We had a legany HIS system, we have re-developed the entire system in C# and VB .NET (and recently upgraded to .NET 3.5)
The application has several parts (about 20-25) and each part is a dll file (called Modules or Kits) and these modules (kits) are connected to the main program.
(Each kit does its own job with a common protocol, and kits are not related to each other on their work)
Everything is working fine.
Some clients may not need to have all modules (kits) and depending on their work, they may only need to have a small subset of all kits. Also in future, they may need new kits and etc.
Now for the future expanding of the system, we may need some new features in the system. We planed to provide new features using kits (dll files). But in the case of a new kit, we should add a reference of that dll file to our main exe file. Then re-compile exe file and distribute new dll and new exe file togoether. And this is not welcomed.
I am trying to find a way that a small installation script adds the new dll file to the main exe file so it can be accessed from the main program and no re-compilation of main exe file be needed.
And just distributing the dll file be enough.
In case of automatic module recognition and installation, there may be some extra code is main exe file that recognizes the attached and installed modules and provide some links in menus and etc to be able to use new facilities that are provided be new modules (kits).
That's all!
Now I want to know how this can be performed?
If any part of the question is ambiguous, let me know to describe more clearly.
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