Benchmarking Native AOT performance of MsdialConsoleApp

[kozo2]

Proposed mentors: @YukiMatsuzawa @kozo2

Language/skills: .NET project build techniques, How to run MSDIAL

Estimated Project Length: 90 hours

Difficulty: easy

This project is centered on the continuous development and enhancement of the .NET framework, specifically transitioning to the Long-Term Support (LTS) version, .NET 8, which was released last year. The upgrade promises numerous advantages, such as improved performance and additional features vital for contemporary applications. The MSDIAL GUI application currently utilizes .NET Framework 4.8, and the Command Line Interface (CLI) version is built on .NET Core 3.0, which is no longer supported. A timely transition to a newer framework version is essential.

The primary goal is to update both the framework and its dependent packages to harness the benefits provided by the latest .NET version, focusing on enhanced performance and other key improvements. A significant aspect of this project involves exploring the capabilities of Native AOT (Ahead-of-Time) compilation. This advanced compilation method transforms bytecode or source code into native machine code prior to runtime, greatly boosting application performance and startup speed. By pre-compiling code into native binaries, it negates the need for Just-In-Time (JIT) compilation at execution time, leading to quicker application launches and more efficient runtime performance, as the hardware directly executes the code. This approach is particularly advantageous for scenarios demanding swift execution and in environments where JIT compilation is impractical or unwelcome.

Contributors to this project will focus on upgrading the framework to .NET 8 for MSDIAL5 and updating the console version of MSDIAL for better development practices and performance enhancement. Additionally, there's an opportunity to experiment with building the console version using Native AOT, to further explore performance optimizations in various environments.