Summary

As one developer put it so well, "The overwhelmingly positive benefits COM+ offered to COM development aren't so overwhelmingly positive in .NET." It's often said that the EnterpriseServices namespace gives .NET access to the full set of COM+ features. This is more or less true, but it doesn't tell the whole story. In .NET, you can't apply COM+ services in the same way that you would in a COM-based application. First of all, if you do, you could end up with DCOM nightmares and distribution headaches. Second, some COM+ features bring their own .NET baggage, including limitations that compromise their use with other types of components or managed code (such as role-based security or queued components). Third, you don't have to apply COM+ services in .NET many features of .NET mirror COM+ services, although they can't replace them in all situations. Using COM+ effectively in .NET means knowing where COM+ can truly provide a benefit that the CLR can't and how to integrate it into the service provider model with XML Web services and .NET Remoting.