I use MSBuild and CruiseControl.NET for my automated build process.  Just yesterday I was debugging a problem in one of my assemblies and came across this warning message:

Use command line option '/keyfile' or appropriate project settings instead of 'AssemblyKeyFile'

I had never noticed the warning before, but looked into some of the past builds and noticed that it had always been there.  After doing some research, I found out that Visual Studio 2005 now considers the use of setting the AssemblyKeyFile in the AssemblyInfo.cs file a security issue.  This is due to the AssemblyKeyFile attribute being embedded within your assembly and possibly containing sensitive path information.  The warning also recommended setting this information via the project settings.  I use an external strong name key file for all of my assemblies.  It resides outside all of my projects/solutions.  When I referenced this strong name key file, VS2005 copied it into the project.  This wasn't a good thing at all.

After looking into what was going on, I noticed that in the project msbuild file, there is a property called AssemblyOriginatorKeyFile.  VS2005 automatically set it to reference the copied strong name key that it placed in the project.  I updated this path to reference my external strong name key, saved it, and deleted the local copy of the strong name key in the project.  I tested the build and it worked!

I have no idea why Microsoft designed it this way, but thankfully this method works great.

After using Resharper 2.0 for over a month now, I have had enough time for me to decide which tool I'm going to use from now on.  That tool is CodeRush and Refactor! Pro from Developer Express.

Having used Resharper 1.x thoroughly in the past, I am very familiar with the tool.  I tried several of the 2.0 betas, but decided to wait for the final release due to all the bugs and crashes involved with beta testing.  When 2.0 finally came out I was very excited to try out all of the new features.  Installation went without a hitch and I was up and running in no time.  Over the course of a month and a half, I only had the tool crash on me 3 times, not too bad.  There wasn't any one thing that I disliked or found to have problems.  The thing that really bothered me was how slow it was.  Just starting VS2005 (not opening a solution/project) takes almost 30 seconds, and I'm running it on a very fast machine (P4 3.8Ghz 64-bit, 2Gigs mem).  I have heard other people complain over this same issue.  So tonight I'm reinstalling CodeRush and Refactor! Pro.  If you haven't had a chance to try it out, you definately should.  It's rock solid with tons of features.  To make things even better, version 2.0 is coming out this week with tons of new features.  You can read about it here.  One of the nice things is they are packaging CodeRush and Refactor! Pro together now.