Baubit.Reflection 2025.49.1

Baubit.Reflection

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A utility library for .NET that provides enhanced reflection capabilities with functional error handling using FluentResults. This library simplifies common reflection tasks such as assembly resolution, type resolution, and assembly-qualified name formatting.

Features

• Assembly Management: Advanced assembly name parsing and resolution with version-aware comparison
• Type Resolution: Safe type resolution with descriptive error handling
• Assembly Name Formatting: Generate clean, simplified assembly-qualified type names (Baubit format)
• Resource Reading: Read embedded resources from assemblies with error handling
• Functional Error Handling: All operations return Result<T> types for safe error handling using FluentResults

Installation

Install the package via NuGet:

dotnet add package Baubit.Reflection

Or via the NuGet Package Manager:

Install-Package Baubit.Reflection

Usage

Assembly Name Resolution

Parse Assembly Names from Persistable Strings

using Baubit.Reflection;

// Parse assembly name from "Name/Version" format
var assemblyName = AssemblyExtensions.GetAssemblyNameFromPersistableString("MyAssembly/1.2.3.4");
// assemblyName.Name = "MyAssembly"
// assemblyName.Version = Version(1, 2, 3, 4)

Resolve Loaded Assemblies

using Baubit.Reflection;

var assemblyName = new AssemblyName("System.Runtime");
var assembly = assemblyName.TryResolveAssembly();

if (assembly != null)
{
    Console.WriteLine($"Found assembly: {assembly.FullName}");
}

Compare Assembly Names with Version-Aware Logic

using Baubit.Reflection;

var assembly1 = new AssemblyName { Name = "MyLib", Version = new Version(1, 2, 3, 4) };
var assembly2 = new AssemblyName { Name = "MyLib", Version = new Version(1, 2, 3) };

// Compares Major, Minor, Build; ignores Revision if one is undefined
bool isSame = assembly1.IsSameAs(assembly2); // true (revision difference ignored)

Type Resolution

Safely Resolve Types

using Baubit.Reflection;

var assemblyQualifiedName = "System.String, System.Private.CoreLib";
var result = TypeResolver.TryResolveType(assemblyQualifiedName);

if (result.IsSuccess)
{
    Type resolvedType = result.Value;
    Console.WriteLine($"Resolved type: {resolvedType.FullName}");
}
else
{
    // Check for specific error reasons
    var typeNotDefinedReason = result.Reasons.OfType<TypeNotDefined>().FirstOrDefault();
    Console.WriteLine($"Failed: {typeNotDefinedReason?.Message}");
}

Assembly-Qualified Name Formatting

Generate Clean Type Names (Baubit Format)

using Baubit.Reflection;

var type = typeof(Dictionary<string, List<int>>);
var result = type.GetBaubitFormattedAssemblyQualifiedName();

if (result.IsSuccess)
{
    // Returns type name without Version, Culture, PublicKeyToken
    Console.WriteLine(result.Value);
    // Example: System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2[[System.String],[System.Collections.Generic.List`1[[System.Int32]]]]
}

Read Embedded Resources

Read Assembly Resources Asynchronously

using Baubit.Reflection;

var assembly = Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly();
var result = await assembly.ReadResource("MyNamespace.EmbeddedFile.txt");

if (result.IsSuccess)
{
    string content = result.Value;
    Console.WriteLine($"Resource content: {content}");
}
else
{
    Console.WriteLine($"Failed to read resource: {result.Errors.First().Message}");
}

Create Instances using specific constructors

CreateInstance

Create type instances via reflection with Result error handling.

var result = typeof(MyService).CreateInstance<IMyService>(
    new[] { typeof(IConfiguration), typeof(ILogger) },
    new object[] { config, logger }
);
if (result.IsSuccess)
{
    var service = result.Value;
}

Stream Utilities

Read Streams as Strings

using Baubit.Reflection;

using var stream = new MemoryStream(Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes("Hello, World!"));
var result = await stream.ReadStringAsync();

if (result.IsSuccess)
{
    Console.WriteLine(result.Value); // "Hello, World!"
}

Key Classes and Methods

AssemblyExtensions

TypeResolver

Error Reasons

Dependencies

• FluentResults: For functional error handling
• Baubit.Traceability: For custom error reason types

Development

Building the Project

dotnet build

Running Tests

dotnet test

Creating NuGet Package

dotnet pack -c Release

CI/CD

This project uses CircleCI for continuous integration and deployment:

• Build: Automated on every commit
• Test: Unit tests with code coverage reported to Codecov
• Pack & Publish: NuGet packages published from the master branch
• Release: Production releases from the release branch

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit pull requests or open issues for bugs and feature requests.

License

See the LICENSE file for details.

Author

Prashant Nagoorkar

Links

• GitHub Repository
• NuGet Package