Mono: A .Net Implementation for Linux

Dave Blizzard

Dept of CSSE, University of Canterbury

Fri May 14 15:10:00 NZST 2004 in Room 031, MSCS

Abstract

For a long time, the only available cross platform enterprise programming environment was Java. Many in the development community pressed hard on Sun to open its strangle hold on development. Sun has steadfastly refused.

Microsoft released its new C# language (an improved Java) and .NET framework (an improved JVM) during the above infighting. After making language and virtual machine improvements over Java, Microsoft then opened up the C# development environment by supporting its inclusion in ISO standards. The Mono project was started shortly after its inclusion.

Mono is an open source implementation of the .NET Development Framework and is sponsored by Novell. There is a version for Windows and well as Linux and thus it is truly cross platform. In its approximately 3 years of existence, Mono has implemented and released a C# compiler, CLI with supporting class libraries, ADO.NET, and ASP.NET. Supporting tools include an integrated help system called MonoDoc, an web server called XSP which can be used either stand alone or to enable ASP.NET pages for Apache, a language binding for the gtk+ toolkit and assorted GNOME libraries called GTK#, and an IDE, MonoDevelop will be released on June 30. Complete Visual Basic support is scheduled for the end of this year.

My presentation will focus on Mono in the Linux environment. It will start with a short discussion about installing Mono then show MonoDoc, a few GTK# examples running in a local XSP server, simple ADO.NET examples using mysql drivers, and end with a demonstration of a pre-release version of MonoDevelop.