Welcome to the NAR Loader Project   

Maybe some of you know the concept of JAR archives from Java. A lot of things from Java have found their way to the Dot Net world. Having the same functionality for Dot Net would be a nice feature. Since Dot Net 2, Microsoft has included some very interesting features in the CLR and the framework. These features makes it possible to create the functionality needed to handle archives for Dot Net - called NAR archives. The loader works only with .Net 2.x. .Net 1.x is not supported. Mono will be tested when the windows version is stable.

Additional infos about the NAR loader can be found in this Article.

• Disclaimer
• Download
• Installation
• Usage
• How to crate an archive
• Encryption
• How the loader helps the CLR to resolve assemblies
• What it [ is | can | does ]
• What it [ is | can | does ] NOT
• Running the NAR Loader under Windows Vista
• Nobody is perfect
• Known issues, FAQ, Help
• What's next
• Links

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Current Versions

Older Versions

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NARLoader.exe -i

Optionally you can type:

NARLoader.exe -d -i

to install the loader. This enables debug mode. In debug mode you can watch debug messages of the loader in a separate console window while the loader runs an application. To disable debug mode just install the loader again without the -d parameter.

To uninstall the loader just start it with the -u parameter. This removes the .nar file extension mapping and the NARLoader CAS CodeGroup from your system.

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NARLoader.exe MyApp.nar param1 param2 ...

(Everything after the archivename is used as command line arguments for the application inside the archive). It's not necessarry to specify NARLoader.exe so:

MyApp.nar param1 param2 ...

would be enough.

Another way to start your archives is just double clicking them.

The loader uses the following command line parameters.

Normal operation:

NARLoader [-d] [-p Password] Archive

• -d Turns debugging on
  Turns debugging on which means that you will see a console window while your application is running where you can see whats going on behind the scenes.
• -p Password
  The password for a encrypted archive can be specified with this parameter. If no password is specified and an encrypted archive is used a dialog is displayed for entering the password.
Install / Uninstall

NARLoader [-d] -i | -u

• -i Installs the loader
  so that files with .nar extension are seamless integrated into the OS. You can double click .nar files or start .nar archives from the command line.
• -u Uninstalls the .nar handling
  This is the opposite of the -i parameter.
Creation of self running archives

NARLoader [-d] [-c SelfRunningName] [-I IconFileName] [-p Password] -d Archive

• -c Creates a self running archive
  This creates a stand alone .exe archive which does not need the loader. When used with the -d parameter the self running archive starts in debug mode. When a self running archive is run on a machine where the NARLoader is not installed a "silent install" is done the first time such an archive is run on this machine. This "silent install" only creates the necessary CAS code goup - no .nar file mapping is installed. If NARLoader was already installed on the machine (using the -i parameter nothing is installed by the self running archive.

  If you use a encrypted archive for your self running archive it is possible to embed the password inside the self running archive in encrypted form. Thus it is possible to create a strong AES encrypted archive without the need for the user to enter a password. This can be used as a form of obfuscator for your applications assemblies.

• -o EXEFile - is used in conjunction with -c to specify the name of the self running archive. If this is omitted the original archivename with appended .exe is used.
• -I IconFile - also used in conjunction with -c to specify the name of an Icon for the self running exe. This can either be the name of an .ico file or of a .exe or .dll file. When a .exe or .dll file is used the first Icon from this file is used. The Icon of a self running archive can also be specified in the archives manifest file. In this case the Icon must reside inside the archive again as .ico, .exe or .dll file. The -I command line parameter overrules the Icon parameter in the manifest. If both Icon parameters are missing or the given Icon files could not be processed for any reason the standard NARLoader Icon is used for the self running archive.
Help & Version information

NARLoader [-d] -v | -h

• -v Shows version information
• -h Shows a short help about command line parameters.

NARLoader.exe Test.nar

Starts the application inside the archive Test.nar

NARLoader.exe -d Test.nar

Same as above but with debugging enabled

NARLoader.exe -di
NARLoader.exe -d -i

Installs the loader to handle .nar files automatically

NARLoader.exe -u

The opposite from the above

NARLoader.exe -d -I World.ico -O World.exe -c NARTest.nar

Creates a self running archive World.exe with Icon World.ico from the archive NARTest.nar. The Icon parameter from the archives manifest is ignored.

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Here is the testproject included in the loader distribution shown with WinZip. It consists of the main .exe assembly NARTest, an assembly NARTestDLL1 in the application directory and NARTestDLL2 in the testdir subdirectory as well as some sattelite assemblies with localized strings and a multifile assembly with three modules.

Included in this archive is the manifest NARTest.nar.manifest:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<NARLoader>
   <Start Assembly="NARTest"
          Type="NARTest.Program"
	  AppConfig="NARTest.exe.config"
	  ShowComment="1"
          Icon="Clown.ico"/>
</NARLoader>

• Assembly
  specifies which assembly to load
• Type
  the entrypoint (Main) of which type should be called
• AppConfig
  which app.config file should be used
• ShowComment
  Anything other than 0 allows the display of archive comments (if any). Archive comments are standard zip archive comments. See your zip utility for how to create them.
• Icon
  Used when creating self running archives. Specifies a .ico, .exe or .dll file which icon should be used for the self running archive .exe file. The given .ico, .exe or .dll file must reside inside the archive. It can be overriden by the -I command line parameter.

You can have many different manifest files within an archive. They are used depending on the name of the archive. If there is no manifest file in the archive or if there is a manifest file but some parameters like Assembly or AppConfig are missing (or empty) in the manifest then the name of the archive is taken instead. So for example if there is no manifest and the archive is named Test.nar then the startassembly is Test, the type is Test.Program and the configfile is Test.exe.config. Id does not matter if the assemblyname is fully qualified or not.

Probing is the same as on the local filesystem. See here for more information's about probing.

If an archive contains a comment (zip file comment) it is displayed a applicationstartup if the ShowComment manifest parameter is set. This feature can be used to display license agreements.

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• The NAR Loader is a single hybrid executable consisting of a managed and an unmanaged part (contained in a single executable).
• You can use the -i or -d[il] command line parameter to install the loader to handle .nar files automatically. This means you can start your archives by just double-clicking on it or by just entering the archive name on the command line.
• You can use command line arguments with NAR archives. Everything following the archive name is handed over to the application in the archive as command line
• You can use subdirectories inside the archive the same way as you would in the real filesystem (binPath probing)
• The loader may create a small temporary file in the users temp directory. This will be changed in one of the next version. This temporary file represents the app.config file. Unlike assemblies it is not possible to bring the content of the app.config file into the CLR from unmanaged code without using a file. This temp file is deleted when the application exits. SetConfigBytes seems not to work as expected.
• The ApplicationBase for the application inside the archive is set to the directory in which the archive is.
• Every resolve step first checks the physical directory in which the archive is for the requested assembly or app.config file. If it is found the native file on the disk is used instead of the file in the archive. This is by design. In this way you can simply update your application in the archive by just copying the needed files besides the archive without the need to repackage the archive. Later version may expand this mechanism about security (only files with given security attributes will be considered) and autoupdate of the archive (files will be automatically merged into the archive and deleted on disk afterwards so that you always have only one archive)

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• It is not a replacement for multimodule assemblies (although you can use multimodule assemblies inside .nar archives)
• It does not extract the archive content to some place on your disk and starts the application from there. Instead when an assembly is requested from the archive all handling is done in memory without write disk access.
• It does not read the whole archive into memory and holds it there. Even when your archive is 10Gb in size only the things needed from the archive are loaded into memory and only when they are needed.
• For the moment the loader can not provide application data like text or database files the application will read from inside the archive. They must be in the normal filesystem like without the loader. But in one of the next versions of the loader there meight be a sollution for keeping application data files within the archive and give the application read/write access to these data. Thus providing a way to have application binaries and application data within a single entity: a .nar archive.

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• The binary package of the loader contains two test archives: NARTest.nar and NARTestP.nar. NARTestP.nar is a password protected archive. The password for this archive is TopSecret! . So you can test the password and protection features of the loader.
• app.config must be physical on disk for ConfigurationManager to work correct. see here
• Loading multifile assemblies sometimes crashes the loader - reason unknown - has to be fixed
• The loader needs a security.config file where it can add it's CAS code group during install. If there is no security.config but only a security.config.cch you can create one by just starting

  Control Panel/Administrative Tools/Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 Configuration

  or mscorcfg.msc from your DotNet SDK's bin directory

  and closing if without any further action. After this you should have a security.config and can install the loader.

Another way to create a security.config is to run CasPol.exe:

CasPol.exe -all -reset

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• Extend the functionality of the privatePath configuration option to probe for assemblies in other .nar archives (aka. linked .nar archives)
• Application data inside archives with transparent acces to the application inside the archive see here

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• zLib - an unmanaged ZIP library
• zLib for Windows
• sharpZlib - a managed ZIP library
• http://blogs.msdn.com/junfeng/default.aspx
• http://blogs.msdn.com/suzcook/default.aspx
• MSDN Magazine, Issue August 2006, CLR Inside Out: CLR Hosting APIs
• The Book "Customizing the Microsoft .Net Framework Common Language Runtime"
  from Steven Pratschner http://www.microsoft.com/learning/books/products/6895/ on Amazon
• The Book "Essential .Net"
  from Don Box on Amazon
• There also exists an interesting commercial product at http://www.xenocode.com
• .NETZ - another open source application packer http://www.madebits.com/netz
• ILMerge - merges .Net assemblies into one assembly - from Microsoft Research http://research.microsoft.com/~mbarnett/ilmerge.aspx
• .NET Fusion Workshop
• Dr. Brian Gladman's AES implementation

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