This page provides important information for .NET developers.
On this page:
Building Ice Applications for .NET with Visual Studio
Install the following software on your Windows system:
- The Ice Builder for Visual Studio extension
- The NuGet package zeroc.ice.net, described later on this page
- Optionally the .NET Core 2.0 SDK if you want to create applications for .NET Core 2.0
Building Ice Applications for .NET with the .NET Core SDK
Install the following software:
The .NET Core 2.0 SDK for your operating system
- The NuGet package zeroc.ice.net, described later on this page
- The
slice2cscompilerslice2csis a command-line tool written in C++ and available on most platformsPlatform Distribution Package with slice2cs Ubuntu apt packages zeroc-ice-compilers
You need to install zeroc-ice-compilers from the 3.7.1 beta repo, as it includes a fix to the generated code for optional. The corresponding bug affects only Linux applications.RHEL RPMs ice-compilers
You need to install ice-compilers from the 3.7.1 beta repo, as it includes a fix to the generated code for optional. The corresponding bug affects only Linux applications.Windows NuGet zeroc.ice.net
Programming Language
You can use any .NET programming language with Ice, however, the preferred programming language for Ice .NET applications is C# since:
- the only Slice language mapping for .NET is Slice to C#
- the only Slice compiler for .NET,
slice2cs, generates C# code - Ice for .NET is itself written in C#
zeroc.ice.net NuGet Package
The Ice for .NET (zeroc.ice.net) NuGet package is organized as follows:
Folder | Contents |
|---|---|
lib\net45 | Assemblies for .NET Framework 4.5.1 |
lib\netstandard2.0 | Assemblies for .NET Standard 2.0 |
tools | slice2cs.exe, slice2html.exe (Windows-only native tools) |
tools\net45 |
|
tools\netcoreapp2.0 |
|
build | MSBuild support files |
slice | Slice files |
For the 3.7.1 beta release, zeroc.ice.net is available from the beta repository https://dev.zeroc.com/nexus/repository/nuget.ice-v3.7.1-netcore-beta0.
On windows you can add this repository as a new package source using Visual Studio's "Tools > NuGet Package Manager > Package Manager Settings...":
On Linux you need to edit NuGet configuration (~/.nuget/NuGet/NuGet.Config) to add a new package source
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<configuration>
<packageSources>
<add key="zeroc.com" value="https://dev.zeroc.com/nexus/repository/nuget.ice-v3.7.1-netcore-beta0/" />
<add key="nuget.org" value="https://api.nuget.org/v3/index.json" protocolVersion="3" />
</packageSources>
</configuration>
.NET Framework and .NET Standard Assemblies
zeroc.ice.net includes two sets of Ice assemblies: one set of assemblies for the .NET Framework 4.5 and another set for .NET Standard 2.0.
These assemblies are the same except for the differences described below:
| .NET Framework 4.5 Assemblies | .NET Standard 2.0 Assemblies | |
|---|---|---|
| Run-time platform | Windows | Windows, Linux, macOS |
| Target Framework | .NET Framework 4.5.1 or greater on Windows | Any implementation of .NET Standard 2.0, including .NET Core 2.0 and .NET Framework 4.6.1. |
| Ice properties can be read from the Windows Registry |  |  |
| Signals caught by Ice.Application | Signal catching implemented using the Windows native function SetConsoleCtrlHandler. | Signal catching implemented using the portable .NET event Console.KeyPress. |
The .NET Standard 2.0 assemblies are expected to work with any .NET implementation of .NET Standard 2.0, however, they are currently tested and supported only with .NET Core 2.0 on Windows and Linux.
Building Applications with Visual Studio or MSBuild
Adding zeroc.ice.net to a Visual Studio or MSBuild project imports the props and targets files from the build folder into that project.
The props file defines the following properties:
Name | Value | Description |
|---|---|---|
IceVersion | 3.7 | Ice string version |
IceIntVersion | 30701 | Ice version as a numeric value |
IceVersionMM | 3.7 | Major Minor version |
IceSoVersion | 37 | Version used in dynamic libraries |
IceNugetPackageVersion | 3.7.1 | Nuget package numeric version |
IceHome | $(MSBuildThisFileDirectory)..\.. | Full path to the package root folder |
IceToolsPath | $(IceHome)\tools | Full path to the tools folder |
The targets file defines two MSBuild targets, SliceCompile and SliceClean. SliceCompile compiles Slice files with slice2cs, while SliceClean removes the files generated by slice2cs. The SliceCompile target runs before the default Build target and compile all project items of type Slice. Similarly, the SliceClean target runs before the default Clean target and removes all the files generated by the SliceCompile target.
The SliceCompile target can be customized using the following MSBuild properties:
Name | Default Value | Description |
|---|---|---|
SliceCompiler | Windows: Other: | Slice to C# compiler used to compile Slice files. |
SliceCompilerOutputDir | $(MSBuildThisFileDirectory)generated | Output directory for the generated code. Correspond to the --output-dir option of slice2cs. |
SliceCompilerArgs | Extra arguments to pass to the Slice to C# compiler. |
Compression with bzip2
Ice for .NET supports the optional compression of Ice requests and responses using the bzip2 native library. The bzip2 native DLL for Windows x64 is included in the zeroc.ice.net package. You can use the bzip2 system library on Linux and macOS.
Using the Sample Programs
Sample programs are available at the ice-demos GitHub repository. You can browse this repository to see build and usage instructions for all supported programming languages. You can clone this repository with:
git clone -b netcore https://github.com/zeroc-ice/ice-demos.git cd ice-demos