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Introduction
.NET Client Profile is supported by .NET Versions 3.5 and 4.0. It is designed for client applications like Console Applications, Windows Forms, WPF Applications and so on.
As we all know there are many types of applications and hence what is required by one application may not be necessarily required by another type of application. For example, System.Web is only used by ASP.NET / Web apps, this is of no use for Windows Forms app.
The Client Profile version of .NET Framework is a lightweight subset of the Framework. This enables quicker deployment and small installation packages.
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Let's see how Microsoft made the .NET Client Profile
Microsoft removed some of the features from the .NET Framework to make the footprints smaller and optimized.
Microsoft chose to remove ASP.NET, MSBuild, Advanced WCF features and support for Oracle databases to reduce the framework into a smaller and optimized footprint.
Web Applications don't support the Client Profile version of the framework.
Web applications are server-side and so full .NET Framework installation is recommended, unlike client applications.
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Microsoft has removed the Client Profile from the latest version of .NET Framework 4.5 and hence with .NET 4.5 there is no Client Profile as shown in the image below.
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Why .NET 4.5 doesn't have a Client Profile
Now if you think from a deployment's point of view, you would want your installer to be as optimized and small as possible, so it takes the minimum required on the client machine and this can be done by the Client Profile flavor of.NET 3.5 and 4.0.
.NET 4.5 is already optimized and tuned for quicker deployment and takes a small amount of disk space for all type of applications. Hence, no more .NET 4.5 Client Profile.