Question

after compiling a simple console application project for release I get a lot of output:

• The .exe => thats fine, I need this for sure 🙂
• MyApp.exe.config => Im using and changing this, thats fine
• Some .dll files => these are the extern libraries Im using, I think thats fine too

Unknown:

• MyApp.pdb
• MyApp.vshost.exe
• MyApp.vshost.exe.config
• MyApp.vshost.exe.manifest
• log4net.xml => huh, the config for log4net is already in MyApp.exe.config, why is another log4net config xml here?

Can I delete some of them without getting later trouble? Can I add the .dll´s somehow into the .exe (so that I dont have to copy always all the .dll with the .exe)?

Answer 1

This is expected, and all have purposes – but you are right: you don’t need any of the “unknown” files, and can delete them (and certainly don’t need to distribute them). For info:

• MyApp.pdb is the debug symbols; useful for stacktrace, and for debugging later if problematic; you can disable this via the Debug Info option in the Advanced Build Settings dialog (Project Properties, Build, Advanced…) but I don’t recommend it
• MyApp.vshost.* is the debugger host process; you can disable this by disabling the “Enable the Visual Studio hosting process” option (Project Properties, Debug)
• log4net.xml is the intellisense comments – useful for IDE usage when adding references