The most important component of the .NET Framework is the Common Language Runtime (CLR). The CLR manages and executes code written in .NET languages and is the basis of the .NET architecture, similar to the Java Virtual Machine. The CLR activates objects, performs security checks on them, lays them out in memory, executes them, and garbage-collects them.
In this chapter, we describe the CLR environment, executables (with examples in several languages), metadata, assemblies, manifests, the CTS, and the CLS.
The CLR is the underlying .NET infrastructure whose facilities cover all the goals that we spelled out in Chapter 1. Unlike software libraries such as MFC or ATL, the CLR is built from a clean slate. The CLR manages the execution of code in the .NET Framework.
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An assembly is the basic unit of deployment and versioning, consisting of a manifest, a set of one or more modules, and an optional set of resources.
Figure 2-1 shows the two portions of the .NET environment, with the bottom portion representing the CLR and the top portion representing the CLR executables or Portable Executable (PE) files, which are .NET assemblies or units of deployment. The CLR is the runtime engine that loads required classes, performs just-in-time compilation on needed methods, enforces security checks, and accomplishes a bunch of other runtime functionalities. The CLR executables shown in Figure 2-1 are either EXE or DLL files that consist mostly of metadata and code.
