Easy GIS .NET is a suite of .NET 2.0 GIS and mapping tools and controls to let developers easily incorporate GIS functionality into their applications.
The tools currently support ESRI shapefile format.
Easy GIS .NET is free software released under the Lesser General Public License. You can freely use it in personal and commercial software.
Easy GIS .NET components have been designed to handle very large shapefiles, without compromising performance or memory usage.
Furthermore the componentized design means that you can incorporate GIS and mapping functionality into your .NET desktop applications
and ASP .NET web pages with a few mouse clicks and minimal code.
If you are looking for a free .NET Shapefile library don't pay expensive licensing costs for a product that may not give you the same benefits of Easy GIS .NET.
Not only is Easy GIS .NET free, in most cases it outperforms expensive commercial software.
History
In 2004 while working on a GIS project, I started developing a simple .NET shapefile library using C# for in-house project purposes. At the time the company I worked for was also using ESRI products. While the library was quite good, it was shelved as my time was consumed working on other non-GIS projects.
In 2007 I started working on a small project that required GIS functionality. This project did not merit investing in commercial software for the GIS functionality and so I investigated many of the Open Source and other free GIS software, only to find that they just couldn't handle large shapefiles.
At this point I returned to my shapefile library and some time later the first version of Easy GIS .NET was complete.
Winston Fletcher
Creator of Easy GIS .NET