Merge DLL into EXE?

Question

I have two DLL files which I'd like to include in my EXE file to make it easier to distribute it. I've read a bit here and there how to do this, even found a good thread here, and here, but it's far too complicated for me and I need real basic instructions on how to do this.

I'm using Microsoft Visual C# Express 2010, and please excuse my "low standard" question, but I feel like I'm one or two level below everyone else's expercise :-/ If someone could point out how to merge these DDL files into my EXE in a step-by-step guide, this would be really awesome!

Izawa

Answer 1

For .NET Framework 4.5

ILMerge.exe /target:winexe /targetplatform:"v4,C:\Program Files\Reference Assemblies\Microsoft\Framework\.NETFramework\v4.0" /out:finish.exe insert1.exe insert2.dll

ILMerge

1. Open CMD and cd to your directory. Let's say: cd C:\test
2. Insert the above code.
3. /out:finish.exe replace finish.exe with any filename you want.
4. Behind the /out:finish.exe you have to give the files you want to be combined.

Bula

Hurray, that worked. The problem was a "\" at the end of the directory path which was too much. – Izawa

I just followed your instructions as you mention above. still not merged. please help me. In Command Prompt : ILMerge.exe /target:winexe /targetplatform:"v4,C:\Program Files (x86)\Reference Assemblies\Microsoft\Framework\.NETFramework\v4.0" /out:finish.exe myExe.exe mfc100u.dll mfc110u.dll msvcp110.dll Error: An exception occurred during merging: ILMerge.Merge: Could not load assembly from the location 'C:\test\my folder\mfc 100u.dll'. Skipping and processing rest of arguments. Any idea whats gonin wrong ? – Personalize

Sometimes you have to 1) use Program Files (x86) 2) type the full path to ILMerge. Use /target:exe for console applications. – Vasodilator

Windows by-default comes with .NET framework here C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework. So you can also use /targetplatform:"v2,C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727" or /targetplatform:"v4,C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319" – Pinnatipartite

Answer 2

Use Costura.Fody.

You just have to install the nuget and then do a build. The final executable will be standalone.

Commercialism

this is a very interesting project. but it seems to be a plugin for Fody.. so you could improve this answer a bit by providing some information on Mono.Cecil and Fody (as they are both dependencies, and are really the most relevant to the underline premise). But, yea, the plugin itself does seem to make it 'easier' to embed and distribute dlls in a configurable manner. – Lindquist

This is voodoo. Unbelievably easy. Install-Package Costura.Fody and Bam! your build will produce one big fat exe. – Freedafreedman

Doesnt quite work but i support this is can happen in some cases. (Can't build and i have an error) – Fescue

Wow - I struggled for 3 days trying to get iLMerge to work with several 3rd party dlls that had multiple other references I had to point to, and even though I had all dependencies added it still did not work and upon examining the logs it was mutating some of the namespace names, saying they were duplicate. (They were inside the 3rd party assemblies) This worked just as easy as @CristianDiaconescu said. – Whitesell

Answer 3

Download ilmerge and ilmergre gui . makes joining the files so easy ive used these and works great

Genseric

Answer 4

Reference the DLL´s to your Resources and and use the AssemblyResolve-Event to return the Resource-DLL.

public partial class App : Application
{
    public App()
    {
        AppDomain.CurrentDomain.AssemblyResolve += (sender, args) =>
        {

            Assembly thisAssembly = Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly();

            //Get the Name of the AssemblyFile
            var name = args.Name.Substring(0, args.Name.IndexOf(',')) + ".dll";

            //Load form Embedded Resources - This Function is not called if the Assembly is in the Application Folder
            var resources = thisAssembly.GetManifestResourceNames().Where(s => s.EndsWith(name));
            if (resources.Count() > 0)
            {
                var resourceName = resources.First();
                using (Stream stream = thisAssembly.GetManifestResourceStream(resourceName))
                {
                    if (stream == null) return null;
                    var block = new byte[stream.Length];
                    stream.Read(block, 0, block.Length);
                    return Assembly.Load(block);
                }
            }
            return null;
        };
    }
}

Recrudesce

Ok, I don't understand the slightest thing of what you wrote there ;-) Where do I have to put this code into? – Izawa

Are you using a WPF or a WindowsForms Application? – Recrudesce

Ok, first you have to add the DLL´s to your project-Resources. Add a folder "Resources" to your Solution and just put your dll´s in there. Right click on your project -> Properties -> Resources. There click "Add Resource" and add your dll´s. After that go to your program.cs file and add the code to your Main() before everything else. – Recrudesce

For WinForms try this code instead of the code above: AppDomain.CurrentDomain.AssemblyResolve += (sender, arg) => { if (arg.Name.StartsWith("Your_DLL")) return Assembly.Load(Properties.Resources.Your_DLL); return null; }; – Recrudesce

Okay, I used your shortened version, but my IDE tells me that the name "Assembly" is not available in this context :-/ – Izawa

Add a using System.Reflection; – Recrudesce

And to ensure that the referenced dll´s are not copied to the output dir, you have to select your dll´s from References and set the property "Copy Local" to false. – Recrudesce

So I included this code snippet for each DLL, but the EXE won't start if the DLLs aren't in the same folder (copied the EXE to desktop to test it). - And I couldn't find this property. How do I get to the References? If I go to the program's resources, I can't edit their properties (except for Comment, Filename, FileType, Persistence and Type). – Izawa

In your Solution Explorer there is a point "References". The Point, where you added your dll to use it in your program. There are all referenced dll listed. Select your dll and change "Copy Local" to false. – Recrudesce

I did that, even changing WMPLib's and AXVLC's Interop type to "false" to let me change "local copy" to false. I created a pastebin to show you the code snippet in my Program.cs: pastebin entry – Izawa

Answer 5

Download

ILMerge

Call

ilmerge /target:winexe /out:c:\output.exe c:\input.exe C:\input.dll

Stome

Add: /target:winexe /target platform:"v4,C:\Program Files\Reference Assemblies\Microsoft\Framework\.NETFramework\v4.0" to it if you have a .NEt framework 4.5 application :). – Bula

This results in the following error message: An exception occurred during merging: Unresolved assembly reference not allowed: System.Core. - I created a bat file with the following content: ilmerge /target:winexe my_exe.exe my_dll.dll /out:merged.exe – Izawa

@Izawa Try with the target platform parameter ;). – Bula

Ok, so I have this command: ilmerge /target:winexe /target:platform:"v4,c:\Program Files (x86)\Reference Assemblies\Microsoft\Framework\.NETFramework\v4.0\" /out:merged.exe my_exe.exe my_dll.dll, but the prompt says that I have to specify at least one input fil and an output file. I also exchanged the out parametre with the inputs with no result. – Izawa

Answer 6

1. Install ILMerge as the other threads tell you to

2. Then go to the installation folder, by default C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft\ILMerge

3. Drag your Dll's and Exes to that folder

4. Shift-Rightclick in that folder and choose open command prompt

5. Write

   ilmerge myExe.exe Dll1.dll /out:merged.exe
   

   Note that you should write your exe first.

There you got your merged exe. This might not be the best way if your going to do this multiple times, but the simplest one for a one time use, I would recommend putting Ilmerge to your path.

Soutane

I just followed your instructions as you mention above. I have also put ilmerge to my system path. still not merged. please help me. In Command Prompt : >ilmerge myExe.exe mfc100u.dll mfc110u.dll /out:final.exe Error: An exception occurred during merging: ILMerge.Merge: Could not load assembly from the location 'C:\test\my folder\mfc 100u.dll'. Skipping and processing rest of arguments. Any idea whats gonin wrong ? – Personalize

Looks like your dlls name contains a space? Try putting quotes around it – Soutane

Thanx for reply. But only in this my above comment, mfc100u.dll have space. I want to merge more than one dll file. I have also try ILMerge GUI. But still facing the same problem. Please help me. – Personalize

Could not get the above examples from other users to work, but this work perfectly. Thanks. – Archaean

Answer 7

static class Program
{
    /// <summary>
    /// The main entry point for the application.
    /// </summary>
    [STAThread]
    static void Main()
    {
    /* PUT THIS LINE IN YOUR CLASS PROGRAM MAIN() */           
        AppDomain.CurrentDomain.AssemblyResolve += (sender, arg) => { if (arg.Name.StartsWith("YOURDLL")) return Assembly.Load(Properties.Resources.YOURDLL); return null; }; 
        Application.EnableVisualStyles();
        Application.SetCompatibleTextRenderingDefault(false);
        Application.Run(new Form1());
    }
}

First add the DLL´s to your project-Resources. Add a folder "Resources"

Pacha

Answer 8

2019 Update (just for reference):

Starting with .NET Core 3.0, this feature is supported out of the box. To take advantage of the single-file executable publishing, just add the following line to the project configuration file:

<PropertyGroup>
  <PublishSingleFile>true</PublishSingleFile>
</PropertyGroup>

Now, dotnet publish should produce a single .exe file without using any external tool.

More documentation for this feature is available at https://github.com/dotnet/designs/blob/master/accepted/single-file/design.md.

Zr

Nice, this works but you just need to specify RuntimeIdentifier or RuntimeIdentifiers and the file gains about 65.4 MB. – Donelladonelle

Answer 9

Here is the official documentation. This is also automatically downloaded at step 2.

Below is a really simple way to do it and I've successfully built my app using .NET framework 4.6.1

1. Install ILMerge nuget package either via gui or commandline:

   Install-Package ilmerge
   

2. Verify you have downloaded it. Now Install (not sure the command for this, but just go to your nuget packages): Note: You probably only need to install it for one of your solutions if you have multiple

3. Navigate to your solution folder and in the packages folder you should see 'ILMerge' with an executable:

   \FindMyiPhone-master\FindMyiPhone-master\packages\ILMerge.2.14.1208\tools
   

4. Now here is the executable which you could copy over to your \bin\Debug (or whereever your app is built) and then in commandline/powershell do something like below:

   ILMerge.exe myExecutable.exe myDll1.dll myDll2.dll myDlln.dll myNEWExecutable.exe
   

You will now have a new executable with all your libraries in one!

Oligarch

For me it is the best way to update ILMerge, thanks @Oligarch – Ojeda

Answer 10

I Found The Solution Below are the Stpes:-

1. Download ILMerge.msi and Install it on your Machine.
2. Open Command Prompt
3. type cd C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft\ILMerge Preess Enter
4. C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft\ILMerge>ILMerge.exe /target:winexe /targetplatform:"v4,C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319" /out:NewExeName.exe SourceExeName.exe DllName.dll

For Multiple Dll :-

C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft\ILMerge>ILMerge.exe /target:winexe /targetplatform:"v4,C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319" /out:NewExeName.exe SourceExeName.exe DllName1.dll DllName2.dll DllName3.dll

Launalaunce

Answer 11

I answered a similar question for VB.NET. It shouldn't however be too hard to convert. You embedd the DLL's into your Ressource folder and on the first usage, the AppDomain.CurrentDomain.AssemblyResolve event gets fired.

If you want to reference it during development, just add a normal DLL reference to your project.

Embedd a DLL into a project

Rambler

Answer 12

NOTE: if you're trying to load a non-ILOnly assembly, then

Assembly.Load(block)

won't work, and an exception will be thrown: more details

I overcame this by creating a temporary file, and using

Assembly.LoadFile(dllFile)

Scup

Answer 13

The command should be the following script:

ilmerge myExe.exe Dll1.dll /target:winexe /targetplatform:"v4,c:\Program Files (x86)\Reference Assemblies\Microsoft\Framework\.NETFramework\v4.0\" /out:merged.exe /out:merged.exe

Aeolotropic