TTL in the Assembly Download Cache

[Jeff B.]

Hello,

Can anyone tell me how long an assembly downloaded via a no-touch
application will remain in the assembly download cache? I realize I can
manually remove them via the "gacutil.exe /cdl" command, however, I'm
curious how long they'll stick around if they are never manually removed.

There are two reasons I am asking this:

1) Users with only the runtime version of the .NET Framework will not have
the "gacutil.exe" utility and therefore can't manually clear the cache.

2) As new versions of a downloaded assembly are made available, older
versions remain in the cache.

Any insight as to how long they will remain is greatly appreciated.

 

[Jan Tielens]

I thought the size was set default to 50MB. If it gets full the assembly
that is not used for the longest time will be deleted from the cache. This
mechanism works in the same way as the cache in Internet Explorer.

 

[Jeff B.]

I thought the size was set default to 50MB. If it gets full the assembly

that is not used for the longest time will be deleted from the cache. This
mechanism works in the same way as the cache in Internet Explorer.

Yeah, I just found something stating the same thing. Do you (or anyone
else) know if this 50MB value is configurable?

 

[Jan Tielens]

Yes you can configure it:
- In an explorer window navigate to C:\WINDOWS\assembly\Download (or
C:\WINNT\assembly\Download)
- Then choose "Cache Settings..." from the Extra menu.
- In the store limits frame you can alter the size.

 

[Jeff B.]

Yes you can configure it:

- In an explorer window navigate to C:\WINDOWS\assembly\Download (or
C:\WINNT\assembly\Download)
- Then choose "Cache Settings..." from the Extra menu.
- In the store limits frame you can alter the size.

Thanks again. That's useful information. The odd thing is, my download
size is set to 1MB (not the 50MB default) but the cache currently contains
13MB of files (obviously over the 1MB limit). The help page associated with
this dialog also shows a cache size of 1MB in the screenshot of the
properties dialog. I wonder if this 1MB size is just a fluke and it's
really 50MB until changed?

 

[Jan Tielens]

Jeff

I have no idea... Maybe some MS guys/girls?