Where can I find location of generated file after doing Ngen?

Question

I did Ngen on a C# executable. It was succesful, but I cannot figure out where the generated file is in my PC. MSDN says it should be in native image cache, still not able to figure out where it is..

EDIT : I want to run objdump on it, hence I need the physical file

EDIT2: my putput of running ngen is :

C:\Documents and Settings\nmea\My Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\Consol
eApplication4\ConsoleApplication4\bin\Release>ngen install ConsoleApplication4.e
xe
Microsoft (R) CLR Native Image Generator - Version 2.0.50727.3053
Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation.  All rights reserved.
Installing assembly C:\Documents and Settings\nmea\My Documents\Visual Studio
2008\Projects\ConsoleApplication4\ConsoleApplication4\bin\Release\ConsoleApplica
tion4.exe
    Compiling assembly C:\Documents and Settings\nmea\My Documents\Visual Stud
io 2008\Projects\ConsoleApplication4\ConsoleApplication4\bin\Release\ConsoleAppl
ication4.exe (CLR v2.0.50727) ...
ConsoleApplication4, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=null

score 23 · Accepted Answer · answered Apr 14 '11 at 01:45

The exact location will vary by version but it will be something similar to this:

C:\Windows\assembly\NativeImages_v2.0.50727_32\System.Web\ace3bede2f516f9e5bca620ad86cc063>System.Web.ni.dll

They start in C:\Windows\assembly and then there is a subfolder NativeImages_vXXX for each .NET version. Then there is a subfolder for each dll that has a native image. Under that another subfolder for a unique version identifier (so you can have multiple native images from different versions of the same dll). Finally the native dll itself.

Note that you cannot navigate to this directory in Windows Exlporer. Use cmd. In Explorer there is a shell extension that hides the details of how the GAC and native images work and just shows you a prettier UI.

Turns out you can navigate the GAC in explorer -- have added an answer, not sure if better as a comment. — Tim Barrass, Mar 14 '12 at 15:56
Ngen is related to Native Image Cache, not GAC. see: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/939242 — Manohar Reddy Poreddy, Nov 08 '16 at 04:47

score 21 · Answer 2 · answered Mar 14 '12 at 15:56

Just exploring some similar issues here and you can navigate the GAC in explorer if you make a change in the registry.

Under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Fusion create a DWORD entry named DisableCacheViewer, and set it to 1.

After that, open a new explorer window and navigate to e.g. c:\windows\assembly.

score 2 · Answer 3 · answered Jul 19 '13 at 07:17

2

Try ngen display AssemblyName /verbose | findstr "File:"

ex: %windir%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319\ngen.exe display System.Xaml /verbose | findstr "File:"

answered Jul 19 '13 at 07:17

m_eric

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Teoman Soygul · Answer 4 · 2011-04-14T01:52:58.567

2

You'll find them in the NativeImages_blabla folder in c:\windows\assembly. Also I've noted that .NET 3.5 and above actually does not allow physically accessing the NGENed image. I guess it reverted to using one large database for all files but I cant be sure since the generated images are no where to be seen on the disk.

edited Apr 14 '11 at 01:52

answered Apr 14 '11 at 01:28

Teoman Soygul

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there is only one folder called "download" under c:\windows\assembly in my PC. could not find any file beginnig with "Native" there.. – paseena Apr 14 '11 at 01:30
running from visual c# 2008 sdk prompt. Ngen version is "Microsoft (R) CLR Native Image Generator - Version 2.0.50727.3053" – paseena Apr 14 '11 at 01:33
Then be sure that file exists in the native image cache, use `ngen /show MyAssembly` and then search for the assembly inside the whole Windows directory. I'm sure it will come up if properly installed in the cache. – Teoman Soygul Apr 14 '11 at 01:35
yes, it is there when i tried show : "Native Images:ConsoleApplication4, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=null" – paseena Apr 14 '11 at 01:37

score 1 · Answer 5 · edited Apr 23 '17 at 12:09

Well, you see it took a long long time to find where the location is!

Well, it is inside c:\Windows\assembly folder, but when I opened this folder then I was only be able to see the .NET assemblies, so I thought there will be some hidden folders. So I open the command prompt with administrative privileges then I was able to see list of folders as shown below...

GAC,  GAC_32,  GAC_64,  GAC_MSIL,  NativeImages_v2.0.50727_32
NativeImages_v2.0.50727_64,  NativeImages_v4.0.30319_32,
NativeImages_v4.0.30319_64

You see it's amazing. I mean, here I can only see the required folders, but not the assemblies. Well, no problem, be happy.

So my application was built in v4 and 64-bit compilation so therefore my required EXE file was in the root of the NativeImages_v4.0.30319_64 folder.

Where can I find location of generated file after doing Ngen?

5 Answers5

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