.NET Framework
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.NET Framework
The Microsoft .NET Framework is a software technology that is available with several Microsoft Windows operating systems. It includes a large library of pre-coded solutions to common programming problems, a runtime or virtual machine that manages the execution of programs written specifically for the framework, and a set of tools for configuring and building applications. The .NET Framework is a key Microsoft offering and is intended to be used by most new applications created for the Windows platform. The pre-coded solutions that form the framework's Base Class Library cover a large range of programming needs in a number of areas, including user interface, data access, database connectivity, cryptography, web application development, numeric algorithms, and network communications. The class library is used by programmers who combine it with their own code to produce applications. Programs written for the .NET Framework execute in a software environment that manages the program's runtime requirements. Also part of the .NET Framework, this runtime environment is known as the Common Language Runtime (CLR). The CLR provides the appearance of an application virtual machine so that programmers need not consider the capabilities of the specific CPU that will execute the program. The CLR also provides other important services such as security, memory management, and exception handling. The class library and the CLR together compose the .NET Framework. The .NET Framework is included with Windows Server 2008 and Windows Vista. The current version of the framework can also be installed on Windows XP and the Windows Server 2003 family of operating systems.[1] A reduced "Compact" version of the .NET Framework also available on Windows Mobile platforms, including Smartphones.
Principal Design Features
ArchitectureCLI (Common Language Infrastructure)The core aspects of the .NET framework lie within the Common Language Infrastructure, or CLI. The purpose of the CLI is to provide a language-neutral platform for application development and execution, including functions for exception handling, garbage collection, security, and interoperability. Microsoft's implementation of the CLI is called the Common Language Runtime or CLR. The CLR is composed of four primary parts:
AssembliesThe intermediate CLI code is housed in .NET assemblies. As mandated by specification, assemblies are stored in the Portable Executable (PE) format, common on the Windows platform for all DLL and EXE files. The assembly consists of one or more files, one of which must contain the manifest, which has the metadata for the assembly. The complete name of an assembly (not to be confused with the filename on disk) contains its simple text name, version number, culture, and public key token. The public key token is a unique hash generated when the assembly is compiled, thus two assemblies with the same public key token are guaranteed to be identical from the point of view of the framework. A private key can also be specified known only to the creator of the assembly and can be used for strong naming and to guarantee that the assembly is from the same author when a new version of the assembly is compiled (required to add an assembly to the Global Assembly Cache). MetadataAll CIL is Self-Describing through .NET metadata. The CLR checks on metadata to ensure that the correct method is called. Metadata is usually generated by language compilers but developers can create their own metadata through custom attributes. Metadata contains information about the assembly, and is also used to implement the reflective programming capabilities of .NET Framework. Security.NET has its own security mechanism with two general features: Code Access Security (CAS), and validation and verification. Code Access Security is based on evidence that is associated with a specific assembly. Typically the evidence is the source of the assembly (whether it is installed on the local machine or has been downloaded from the intranet or Internet). Code Access Security uses evidence to determine the permissions granted to the code. Other code can demand that calling code is granted a specified permission. The demand causes the CLR to perform a call stack walk: every assembly of each method in the call stack is checked for the required permission; if any assembly is not granted the permission a security exception is thrown. When an assembly is loaded the CLR performs various tests. Two such tests are validation and verification. During validation the CLR checks that the assembly contains valid metadata and CIL, and whether the internal tables are correct. Verification is not so exact. The verification mechanism checks to see if the code does anything that is 'unsafe'. The algorithm used is quite conservative; hence occasionally code that is 'safe' does not pass. Unsafe code will only be executed if the assembly has the 'skip verification' permission, which generally means code that is installed on the local machine. .NET Framework uses appdomains as a mechanism for isolating code running in a process. Appdomains can be created and code loaded into or unloaded from them independent of other appdomains. This helps increase the fault tolerance of the application, as faults or crashes in one appdomain do not affect rest of the application. Appdomains can also be configured independently with different security privileges. This can help increase the security of the application by isolating potentially unsafe code. The developer, however, has to split the application into subdomains; it is not done by the CLR. Class library
Microsoft .NET Framework includes a set of standard class libraries. The class library is organized in a hierarchy of namespaces. Most of the built in APIs are part of either The Base Class Library (BCL) includes a small subset of the entire class library and is the core set of classes that serve as the basic API of the Common Language Runtime.[8][9] The classes in The Framework Class Library (FCL) is a superset of the BCL classes and refers to the entire class library that ships with .NET Framework.[9] It includes an expanded set of libraries, including WinForms, ADO.NET, ASP.NET, Language Integrated Query, Windows Presentation Foundation, Windows Communication Foundation among others.[9] The FCL is much larger in scope than standard libraries for languages like C++, and comparable in scope to the standard libraries of Java. Memory managementThe .NET Framework CLR frees the developer from the burden of managing memory (allocating and freeing up when done); instead it does the memory management itself. To this end, the memory allocated to instantiations of .NET types (objects) is done contiguously[10] from the managed heap, a pool of memory managed by the CLR. As long as there exists a reference to an object, which might be either a direct reference to an object or via a graph of objects, the object is considered to be in use by the CLR. When there is no reference to an object, and it cannot be reached or used, it becomes garbage. However, it still holds on to the memory allocated to it. .NET Framework includes a garbage collector which runs periodically, on a separate thread from the application's thread, that enumerates all the unusable objects and reclaims the memory allocated to them. The .NET Garbage Collector (GC) is a non-deterministic, compacting, mark-and-sweep garbage collector. The GC runs only when a certain amount of memory has been used or there is enough pressure for memory on the system. Since it is not guaranteed when the conditions to reclaim memory are reached, the GC runs are non-deterministic. Each .NET application has a set of roots, which are pointers to objects on the managed heap (managed objects). These include references to static objects and objects defined as local variables or method parameters currently in scope, as well as objects referred to by CPU registers.[10] When the GC runs, it pauses the application, and for each object referred to in the root, it recursively enumerates all the objects reachable from the root objects and marks them as reachable. It uses .NET metadata and reflection to discover the objects encapsulated by an object, and then recursively walk them. It then enumerates all the objects on the heap (which were initially allocated contiguously) using reflection. All objects not marked as reachable are garbage.[10] This is the mark phase.[11] Since the memory held by garbage is not of any consequence, it is considered free space. However, this leaves chunks of free space between objects which were initially contiguous. The objects are then compacted together, by using The GC used by .NET Framework is actually generational.[12] Objects are assigned a generation; newly created objects belong to Generation 0. The objects that survive a garbage collection are tagged as Generation 1, and the Generation 1 objects that survive another collection are Generation 2 objects. The .NET Framework uses up to Generation 2 objects.[12] Higher generation objects are garbage collected less frequently than lower generation objects. This helps increase the efficiency of garbage collection, as older objects tend to have a larger lifetime than newer objects.[12] Thus, by removing older (and thus more likely to survive a collection) objects from the scope of a collection run, fewer objects need to be checked and compacted.[12] Standardization and licensingIn August 2000, Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard, and Intel worked to standardize CLI and the C# programming language. By December 2001, both were ratified ECMA standards (ECMA 335 and ECMA 334). ISO followed in April 2003 - the current version of the ISO standards are ([13] and[14] ). While Microsoft and their partners hold patents for the CLI and C#, ECMA and ISO require that all patents essential to implementation be made available under "reasonable and non-discriminatory terms." In addition to meeting these terms, the companies have agreed to make the patents available royalty-free. However, this does not apply for the part of the .NET Framework which is not covered by the ECMA/ISO standard, which includes Windows Forms, ADO.NET, and ASP.NET. Patents that Microsoft holds in these areas may deter non-Microsoft implementations of the full framework. On October 3 2007, Microsoft announced that much of the source code for the .NET Framework Base Class Library (including ASP.NET, ADO.NET and Windows Presentation Foundation) will be made available with the final release of Visual Studio 2008 towards the end of 2007 under the shared source Microsoft Reference License.[15] The source code for other libraries including Windows Communication Foundation (WCF), Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) and Language Integrated Query (LINQ) will be added in future releases. Being released under the Microsoft Reference License means this source code is made available for debugging purpose only, primarily to support integrated debugging of the BCL in Visual Studio. VersionsMicrosoft started development on the .NET Framework in the late 1990s originally under the name of Next Generation Windows Services (NGWS). By late 2000 the first beta versions of .NET 1.0 were released.[16] The .NET Framework stack.
A more complete listing of the releases of the .NET Framework may be found on the .NET Framework version list. .NET Framework 1.0This is the first release of the .NET Framework. Released on February 13 2002. Available for Windows 98, NT 4.0, 2000, and XP. Mainstream support by Microsoft for this version ended July 10 2007, and extended support ends July 14 2009.[17] .NET Framework 1.1This is the first major .NET Framework upgrade. It is available on its own as a redistributable package or in a software development kit, and was published on April 3 2003. It is also part of the second release of Microsoft Visual Studio .NET (released as Visual Studio .NET 2003). This is the first version of the .NET Framework to be included as part of the Windows operating system, shipping with Windows Server 2003. Mainstream support for .NET Framework 1.1 ends on October 14 2008, and extended support ends on October 8 2013. Since .NET 1.1 is a component of Windows Server 2003, extended support for .NET 1.1 on Server 2003 will run out with that of the OS - currently June 30 2013. Changes in 1.1 on comparison with 1.0
.NET Framework 2.0Released with Visual Studio 2005, Microsoft SQL Server 2005, and BizTalk 2006.
Changes in 2.0 on comparison with 1.1
.NET Framework 3.0.NET Framework 3.0, formerly called WinFX,[18] includes a new set of managed code APIs that are an integral part of Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 operating systems. It is also available for Windows XP SP2 and Windows Server 2003 as a download. There are no major architectural changes included with this release; .NET Framework 3.0 uses the Common Language Runtime of .NET Framework 2.0.[19] Unlike the previous major .NET releases there was no .NET Compact Framework release made as a counterpart of this version. .NET Framework 3.0 consists of four major new components:
.NET Framework 3.5Version 3.5 of the .NET Framework was released on November 19 2007, but it is not included with Windows Server 2008. As with .NET Framework 3.0, version 3.5 uses the CLR of version 2.0. In addition, it installs .NET Framework 2.0 SP1 and .Net Framework 3.0 SP1, which adds some methods and properties to the BCL classes in version 2.0 which are required for version 3.5 features such as Language Integrated Query (LINQ). These changes do not affect applications written for version 2.0, however.[20] As with previous versions, a new .NET Compact Framework 3.5 was released in tandem with this update in order to provide support for additional features on Windows Mobile and Windows Embedded CE devices. The source code of the Base Class Library in this version has been partially released (for debugging reference only) under the closed-source Microsoft Reference Source License.[15] Changes since version 3.0
SP1 (codename "Arrowhead").NET Framework 3.5 SP1, codenamed "Arrowhead", will reportedly enhance support for occasionally connected applications[25], and provide built-in support for the Microsoft ASP.NET Model-View-Controller (MVC) Framework.[26] "Arrowhead" will[27] increase the cold-start performance (startup when no other .NET Framework application has been started previously) of .NET Framework applications, by as much as 25 - 40%.[28] It will also hardware accelerate some WPF effects such as shadows, as well as general performance and API enhancements across the WPF stack. In addition, a set of WPF controls, including a Future developmentMicrosoft has not yet made public a roadmap of the development plans for future edition of the .NET Framework, but it has released general information regarding it. The company plans to implement better support for parallel programs, which target multi-core or distributed systems.[30] To this end, they plan to include technologies like PLINQ (Parallel LINQ),[31] a parallel implementation of the LINQ engine, and Task Parallel Library, which exposes parallel constructs via method calls.[32] Microsoft has also stated that they plan to support a subset of the .NET Framework and ASP.NET with the "Server Core" variant of Windows Server 2008's successor.[33] .NET vs. Java and Java EEThe CLI and C# have many similarities to Sun's JVM and Java. They are strong competitors. Both are based on a virtual machine model that hides the details of the computer hardware on which their programs run. Both use their own intermediate byte-code, Microsoft calling theirs Common Intermediate Language (CIL; formerly MSIL) and Sun Java bytecode. On .NET the byte-code is always compiled before execution, either Just In Time (JIT) or in advance of execution using the ngen.exe utility. With Java the byte-code is either interpreted, compiled in advance, or compiled JIT. Both provide extensive class libraries that address many common programming requirements and address many security issues that are present in other approaches. The namespaces provided in the .NET Framework closely resemble the platform packages in the Java EE API Specification in style and invocation. .NET in its complete form (Microsoft's implementation) is only available on Windows platforms and partially available on Linux and Macintosh,[34][35][36] whereas Java is fully available on many platforms.[37] From its beginning .NET has supported multiple programming languages and at its core remains platform agnostic and standardized so that other vendors can implement it on other platforms (although Microsoft's implementation only targets Windows, Windows CE, and Xbox platforms). The Java platform was initially built to support only the Java language on many operating system platforms under the slogan "Write once, run anywhere." Other programming languages have been implemented on the Java Virtual Machine[38] but are less widely used (see JVM languages). Sun's reference implementation of Java (including the class library, the compiler, the virtual machine, and the various tools associated with the Java Platform) is becoming open source under the GNU GPL license with Classpath exception.[39] The source code for the .NET framework base class library is available under the Microsoft Reference License, which is a closed-source license. [40] [41] The third-party Mono Project, sponsored by Novell, has been developing an open source implementation of the ECMA standards that define the .NET Framework, as well as most of the other non-ECMA standardized libraries in Microsoft's .NET. The Mono implementation is meant to run on Linux, Solaris, Mac OS X, BSD, HP-UX, and Windows platforms. Mono includes the CLR, the class libraries, and compilers for C# and VB.NET. The current version supports nearly all the APIs in version 1.1 of Microsoft's .NET and almost 96% of the APIs in version 2.0 of Microsoft's .NET. Support for the additional libraries in .NET 3.0 and 3.5 is in the early stages of development, as is support for C# 3.0 and LINQ. [42] CriticismsSome concerns and criticisms relating to .NET include:
Alternative implementationsThe Microsoft .NET Framework is the predominant implementation of .NET technologies. Other implementations for parts of the framework exist. Since the runtime engine is described by an ECMA/ISO specification, other implementations of it are unencumbered by copyright issues. It is more difficult to develop alternatives to the base class library (BCL), which is not described by an open standard, and may be subject to copyright restrictions. Additionally, parts of the BCL have Windows-specific functionality and behavior, so implementation on non-Windows platforms can be problematic. Some alternative implementations of parts of the framework are listed here.
See also
Components and libraries
ReferencesExternal links
af:.NET Framework ar:???? ??? .?? bg:.NET Framework da:.NET (Microsoft) de:.NET es:.NET Framework eu:.NET Framework fa:?????? ?????? fr:Framework .NET ko:?? ????? is:.NET-umhverfið it:.NET Framework he:.NET lt:.NET Framework nl:.NET ja:.NET Framework pl:.NET Framework ru:.NET Framework sv:.NET th:????????????????? tr:.NET Framework zh:.NET Framework Source: Wikipedia | The above article is available under the GNU FDL. | Edit this article
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