A registry-free In-Process COM server
The sample is composed of
- a "RefreeNetCom" .NET 8.0 COM In-Process server (supports x86 or x64)
- a native x86, x64 console client written in C++
- a .NET Framework x86 or x64 console client written in C#
- a VB6 x86 client (only works when compiled as an .exe)
- a VBScript x86, x64 client.
- And Excel VBA x64 client.
Everything is reg-free. All clients can call the .NET Server. Build RefreeNetCom for x86 to test x86 clients, build RefreeNetCom for x64 to test x64 clients.
There's a similar Out-Of-Process COM server project available here: RegfreeNetComServer
Reg-Free COM is here based on a Type Library .TLB file (RegfreeNetCom.tlb) present aside the all clients .exe (no TLB is embedded in this sample). Both .NET and C++ projects have a specific app.manifest file that declares that type library.
Sadly, there's no tooling in Visual Studio C# projects to build .tlb files from .idl (there is only in Visual Studio C++ projects!), so the C# project references an extra GetWindowsSDKPaths.targets file (to gather various Windows SDK and Visual studio paths), plus some extra lines in the .csproj to do that automatically.