.NET Framework

Basil

Basil

Member
Joined
Nov 4, 2012
Posts
14
Location
Kent, UK
To be honest, I never understood what .Net Framework is. Reading about it, this morning, I learn that:

"The .NET Framework is a software framework developed by Microsoft that runs primarily on Microsoft Windows. It includes a large library and provides language interoperability (each language can use code written in other languages) across several programming languages. Programs written for the .NET Framework execute in a software environment (as contrasted to hardware environment), known as the Common Language Runtime (CLR), an application virtual machine that provides services such as security, memory management, and exception handling. The class library and the CLR together constitute the .NET Framework."

If I understand it correctly, it is primarily aimed at developers, and I am not a developer.....just a normal, everyday Windows user.

I would like to ask if it is necessary/advisable to keep downloading updates for this, via Windows Updates, or can I safely hide these updates.

Thank you
Basil
 
Hello Basil :)

You should not hide these updates, and should continue to download them. Firstly, the fact that you are being offered them at all means that you have do have .net installed. If you hide these updates, you will not get patches for various security vulnerabilities, so you will not be protected. Hiding them only makes your computer vulnerable.

So the next question is do you need .net? Because surely you could uninstall it, and the updates wouldn't come through. Well, yes and no.

If you did uninstall it, the updates wouldn't be offered. But I would strongly advise against it. There are two parts to .net (arguably three, but let's not get bogged down in technicalities), the part for developers, and the part for normal users. You currently only have the much smaller part for normal users. Developers need a much bigger download. If you remove .net, you will suddenly not be able to use any application created with .net. This is bad, so I would advise very strongly against removing it. :)

Some small parts of .net are so built into the OS that they cannot fully be uninstalled. But even so, you will happily manage to break a lot of apps if you forced an uninstall.

I shall now predict the next question :p I have many versions of .net on my system, do I need them all. The short answer? Yes, you do. They are not fully backwards compatible in the way some people expect. Some versions are backwards compatible with some other versions, but at the end of the day, if you start removing any, you are extremely likely to break some application or other.

I can provide more details if you are interested. These are just the short answers: it summarises to: don't uninstall any .net versons, and do install all updates. Otherwise .net applications will break and/or you leave your computer vulnerable.

Richard
 
Good Morning Richard,

Thank you very much for the explanation. Now I understand it a lot more.
As far as "predicting the next question".....you are absolutely right....:thumbsup2:
I just forgot to include it....:lol:

Thank you Richard. I will carry on downloading them!
 
Excellent question, Basil, particularly because many people have problems with .NET Framework updates. If you have ever had a problem with .NET Framework updates, I suggest installing them separately from other updates with a shutdown/restart.
 
Thank you Corrine.

Based on your past advise I always install them separately despite the fact I never had any problem with them. Just in case...:lol:
 
Basil said:
Thank you Corrine.

Based on your past advise I always install them separately despite the fact I never had any problem with them. Just in case...:lol:
Click to expand...

I would second Corrine's advice. .net Framework updates are a pain, TBH. They don't use the normal Windows Update package format (even though they come through normal Windows Update), and tend to be a bit more brittle. But it is more than that. The error codes tend to be just a generic 643 (ERROR_INSTALL_FAILURE: Fatal error during installation.) which is very hard to work from. One 643 could be extremely different from another 643, whereas a 0x800B0100 vs 0x80070005 will be completely different. But the 643s are indistinguishable. Also, the logfiles are written to completely different locations, the corruptions are completely different, and our normal tools do not apply. No wonder they are hard to fix in the normal way. Hence other techniques must be employed.

Richard
 

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