How-To's, Usage Notes

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This section explains how to perform selected Manifest Maker and Windows tasks. The division between Manifest Maker and Windows tasks is quite flexible since most tasks here involve both Manifest Maker and Windows.

Windows Server 2003 Note

Windows 2003 Server introduces a change in side-by-side behaviour. In Windows XP the external manifest takes priority over any embedded manifest. This means that if you create a manifest for an application that has an embedded manifest, your new external manifest is used instead of the old embedded manifest. In Windows Server 2003 and subsequent systems, including Windows Vista, this rule is reversed: the embedded manifest is used regardless of whether there is an external manifest. This behaviour can be controlled by a registry setting on Windows Server 2003 SP1 with hotfix 912949 and on all versions of Vista.

To change manifest priority edit the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\SideBySide, add a DWORD value PreferExternalManifest and set it to 1.

See KB article 912949 for the Windows Server 2003 hotfix and detailed instructions.

Manifest Maker Digital Signature

Manifest Maker Is Digitally Signed: Digital signature guarantees authenticity and integrity of the signed program.
As long as the signature is valid, you can be assured that this program is original and unmodified.
Windows Security Warning: What to do if you get a Windows security warning that Manifest Maker's signature cannot be verified.

Manifest Maker Skills

Choosing Your Certificate: How to choose which certificate should be used to sigh a shared assembly.
Private Assembly Library: How to create a private assembly library.

Windows Skills

Managing Your Certificates: How to manage your certificate using Windows Certificate Manager.

Web Applications

Isolating Web Applications: How to isolate web applications using Windows Server 2003 and IIS6.
Isolating ASP .Net 1.x Applications: How to make ASP .Net 1.x web applications use non-registered COM components.
Isolating ASP .Net 2.0 Applications: How to make ASP .Net 2.0 web applications use non-registered COM components.

Using Managed (.Net) Objects

Accessing .Net (CLR Managed) Classes in Win32 Applications: How to access .Net (CLR managed) classes from Win32 applications.
Accessing .Net (CLR Managed) Classes in IIS6: How to access .Net (CLR managed) classes from Win32 (ASP or ISAPI) web applications in Windows Server 2003 and IIS6.

Using Manifest Maker with Visual Studio 2005

Manifest Maker Integration: How to use Manifest Maker with Visual Studio 2005.
Command line Manifest Maker: How to build manifests with command line Manifest maker.

64-bit Windows

The Basics of 64-bit Windows: Introduction to 64-bit Windows.
Making 64-bit Manifests: How to build manifests for 64-bit Windows applications.

Using the Side-by-Side API

When to Use the Activation Context API: A discussion of the available options.
How to Use the Activation Context API: The most commonly used side-by-side functions.
Programming the Activation Context API: Practical examples of the SxS API usage.