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.netvisual-studioresourcesembedded-resourcevisual-studio-2008-sp1

Embed resource in a .NET assembly without an assembly prefix?

When you embed a resource into a .NET assembly using Visual Studio, it is prefixed with the assembly name. However, assemblies can have embedded resources that are not assembly-name-prefixed. The only way I can see to do this is to disassemble the assembly using ILDASM, then re-assemble it, adding the new resource -- which works, but... do I really need to finish that sentence?

(Desktop .NET Framework 3.5, Visual Studio 2008 SP1, C#, Windows 7 Enterprise x64.)

Solution

  • Actually, there is a way, but you need to edit the .csproj manually.

    In the .csproj file, find the EmbeddedResource element, which will look like the following:

    <EmbeddedResource Include="Resources\MyImage.png" />

    Add a LogicalName child element, as shown below.

    <EmbeddedResource Include="Resources\MyImage.png">
  <LogicalName>MyImage.png</LogicalName>
</EmbeddedResource>

    After making this change, the resource can be fetched as "MyImage.png" - the default namespace and folder name are omitted.

    It looks like this capability has been available since 2005.