A deleted post, made by @OleksandrIeremenko, on this thread links to this article https://jimblackler.net/blog/?p=49 which was the basis for my solution.
Below is a modification of Jim Blackler's code making extension methods off the MemberInfo and Type objects and adding code that returns the summary text or an empty string if not available.
Usage
var typeSummary = typeof([Type Name]).GetSummary();
var methodSummary = typeof([Type Name]).GetMethod("[Method Name]").GetSummary();
Extension Class
/// <summary>
/// Utility class to provide documentation for various types where available with the assembly
/// </summary>
public static class DocumentationExtensions
{
/// <summary>
/// Provides the documentation comments for a specific method
/// </summary>
/// <param name="methodInfo">The MethodInfo (reflection data ) of the member to find documentation for</param>
/// <returns>The XML fragment describing the method</returns>
public static XmlElement GetDocumentation(this MethodInfo methodInfo)
{
// Calculate the parameter string as this is in the member name in the XML
var parametersString = "";
foreach (var parameterInfo in methodInfo.GetParameters())
{
if (parametersString.Length > 0)
{
parametersString += ",";
}
parametersString += parameterInfo.ParameterType.FullName;
}
//AL: 15.04.2008 ==> BUG-FIX remove “()” if parametersString is empty
if (parametersString.Length > 0)
return XmlFromName(methodInfo.DeclaringType, 'M', methodInfo.Name + "(" + parametersString + ")");
else
return XmlFromName(methodInfo.DeclaringType, 'M', methodInfo.Name);
}
/// <summary>
/// Provides the documentation comments for a specific member
/// </summary>
/// <param name="memberInfo">The MemberInfo (reflection data) or the member to find documentation for</param>
/// <returns>The XML fragment describing the member</returns>
public static XmlElement GetDocumentation(this MemberInfo memberInfo)
{
// First character [0] of member type is prefix character in the name in the XML
return XmlFromName(memberInfo.DeclaringType, memberInfo.MemberType.ToString()[0], memberInfo.Name);
}
/// <summary>
/// Returns the Xml documenation summary comment for this member
/// </summary>
/// <param name="memberInfo"></param>
/// <returns></returns>
public static string GetSummary(this MemberInfo memberInfo)
{
var element = memberInfo.GetDocumentation();
var summaryElm = element?.SelectSingleNode("summary");
if (summaryElm == null) return "";
return summaryElm.InnerText.Trim();
}
/// <summary>
/// Provides the documentation comments for a specific type
/// </summary>
/// <param name="type">Type to find the documentation for</param>
/// <returns>The XML fragment that describes the type</returns>
public static XmlElement GetDocumentation(this Type type)
{
// Prefix in type names is T
return XmlFromName(type, 'T', "");
}
/// <summary>
/// Gets the summary portion of a type's documenation or returns an empty string if not available
/// </summary>
/// <param name="type"></param>
/// <returns></returns>
public static string GetSummary(this Type type)
{
var element = type.GetDocumentation();
var summaryElm = element?.SelectSingleNode("summary");
if (summaryElm == null) return "";
return summaryElm.InnerText.Trim();
}
/// <summary>
/// Obtains the XML Element that describes a reflection element by searching the
/// members for a member that has a name that describes the element.
/// </summary>
/// <param name="type">The type or parent type, used to fetch the assembly</param>
/// <param name="prefix">The prefix as seen in the name attribute in the documentation XML</param>
/// <param name="name">Where relevant, the full name qualifier for the element</param>
/// <returns>The member that has a name that describes the specified reflection element</returns>
private static XmlElement XmlFromName(this Type type, char prefix, string name)
{
string fullName;
if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(name))
fullName = prefix + ":" + type.FullName;
else
fullName = prefix + ":" + type.FullName + "." + name;
var xmlDocument = XmlFromAssembly(type.Assembly);
var matchedElement = xmlDocument["doc"]["members"].SelectSingleNode("member[@name='" + fullName + "']") as XmlElement;
return matchedElement;
}
/// <summary>
/// A cache used to remember Xml documentation for assemblies
/// </summary>
private static readonly Dictionary<Assembly, XmlDocument> Cache = new Dictionary<Assembly, XmlDocument>();
/// <summary>
/// A cache used to store failure exceptions for assembly lookups
/// </summary>
private static readonly Dictionary<Assembly, Exception> FailCache = new Dictionary<Assembly, Exception>();
/// <summary>
/// Obtains the documentation file for the specified assembly
/// </summary>
/// <param name="assembly">The assembly to find the XML document for</param>
/// <returns>The XML document</returns>
/// <remarks>This version uses a cache to preserve the assemblies, so that
/// the XML file is not loaded and parsed on every single lookup</remarks>
public static XmlDocument XmlFromAssembly(this Assembly assembly)
{
if (FailCache.ContainsKey(assembly))
{
throw FailCache[assembly];
}
try
{
if (!Cache.ContainsKey(assembly))
{
// load the docuemnt into the cache
Cache[assembly] = XmlFromAssemblyNonCached(assembly);
}
return Cache[assembly];
}
catch (Exception exception)
{
FailCache[assembly] = exception;
throw;
}
}
/// <summary>
/// Loads and parses the documentation file for the specified assembly
/// </summary>
/// <param name="assembly">The assembly to find the XML document for</param>
/// <returns>The XML document</returns>
private static XmlDocument XmlFromAssemblyNonCached(Assembly assembly)
{
var assemblyFilename = assembly.Location;
if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(assemblyFilename))
{
StreamReader streamReader;
try
{
streamReader = new StreamReader(Path.ChangeExtension(assemblyFilename, ".xml"));
}
catch (FileNotFoundException exception)
{
throw new Exception("XML documentation not present (make sure it is turned on in project properties when building)", exception);
}
var xmlDocument = new XmlDocument();
xmlDocument.Load(streamReader);
return xmlDocument;
}
else
{
throw new Exception("Could not ascertain assembly filename", null);
}
}
}
.csfile you're trying to read, you can use CodeDOM to compile it and extract the XML doc comments. MSDN even has a howto that demonstrates some the APIs: msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms404261.aspx (It goes the other way around though, by generating code at runtime, but it should be possible to somehow feed a CS file to CodeDOM.) – Engel