The Base Class Library (BCL) is a library of types and functionalities available to all languages using the .NET Framework. In order to make the programmer's job easier, .NET includes the BCL in order to encapsulate a large number of common functions, such as file reading and writing, graphic rendering, database interaction, and XML document manipulation. It is much larger in scope than standard libraries for most other languages, including C++, and would be comparable in scope to the standard libraries of Java. The BCL is sometimes incorrectly referred to as the Framework Class Library (FCL), which is a superset including the Microsoft.* namespaces. This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... The term database originated within the computer industry. ... The Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a W3C-recommended general-purpose markup language that supports a wide variety of applications. ... C++ (pronounced see plus plus, IPA: ) is a general-purpose, high-level programming language with low-level facilities. ... Java is an object-oriented programming language developed by Sun Microsystems in the early 1990s. ...

The BCL is updated with each version of the .NET Framework. This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...

Namespaces

Some of these namespaces may or may not be officially considered part of the BCL by Microsoft, but all are included as part of the standard libraries that are provided with the .NET Framework. Microsoft Corporation, (NASDAQ: MSFT, HKSE: 4338) is a multinational computer technology corporation with global annual revenue of US$44. ...

• System - This namespace includes the core needs for programming. It includes base types like String, DateTime, Boolean, and so forth, support for environments such as the console, math functions, and base classes for attributes, exceptions, and arrays.
• System.CodeDom - This library provides the ability to create code and run it, at runtime.
• System.Collections - Defines many common containers or collections used in programming, such as lists, queues, stacks, hashtables, and dictionaries. It includes support for generics.
• System.ComponentModel - Provides the ability to implement the run-time and design-time behavior of components and controls. It contains the infrastructure "for implementing attributes and type converters, binding to data sources, and licensing components."^[1]
• System.Configuration - Provides the infrastructure for handling configuration data.
• System.Data - This namespace represents the ADO.NET architecture, which is set of computer software components that can be used by programmers to access data and data services.
• System.Deployment - Allows you to customize the way your application upgrades when using ClickOnce.
• System.Diagnostics - Gives you the ability to diagnose your application. It includes event logging, performance counters, tracing, and interaction with system processes.
• System.DirectoryServices - Provides easy access to Active Directory from managed code.
• System.Drawing - Provides access to GDI+ graphics functionality, including support for 2D and vector graphics, imaging, printing, and text services.
• System.EnterpriseServices - "Provides .NET objects with access to COM+ services making the .NET Framework objects more practical for enterprise applications."^[2]
• System.Globalization - Provides help for writing internationalized applications. "Culture-related information, including the language, the country/region, the calendars in use, [and] the format patterns for dates, currency, and numbers" can be defined.^[3]
• System.IO - Allows you to read from and write to different streams, such as files or other data streams. Also provides a connection to the file system.
• System.Management - Allows you to query for information, "such as how much free space is left on the disk, what is the current CPU utilization, which database a certain application is connected to, and much more."^[4]
• System.Media - Provides you the ability to play system sounds and .wav files.
• System.Messaging - Allows "you to connect to, monitor, and administer message queues on the network and send, receive, or peek messages."^[5] .NET Remoting is another name for some of the functionality provided. This namespace is being superseded by Windows Communication Foundation.
• System.Net - Provides an interface "for many of the protocols used on networks today,"^[6] such as HTTP, FTP, and SMTP. Secure communication is supported by protocols such as SSL.
• System.Reflection - Provides an object view of types, methods, and fields. You have "the ability to dynamically create and invoke types."^[7]
• System.Resources - Allows you to manage many different resources in the application in order to internationalize an application for different cultures and languages.
• System.Runtime - Allows you to manage the runtime behavior of an application or the CLR. Some of the included abilities are interoping with COM or other native code, writing distributed applications, and serializing objects into binary or SOAP.
• System.Security - "Provides the underlying structure of the common language runtime security system."^[8] This namespace allows you to build security into your application based on policy and permissions. It provides services such as cryptography.
• System.ServiceProcess - Allows you to create applications that run as a service within Windows.
• System.Text - Supports various encodings, regular expressions, and a more efficient mechanism for manipulating strings (StringBuilder).
• System.Threading - Helps facilitate multithreaded programming. It allows the synchronizing of "thread activities and access to data" and provides "a pool of system-supplied threads."^[9]
• System.Timers - "Allows you to raise an event on a specified interval."^[10]
• System.Transactions - Provides support for local or distributed transactions.
• System.Web - Provides various web related functionality. It enables browser-server communication and the creating XML Web Services. Most or all of these libraries are referred to as the ASP.NET architecture.
• System.Windows.Forms - This namespace contains the Windows Forms architecture which provides access to the older Windows API for writing graphical applications for Windows from within managed code. This system is being superseded by the Windows Presentation Foundation.
• System.Xml - "Provides standards-based support for processing XML,"^[11] including reading, writing, schemas, serialization, searching, and transforming.

A namespace is a context in which a group of one or more identifiers might exist. ... In computer programming and some branches of mathematics, strings are sequences of various simple objects. ... In computer science the boolean datatype, sometimes called the logical datatype, is a primitive datatype having two values: one and zero (sometimes called true and false). ... Exception handling is a programming language mechanism designed to handle runtime errors or other problems (exceptions) inside a computer program. ... In computer programming, a group of homogeneous elements of a specific data type is known as an array, one of the simplest data structures. ... Illustration of an application which may use libvorbisfile. ... A container is a type of data structure. ... In object-oriented programming, a collection class is any class that is capable of storing other objects. ... Look up list in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... In providing services in computer science, transport, and operations research a queue (pronounced kyew) is a buffer where various entities such as data, objects, persons, or events are stored and waiting to be processed. ... Look up Stack in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... In computer science, a hash table is a data structure that speeds up searching for information by a particular aspect of that information, called a key. ... In computing, an associative array, also known as a map, lookup table, or dictionary, is an abstract data type very closely related to the mathematical concept of a function with a finite domain. ... Generic programming is a way of computer programming where algorithms are written in an extended grammar and are made adaptable by specifying variable parts that are then somehow instantiated later by the compiler with respect to the base grammar. ... ADO.NET is a set of computer software components that can be used by programmers to access data and data services. ... ClickOnce is a Microsoft technology for deploying Windows Forms or Windows Presentation Foundation -based software, also called Smart clients. ... Typically Active Directory is managed using the graphical Microsoft Management Console. ... GDI is short for Graphics Device Interface or Graphical Device Interface, and is one of the three core components or subsystems of Microsoft Windows. ... In computing, the term stream is used in a number of ways, in all cases referring to a succession of data elements made available over time. ... For library and office filing systems, see Library classification. ... . ... This subsystem is a part of . ... HTTP (for HyperText Transfer Protocol) is the primary method used to convey information on the World Wide Web. ... The abbreviation FTP can refer to: The File Transfer Protocol used on the Internet. ... Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) is the de facto standard for email transmission across the Internet. ... SSL can mean more than one thing: Secure Sockets Layer, a communications protocol. ... In computer science, reflection is the process by which a computer program of the appropriate type can be modified in the process of being executed, in a manner that depends on abstract features of its code and its runtime behavior. ... CLR can refer to: Common Language Runtime CLR (cleaning solution) Compagnie Luxembourgeoise de Radiodiffusion Commonwealth Law Reports, the authorised reports of decisions of the High Court of Australia This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ... Component Object Model (COM) is a Microsoft platform for software componentry introduced by Microsoft in 1993. ... Distributed computing is a programming paradigm focusing on designing distributed, open, scalable, transparent, fault tolerant systems. ... In computer science, in the context of data storage and transmission, serialization is the process of saving an object onto a storage medium (such as a file, or a memory buffer) or to transmit it across a network connection link, either as a series of bytes or in some human... Look up binary in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Soap most commonly appears in bar form. ... The German Lorenz cipher machine, used in World War II for encryption of very high-level general staff messages Cryptography (or cryptology; derived from Greek κρυπτός kryptós hidden, and the verb γράφω gráfo write) is the study of message secrecy. ... 1. ... A regular expression (abbreviated as regexp, regex or regxp) is a string that describes or matches a set of strings, according to certain syntax rules. ... In computer programming, the StringBuffer class is one of two core string classes in Java. ... A web service is a collection of protocols and standards used for exchanging data between applications. ... It has been suggested that ASP master pages be merged into this article or section. ... Microsoft Windows Forms is the name given to the GUI portion of the Microsoft . ... The Windows API, informally WinAPI, is the name given by Microsoft to the core set of application programming interfaces available in the Microsoft Windows operating systems. ... 1. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... The Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a W3C-recommended general-purpose markup language that supports a wide variety of applications. ... The Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a W3C-recommended general-purpose markup language that supports a wide variety of applications. ...

See Also

• .NET Framework
• ADO.NET
• ASP.NET
• Windows Forms

This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... ADO.NET is a set of computer software components that can be used by programmers to access data and data services. ... It has been suggested that ASP master pages be merged into this article or section. ... Microsoft Windows Forms is the name given to the GUI portion of the Microsoft . ...

Other Capabilities of the .NET Framework

• Windows Presentation Foundation
• Windows Communication Foundation
• Windows Workflow Foundation
• Windows CardSpace

This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... This subsystem is a part of . ... This subsystem is a part of . ... This subsystem is a part of . ...

References

1. ^ MSDN Documentation - System.ComponentModel Namespace
2. ^ MSDN Documentation - System.EnterpriseServices Namespace
3. ^ MSDN Documentation - System.Globalization Namespace
4. ^ MSDN Documentation - System.Management Namespace
5. ^ MSDN Documentation - System.Messaging Namespace
6. ^ MSDN Documentation - System.Net Namespace
7. ^ MSDN Documentation - System.Reflection Namespace
8. ^ MSDN Documentation - System.Security Namespace
9. ^ MSDN Documentation - System.Threading Namespace
10. ^ MSDN Documentation - System.Timers Namespace
11. ^ MSDN Documentation - System.Xml Namespace

External Links

• .NET Framework Developer Center. Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN).
• Base Class Libraries Community. More information and FAQs about the BCL.
• MSDN BCL Documentation.
• BCLTeam's WebLog.