8 ms·

Tools for Exploring .NET Internals

180 points by matthewwarren 8y ago

Akaahn 8y ago
Not as all-encompassing as all those tools, but all I've ever needed is, dotPeek + de4dot.
- SeriousM 8y ago
  dw4dot on combination with dnSpy is unbeatable to "understand" licensed software :)
ubercow 8y ago
It's very frustrating having all of these tools only support Windows. Despite all the wonderful work Microsoft has done with CoreCLR, the "IDE" debugger is still only available under a license that only permits use with Visual Studio and VSCode [1] and mdbg is still nowhere to be found for CoreCLR [2]. 1: https://github.com/dotnet/core/issues/505 https://github.com/dotnet/core/issues/505 2: https://github.com/dotnet/coreclr/issues/1145 https://github.com/dotnet/coreclr/issues/1145 From what I've gathered, the best you have right now for doing command line debugging is the "SOS" plugin for lldb, which seems to require building the lldb plugin and sometimes even lldb (!!) yourself [3][4]. 3: https://github.com/dotnet/coreclr/blob/master/Documentation/building/debugging-instructions.md https://github.com/dotnet/coreclr/blob/master/Documentation/... 4: http://blogs.microsoft.co.il/sasha/2017/02/26/analyzing-a-net-core-core-dump-on-linux/ http://blogs.microsoft.co.il/sasha/2017/02/26/analyzing-a-ne... Not very fun if you're not using Windows.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- systems 8y ago
  how does jetbrains rider ide provide debugging then
  - xadoc 8y ago
    Jetbrains was using a package provided by Microsoft and blogged that they would soon have to disable debugging of CoreCLR Read “The Bad News” https://blog.jetbrains.com/dotnet/2017/02/15/rider-eap-17-nuget-unit-testing-build-debugging/ https://blog.jetbrains.com/dotnet/2017/02/15/rider-eap-17-nu... Also the licensing issue https://github.com/dotnet/core/issues/505 https://github.com/dotnet/core/issues/505 Then a week later with the licensing issue still in place Jetbrains implemented their own debugger, on the comments it reads "This is our own debugger implementation." https://blog.jetbrains.com/dotnet/2017/02/23/rider-eap-18-coreclr-debugging-back-windows/ https://blog.jetbrains.com/dotnet/2017/02/23/rider-eap-18-co...
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
- jahewson 8y ago
  The “IDE” debugging library fuss was mistaken. CoreCLR supports the same COM ICorDebug API as mainstream .NET but Microsoft have their own private C# bindings library for using it with VS/VSCode. Anybody can generate their own C# bindings, JetBrains already did. I say this as someone who was using ICorDebug 13 years ago.
- megaman22 8y ago
  Why would they support anything but Windows? Unless it's a bleeding edge tool, it predates .NET Core, and .net Core is still immature.
of 8y ago
Exploring Bill Gates's Privates
ColinWielga 8y ago
Wow, these are awesome!
theclaw 8y ago
No mention of the excellent LINQPad[1] or ilspy[2]? Both do decompilation, I use LINQPad a lot for quick sanity checks, although it's intended for database work I rarely actually use it for that. It'll also spit out IL code and expression trees. ILSpy is a lightweight decompiler that you can just drop DLL files into to see their code. It has some nice analysis tools that allow you to find references and implementations. I associated .dll files with it so they open in ILSpy by default. [1] https://www.linqpad.net/ https://www.linqpad.net/ [2] https://github.com/icsharpcode/ILSpy https://github.com/icsharpcode/ILSpy
- mintplant 8y ago
  You can plug Reflexil [0] into ILSpy for on-the-fly code patching. Then once you've got something going, you can (manually) port your changes over to a Mono.Cecil-based [1] patching program. This is how I hack up Unity games written with C#. [0] http://reflexil.net/ http://reflexil.net/ [1] https://github.com/jbevain/cecil https://github.com/jbevain/cecil

180 points by matthewwarren 8y ago

Akaahn 8y ago

Not as all-encompassing as all those tools, but all I've ever needed is, dotPeek + de4dot.

SeriousM 8y ago
dw4dot on combination with dnSpy is unbeatable to "understand" licensed software :)

ubercow 8y ago

It's very frustrating having all of these tools only support Windows. Despite all the wonderful work Microsoft has done with CoreCLR, the "IDE" debugger is still only available under a license that only permits use with Visual Studio and VSCode [1] and mdbg is still nowhere to be found for CoreCLR [2]. 1: https://github.com/dotnet/core/issues/505 https://github.com/dotnet/core/issues/505 2: https://github.com/dotnet/coreclr/issues/1145 https://github.com/dotnet/coreclr/issues/1145 From what I've gathered, the best you have right now for doing command line debugging is the "SOS" plugin for lldb, which seems to require building the lldb plugin and sometimes even lldb (!!) yourself [3][4]. 3: https://github.com/dotnet/coreclr/blob/master/Documentation/building/debugging-instructions.md https://github.com/dotnet/coreclr/blob/master/Documentation/... 4: http://blogs.microsoft.co.il/sasha/2017/02/26/analyzing-a-net-core-core-dump-on-linux/ http://blogs.microsoft.co.il/sasha/2017/02/26/analyzing-a-ne... Not very fun if you're not using Windows.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
systems 8y ago
how does jetbrains rider ide provide debugging then
- xadoc 8y ago
  Jetbrains was using a package provided by Microsoft and blogged that they would soon have to disable debugging of CoreCLR Read “The Bad News” https://blog.jetbrains.com/dotnet/2017/02/15/rider-eap-17-nuget-unit-testing-build-debugging/ https://blog.jetbrains.com/dotnet/2017/02/15/rider-eap-17-nu... Also the licensing issue https://github.com/dotnet/core/issues/505 https://github.com/dotnet/core/issues/505 Then a week later with the licensing issue still in place Jetbrains implemented their own debugger, on the comments it reads "This is our own debugger implementation." https://blog.jetbrains.com/dotnet/2017/02/23/rider-eap-18-coreclr-debugging-back-windows/ https://blog.jetbrains.com/dotnet/2017/02/23/rider-eap-18-co...
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
jahewson 8y ago
The “IDE” debugging library fuss was mistaken. CoreCLR supports the same COM ICorDebug API as mainstream .NET but Microsoft have their own private C# bindings library for using it with VS/VSCode. Anybody can generate their own C# bindings, JetBrains already did. I say this as someone who was using ICorDebug 13 years ago.
megaman22 8y ago
Why would they support anything but Windows? Unless it's a bleeding edge tool, it predates .NET Core, and .net Core is still immature.

of 8y ago

Exploring Bill Gates's Privates

ColinWielga 8y ago

Wow, these are awesome!

theclaw 8y ago

No mention of the excellent LINQPad[1] or ilspy[2]? Both do decompilation, I use LINQPad a lot for quick sanity checks, although it's intended for database work I rarely actually use it for that. It'll also spit out IL code and expression trees. ILSpy is a lightweight decompiler that you can just drop DLL files into to see their code. It has some nice analysis tools that allow you to find references and implementations. I associated .dll files with it so they open in ILSpy by default. [1] https://www.linqpad.net/ https://www.linqpad.net/ [2] https://github.com/icsharpcode/ILSpy https://github.com/icsharpcode/ILSpy

mintplant 8y ago
You can plug Reflexil [0] into ILSpy for on-the-fly code patching. Then once you've got something going, you can (manually) port your changes over to a Mono.Cecil-based [1] patching program. This is how I hack up Unity games written with C#. [0] http://reflexil.net/ http://reflexil.net/ [1] https://github.com/jbevain/cecil https://github.com/jbevain/cecil