System.Addin: How to update an addin without restarting an application.

Question

Hello.

Here is a scenario:

1. There is a service that can't be stopped
2. Some functionality of the service will be based on pluggable modules: addins.
3. Some time we need to update addins on live service without restarting service. Operation should be performed like this: an administrator replaces assembly of addin, type some command in our console and new version of addin is loaded.

It is possible through shadow copy. But it seems that System.Addin doesn't use shadow copying when loading addin's, so we can't replace an assembly file - it's locked by our service.

Is there some way to force System.Addin to use shadow copying?

Thank you in advance,
Anatoly.

Answer 1

I'm very sorry, just I was inattentive. There is an overload of Activate method that accepts AppDomain as parameter.