Question

Visual Studio produces an XML file and a PDB file when I produce a DLL.

• What are these files used for?
• Do they have to be copied to the System32 folder (assuming that the DLL is stored in the System32 folder) when registering the DLL?

I am using REGASM for COM interoperability.

Answer 1

The xml file contains the xml style comments that decorate the code.

for example:

///<summary>
///This method adds two integers
///</summary>
public int Add(int a, int b)
{
    return a + b;
}

The pdb file is a program database contains the symbols needed to debug the code.

Neither are required for running the program normally.