Chrome Version Assembly The chrome version assembly makes it possible for load-time dependencies of chrome.exe to be shipped in Chrome's version directory to ease updates (eg. chrome_elf.dll). This is done by turning the version directory into a private assembly which refers to any DLLs that chrome.exe needs to know about. New DLLs should be added as entries in "version_assembly_manifest.template". In an ideal world, this would be done by embedding an application config in chrome.exe that would refer to the proper version directory via a probing\privatePath attribute (http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/aa374182.aspx). This would allow us to refer to dlls in the version directory without having to make the version directory itself into an assembly. It would also avoid naming conflicts (as the WinSxS dir and GAC both take precedence over private assemblies when searching for dlls). Unfortunately, the probing\privatePath attribute is only supported for Windows 7 and later.