Question

I am wrapping a native C++ library for consumption by the CLR. However, I’m running into a strange… problem?

The native library’s headers look like so:

namespace Foo {
    class Bar {
    public:
        Bar();

        //etc...

    };
}

So, to consume this class, I have my own class definition:

#include "Foo/Bar.h"

namespace FooNet {
    public ref class Bar {
    private:
        Foo::Bar * m_Impl;

    internal:
        Bar(Foo::Bar *);

        //etc...

    };
}

And, that all works great. However, when I reference the resulting assembly into a C# project (for example) and look at the object browser, I notice that it contains not only my CLR classes (FooNet::Bar), but also the native classes (Foo::Bar) too!

I’m not particularly enthusiastic about exposing the native classes, since they use pointers and std::strings and other .NET unfriendly stuff, so is there any way to stop this from happening?

Edit: Things I learned today:

1. The object browser shows all namespaces in the solution, not in just whatever project you happen to be looking at.
2. Native C++ classes are not exposed in managed assemblies.

Answer 1

Most likely the native classes are listed in the metadata for the benefit of managed debuggers, but they should be marked internal and not usable by consumer code.