How do I debug into an ILMerged assembly?

Question

Summary

I want to alter the build process of a 2-assembly solution, such that a call to ILMerge is invoked, and the build results in a single assemb

Answer 1

I don't think ILMerge can do it. OTOH smartassembly from red-gate (not free) can do it, at least so it says at features

And yes, I do agree with Mike to only use ILMerge for release versions.

Answer 2

I tried to do something like this and found that you should not rename anything, neither before not after the merge. Moving stuff to to separate directory is fine. If you do not rename anything, it works.

Answer 3

I'm sorry you're having problems. I didn't follow your exact steps, but I created a console application, A.exe, that called a method in a dll, B.dll. I built both assemblies in Debug mode (so that they had PDB files). I then merged them like this:

ilmerge /out:foo.exe A.exe B.dll

(Actually A and B were in another directory so my command line was a little more complicated, but that shouldn't make a difference.) After ILMerge completed, there were two files in the current directory: foo.exe and foo.pdb. I then typed:

devenv foo.exe

This opened up Visual Studio and then I hit "F10" to start the debugger. I was able to step into the Main method in the executable and then used "F11" to step into the method in that had originally been in B.dll. The debugging experience was just the same as it had been in the original Visual Studio solution with the two assemblies.

If you are still having problems, please feel free to put your entire solution into a zip file and send it to me (mbarnett at microsoft dot com) and I can try it out.

Answer 4

I would suggest that you only ILMerge release builds of your assemblies. I can't imagine any benefit you'd get from merging debug assemblies.