Windows Server 2022 & Powershell All-in-One For Dummies

Chapter 2

Understanding the .NET Framework

IN THIS CHAPTER

Getting acquainted with the .NET Framework versions

Paying attention to what’s new in .NET 4.8

Viewing the contents of the Global Assembly Cache

Examining .NET Standard and .NET Core

Many people wonder why they need to understand the .NET Framework and, more important, why it’s bundled with PowerShell. Using .NET, not only can you do things in PowerShell that you wouldn’t be able to do natively, but you also can create functions and modules with the .NET code that you can reuse.

In this chapter, I explain the basics of .NET and how to interact with it. I don’t cover .NET programming — that’s a whole other book’s worth of material.

Introducing the Various Versions of .NET Framework

Before I jump into .NET versions, I want to make sure that you understand what the .NET framework actually is. A framework allows a programmer to call code instead of having to write the code each time the programmer wants the functionality. The .NET framework gives developers the code they need to write .NET applications without having to custom ...