The Base Class Library (BCL) is a Common Language Infrastructure (CLI) standard library available to all CLI languages. CLI 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, which makes the programmer's job easier. It is much larger in scope than standard libraries for most other languages, including C++, and is comparable in scope and coverage to the standard libraries of Java. The .NET Framework, being the first implementation of CLI, is the origin of the BCL. It is sometimes incorrectly referred to as the Framework Class Library (FCL) but the FCL is actually a superset including Microsoft specific namespaces.
The BCL is updated with each version of the .NET Framework.
Read more about Base Class Library: Namespaces
Famous quotes containing the words base, class and/or library:
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have left a radio-active and not radiant land.”
—Libby Houston (b. 1941)
“What exacerbates the strain in the working class is the absence of money to pay for services they need, economic insecurity, poor daycare, and lack of dignity and boredom in each partner’s job. What exacerbates it in upper-middle class is the instability of paid help and the enormous demands of the career system in which both partners become willing believers. But the tug between traditional and egalitarian models of marriage runs from top to bottom of the class ladder.”
—Arlie Hochschild (20th century)
“Knowing I loved my books, he furnished me
From mine own library with volumes that
I prize above my dukedom.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)