Assembly References in VS Solution Dependency Visualizer 0.93

One thing that always bugged (haha) me with VS Solution Dependency Visualizer was that it did not distinguish between different referenced assemblies in different locations.

For example, if a VS solution contains one C# project P1 that references a project “MyTools” (also part of that solution), but project P2 references an assembly “MyTools” (e.g. as binary, or as the output of said project), then VS Solution Dependency Visualizer would not distinguish these assemblies, and extract incorrect dependency information from the solution and its projects.

Well, this has now been fixed.

Version 0.93 will now distinguish assemblies, whether they are in the solution, in the file system, or in the GAC.

As a consequence, it is now possible to analyze the solution for

• assemblies missing in the file system or in the GAC
• duplicate assemblies (same name, different location)

and to list all assemblies referenced by the solution.

To check for GAC assemblies, it was necessary to create a .Net 4 build as well, as assemblies can only be loaded if their .Net version is lower or equal to the .Net version of the executable that loads them.

A minor UI fix, the solution folders and projects are now sorted alphabetically in the solution tree.

As usual, the latest release of VS Solution Dependency Viewer is available for download here.