.NET and COM Interoperability Handbook, The

The CLR

At the heart of the .NET Framework is the Comman Languaage Runtime (CLR). The CLR is an execution environment that loads and executes code. Code that runs under the control of the CLR is called managed code. You can still create code that runs in the same way that Win32 executables and Dynamic Link Libraries (DLLs) run now, and this type of code is now called unmanaged code. Managed code will enjoy a number of benefits that aren't afforded to unmanaged code, including automatic memory management (garbage collection), type safety, security, a simple consistent programming model, simplified deployment, rich debugging support, consistent error handling, language independence, and even the possibility running on different platforms. All of ...