Summary

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.NET solves the problems that have plagued Windows development in the past. There is one development paradigm for all languages. Design and programming language choices are no longer in conflict. Deployment is more rational and includes a versioning strategy. While we will talk more about it in later chapters, metadata, attribute-based security, code verification, and type-safe assembly isolation make developing secure applications much easier. The plumbing code for fundamental system services is provided, yet you can extend or replace it if you must.

The Common Language Runtime provides a solid base for developing applications of the future. The CLR is the foundation whose elements are the Common Type System, metadata, the Common Language Specification, and the Virtual Execution System (VES) that executes managed code. ^[14] As we shall see in future chapters, .NET makes it easier to develop Internet applications for both service providers and customer-based solutions. With the unified development platform .NET provides, it will be much easier than in the past for Microsoft or others to provide extensions.

^[14] The Base Class Libraries classes (BCL) are also part of the CLR.

All this is made possible by putting old technologies together in the CLR creatively: intermediate languages, type-safe verification, and of course, metadata. As you will see, metadata is used in many features in .NET.

We shall expand on these topics in the course of the book. We next cover the C# language. Depending on your knowledge of C#, you might be able to skim Chapters 3, 4, and 5. Chapter 4 introduces the Acme Travel Agency case study, which is used throughout the book. Chapter 5 covers important topics about the interaction of C# and the .NET Framework.

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