Working with the Global Assembly Cache

Every .NET installation has a code cache called the global assembly cache. This area serves three primary purposes: -

It is used to store code downloaded from the Internet or other servers (both http and file servers). Note that code downloaded for a particular application is stored in the private portion of the cache-this prevents it from being accessed by others.
It is a data store for components shared by multiple .NET applications. Assemblies that are installed into the cache by using the Global Assembly Cache tool are stored in the global portion of the cache and are accessible by all applications on the machine.
One question I hear frequently is, "Where does the jitted code get stored such that my C# code is only jitted the first time it is executed?" Now you know the answer: native code versions of assemblies that have been prejitted are stored in the cache.