Getting the date of a .NET assembly [duplicate]
The following is based on: https://blog.codinghorror.com/determining-build-date-the-hard-way/
public static class ApplicationInformation
{
/// <summary>
/// Gets the executing assembly.
/// </summary>
/// <value>The executing assembly.</value>
public static System.Reflection.Assembly ExecutingAssembly
{
get { return executingAssembly ?? (executingAssembly = System.Reflection.Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly()); }
}
private static System.Reflection.Assembly executingAssembly;
/// <summary>
/// Gets the executing assembly version.
/// </summary>
/// <value>The executing assembly version.</value>
public static System.Version ExecutingAssemblyVersion
{
get { return executingAssemblyVersion ?? (executingAssemblyVersion = ExecutingAssembly.GetName().Version); }
}
private static System.Version executingAssemblyVersion;
/// <summary>
/// Gets the compile date of the currently executing assembly.
/// </summary>
/// <value>The compile date.</value>
public static System.DateTime CompileDate
{
get
{
if (!compileDate.HasValue)
compileDate = RetrieveLinkerTimestamp(ExecutingAssembly.Location);
return compileDate ?? new System.DateTime();
}
}
private static System.DateTime? compileDate;
/// <summary>
/// Retrieves the linker timestamp.
/// </summary>
/// <param name="filePath">The file path.</param>
/// <returns></returns>
/// <remarks>http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2005/04/determining-build-date-the-hard-way.html</remarks>
private static System.DateTime RetrieveLinkerTimestamp(string filePath)
{
const int peHeaderOffset = 60;
const int linkerTimestampOffset = 8;
var b = new byte[2048];
System.IO.FileStream s = null;
try
{
s = new System.IO.FileStream(filePath, System.IO.FileMode.Open, System.IO.FileAccess.Read);
s.Read(b, 0, 2048);
}
finally
{
if(s != null)
s.Close();
}
var dt = new System.DateTime(1970, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0).AddSeconds(System.BitConverter.ToInt32(b, System.BitConverter.ToInt32(b, peHeaderOffset) + linkerTimestampOffset));
return dt.AddHours(System.TimeZone.CurrentTimeZone.GetUtcOffset(dt).Hours);
}
}
I don't think the assembly itself contains it's creation date. I suspect the closest you can get is the creation date of the assembly file itself:
File.GetCreationTime(Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly().Location)
should do the trick.
EDIT:
I think Jeff Atwood's solution, written up by "grenade" in this thread, is probably the better way to go now.