Assemblies
In .NET, assemblies are components. Assemblies, which may be composed of one or more DLL or EXE files, are the unit of deployment, not individual DLLs or EXEs. Security evidence and versioning are based on the assembly. Assemblies contain Microsoft Intermediate Language (MSIL) instructions, resource data, and metadata. Since metadata describes the content of the assembly, they do not require any external descriptions, such as in the system registry. .NET components are much simpler and less error prone to install and uninstall, than traditional COM components, which had extensive registry entries.
A digital signature is required before an assembly can be deployed in the GAC. Digitally signed assemblies provide cryptographically generated ...
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