Locating the Referenced assembly through Probing

Once after determining the correct assembly version from config file CLR check the GAC for the assembly if it is strong named.If it is not strong named,CLR checks the codebase element in config file,if it is there, which has the location where the assembly is.If a match is found in that location CLR uses that assembly and if the assembly is not there CLR begins Probing(searches for assembly).

1)Checks the application base,root location

2)Culture, which is the culture attribute of the assembly being referenced

3)Name,Which is the name of the referenced assembly

4)Private bin path,Which is any user defined list of sub directories under the root(Bin)

Probing the Application Base and Culture Directories

The runtime always begins probing in the application's base.The directories probed include:

[application base] / [assembly name].dll

[application base] / [assembly name] / [assembly name].dll

If culture information is specified for the referenced assembly, only the following directories are probed:

[application base] / [culture] / [assembly name].dll

[application base] / [culture] / [assembly name] / [assembly name].dll

Probing the Private binpath

The runtime also probes directories specified using the private binpath parameter. The directories specified using the private binpath parameter must be subdirectories of the application's root directory

[application base] / [binpath] / [assembly name].dll

[application base] / [binpath] / [assembly name] / [assembly name].dll

If culture information is specified for the referenced assembly, only the following directories are probed:

[application base] / [binpath] / [culture] / [assembly name].dll

[application base] / [binpath] / [culture] / [assembly name] / [assembly name].dll

Msdn:http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/cpguide/html/cpconstep4locatingassemblythroughcodebasesorprobing.asp

Regards,

Satheesh