as the legacy COM
component is not shared between several processes and reference to it is
not passing around.

Regards,
Walter Wang (wawang@online.microsoft.com, remove 'online.')
Microsoft Online Community Support

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Referencing COM DLL's from VS 2003 & 2005

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