[Mono-list] Compiling .NET programs to EXE files that runwithout Mono/NET Framework

[TuckMeng Lam]

Hi Miguel,

Honored that the founder of Mono is replying to an email from a Newbie. 
Thank you for your advice; I understand better now.

Would like to seek your advice on a matter of a different sort. I am working 
in an organisation dealing with multiple IT vendors for IT projects. 1 of 
them (a subcontractor) would like to use Mono in production, but the main 
vendor's stopping him, siting Legal concerns (we're concerned with violating 
Intellectual Property infringement) and Technical concerns (Mono is not 
mature).

I honestly have doubts over his technical concerns. I think Mono's working 
fine and you have a consulting service from Novell to help out. What I think 
would be nice though is for a webpage to list down Mono implementations 
running in production in big companies to give technical vendors the 
confidence level that the big boys are using it (especially if mono's 
ASP.NET is used in production). As for Legal concerns, I need your advice on 
this one. Based on your website's FAQ, it's using the Windows APIs that are 
probably going to be the issue. The application uses ASP.NET, WinForms and 
ADO.NET. While the vendor can probably use GTK# to get around WinForms, is 
there any compatible API to replace ASP.NET and ADO.NET? What really is the 
risk exposure for a company to use Mono to run these APIs?

Thanks in advance for your advice. Oh, by the way, will we see a source code 
-> native image compiler anytime soon? Just fantasizing on the ability to 
compile to native code in Linux. That would be a 1 up for Mono against .NET, 
wouldn't it? <smile>

Regards,
TuckMeng

>From: Miguel de Icaza <miguel at ximian.com>
>To: TuckMeng Lam <tuckmeng at hotmail.com>
>CC: mono-list at lists.ximian.com
>Subject: Re: [Mono-list] Compiling .NET programs to EXE files that 
>runwithout Mono/NET Framework
>Date: Tue, 23 May 2006 13:46:28 -0400
>
>Hello,
>
> > a. I am running XP and would like to compile .NET programs to standalone 
>EXE
> > files that run without Mono/NET Framework.
> >
> > b. I tried using mono --aot filename.exe and noticed that Mono runs 2
> > programs - AS (assembler) and gcc (to link). The filename that is 
>generated
> > is filename.exe.dll as I had MingW installed in my PC as well.
>
>AOT compilation is merely a process that avoids JITing, it is not a
>process to produce standalone images.  Think of it as "caching" the JIT
>result for a faster startup experience.
>
> > c. How do I compile it to run properly? I noticed that Mono doesn't 
>allow me
> > to stop the assembly process in XP. I could however see a series of
>
>You might want to look into `mkbundle' instead.
>