In my project i need to specify full path of all files I am using. Can I just add folder containing all these files inside the solution and tell visual studio where to find them ? I need to do this because because every time i want to add one file i could just specify its name and extension.`
//Instead of
OpenThis("c:\bla\bla\bla\cube.obj");
//I could do just
OpenThis("cube.obj");
`
I know you can just add file to a solution, but is there another way ?
You can take a look at this
Also, you might want select "Copy if newer" under the "Properties->Copy to Output Directory" for the file you want to include.
This will ensure that the file will get copied over to the output directory.
Related
My Current Situation:
I had a solution in which I split a large MVC project into two smaller projects. Of course the two smaller projects reference the same JavaScript and content files that were in the old larger project.
What I wish to do:
Instead of duplicating the scripts and content in the 2 projects, I want to create a shared folder that the 2 project refer to using something like a link or a shortcut.
How I am trying to approach the problem:
I think that solution folders are the solution to my problem. So I want to create a solution folder to which I will move all my scripts and content files.
However, my problem is that I have to move file by file to this folder since we cannot simply add an existing folder (I moved the scripts and content folders to the solution directory itself instead of being inside a specific project). And this is so tedious.
Here is what I tried to do:
First I tried to locate where solution folders are created. However, I discovered that solution folders don't physically exist. I think they are just some kind of logical structuring to your solution. Whenever you add a file to a solution folder it is physically added to the solution directory.
I thought that the solution file (.sln) may contain the configuration of solution folders and their content in some kind of xml format. However, this doesn't seem to be the case.
I opened the SQL Server Compact Edition file (.sdf) of the solution thinking that may there is a DB table that describes the solution folders. However, this also doesn't seem to be the case.
So, finally, my question is:
Is there any easy way to add an existing folder as a solution folder in order to avoid adding files one by one (I have too many files).
Update:
Thanks for the answers and suggestions. I ended up taking a somewhat different approach. I used a pre-build command: XCOPY "$(SolutionDir)Files\*.*" "$(ProjectDir)" /E. I did this because the suggested solutions and my previous attempt was to add links/shortcuts to the external resource files. While this was fine and shortcuts were actually added to the project, when I tested the MVC project, IIS didn't manage to load the resource files since it looks for physical files (of course).
So my query now is: is there someway, whether a build event or and configuration in the csproj file, to "Include In Project" the newly "physically" copied files?
As drew advised: editing the project file is one way. Another way is to edit the Solution file in a mechanism similar to that of the csproj file.
In a solution file, a project with a specific GUID holds the details of a set of folders.
Write a small app that will read your folder and output a small text of the desired output. Generate new Guids until the file is created. Just paste this at the top of the .sln file. 2150E333-8FDC-42A3-9474-1A3956D46DE8 seems to be the GUID used for Solution Items.
This sample has a few subfolders with content in a nested structure.
i.e.
Project("{2150E333-8FDC-42A3-9474-1A3956D46DE8}") = "NewFolder1", "NewFolder1", "{4CDFCC66-45BD-4B6D-8758-FEF7E9F61C1C}"
EndProject
Project("{2150E333-8FDC-42A3-9474-1A3956D46DE8}") = "SubFolder1", "SubFolder1", "{771BDBFB-5C01-4C51-A170-D88ECA8DE896}"
EndProject
Project("{2150E333-8FDC-42A3-9474-1A3956D46DE8}") = "SubFolder2", "SubFolder2", "{5D23AB90-5EF6-4611-A575-34F7B50BB1B6}"
EndProject
Project("{2150E333-8FDC-42A3-9474-1A3956D46DE8}") = "NewFolder2", "NewFolder2", "{135E9F67-2DF8-4458-AC6D-FF82FC1B3BC6}"
EndProject
Project("{2150E333-8FDC-42A3-9474-1A3956D46DE8}") = "SubSubFolder1", "SubSubFolder1", "{B41C7BAA-7E3D-405B-96AB-005120D12D26}"
ProjectSection(SolutionItems) = preProject
NewFolder1\SubFolder1\SubSubFolder1\a.txt = NewFolder1\SubFolder1\SubSubFolder1\a.txt
EndProjectSection
EndProject
Solution folders (on the file system) are optional, and in Visual Studio they're typically used just to organise files within Visual Studio.
It's a manual approach to create a "physical" folder at the same level as the solution but this reduces complexity.
Below are the steps for moving a single script file:
On the File System
Create a solution folder (typically at top-level directory)
Copy script file from (one) project to solution folder
In Visual Studio
Create a solution folder
Right-click solution folder, select Add > Existing item...
Select script file from the new solution folder on file system, then click Add
Exclude/Remove script file from project1
Right-click project1, select Add > Existing item...
Select script file from solution folder on file system, select "Add as link" from the drop down on the Add button
Repeat steps 6-8 for all other projects
By using "Add as link" the main thing we've done is to add a reference to the script in the solution folder as opposed to the actual file being copied to the project folder.
Note that you're not limited to working with one file at a time, it's just easier to track.
The fastest way I know of to find where you solution folder is located:
Within Visual Studio, open the "Solution explorer if it's not already open View -> Other Windows -> Solution Explorer (CTRL + ALT + L)
Within the solution exploerer, Right-click your project or solution
Select Add -> New Item.
The window that pops up will allow you to select a new file template, but what you're looking for is the "Location" field at the bottom. It should have the path to your solution folder. It's a safe bet that your solution folder is at this location or up a couple levels.
Once you get the path to your solution folder you can click Cancel to exit the wizard.
As far as I can tell, visual studio doesn't provide this feature through their interface. The intention probably is that project files exist within the project folder rather than being separate. It generally makes working with projects easier (moving, sharing, etc).
That said, you don't have to have every real folder in a project location actually included in that project. So you could do something like the following folder structure:
+ /Projects (contains ProjectA.csproj and ProjectB.csproj)
|
+-- /ProjectA (folder with files that are just for "ProjectA"
|
+-- /ProjectB (folder with files just for "ProjectB")
|
+-- /Shared (Folder with your shared scripts/files)
With this structure you should be able to use the "Show All Files" button and include the shared folder in both projects. You will probably need to manually edit the csproj files to map to this new structure but it shouldn't be too difficult.
The only other option I can think of is to try to manually edit the csproj files such as this question shows.
Hope that all helps. Best of luck!
My final solution to the problem is a combination of the solutions suggested answers and the approach I decided to take so that local IIS can see the files.
I added the following section to the csproj file:
<Content Include="..\Files\**">
<Link>%(RecursiveDir)%(Filename)%(Extension)</Link>
</Content>
I also added the following command as a pre-build event in my project:XCOPY /y "$(SolutionDir)Files\*.*" "$(ProjectDir)" /E
I have a set of text files that I need to have a test take in and use the items for specific parts of some Unit tests I am writing. I have put a file path in my app.config of just: .\DataLists\
After I put that in there I added the items needed to add a custom section so it would then get that file path information. The problem I am having is this...it is not finding those lists in that location it is looking at some tmp folder instead. How do I specify a proper file location for this?
Have you tried using the DeploymentItemAttribute? link Use this on the test method(s) where you need access to your 'set' (folder I assume) of text files. The best practice here is to add the folder and files you want deployed to your project file and set them to 'Copy if newer' or 'Copy Always'.
You can also add the file(s) or folder to the Deployment section of the .testsettings configuration screen. In my experience this works better during Team Builds than the DeploymentItemAttribute route. In either case the 'Enable deployment' check box found in the .testsettings config screen must be checked.
I renamed a folder using Tortoise SVN which creates a new folder.
Now I want to add it again but there is no add existing folder option and I can't show all files at the solution level.
How can it be done?
EDIT:
I know that solution folders are virtual, I would like to import an existing hierachy.
Folders on the solution level correspond to projects. So just add the existing project file (.csproj, .vbproj, .vcproj) to your solution from the new folder (if you have a reference to the project at the old location in your solution, remove it first).
However, if you are talking about a subfolder within a project, quickest way to get it right is to open the project file with a simple text editor like notepad, find the old folder name within there and rename it manually.
It cant be done. Solution folder are 'virtual'. Solution files are just links to the actual file location.
How do I change the folder of my existing solution file (sln)?
It's right now inside one of my project's folder; if I cut the solution file and paste it in the root folder,it doesn't load any of my projects.
Open solution explorer in Visual Studio and select the solution.
Click on File > Save MyProject.sln As ...
and choose the new location.
The solution file is just a text file. You should be able to move it and then edit it to make sure that any relative paths referenced in the file are correct.
I've also been able to right-click on the solution file in the solution explorer and then use save-as to save it in a different location. That doesn't seem to work everytime for me though.
Open a blank solution, save it to a location where you would like to move. Then add "Existing Project" and select the Old.sln file to add all the projects under the old solution file.
I just had to do this with some legacy projects I inherited so thought it might be worth documenting...
After upgrading from VS 2005 solution, I noticed that the solution file was at the same level as the project files. Our standard is to have the solution file one level above.
Opening the solution file in 'Notepad' I see the following:
Add required relative path to each of the project path and save in correct location:
In my case to bring up one level 'BloombergPriceRequestService\'
SO project line(s) will look like this:
Microsoft Visual Studio Solution File, Format Version 11.00
# Visual Studio 2010
Project("{FAE04EC0-301F-11D3-BF4B-00C04F79EFBC}") = "BloombergPaydownService", "BloombergPaydownService\BloombergPaydownService.csproj", "{17DDDD3E-CD39-48B4-BE3F-71E550FCBBFC}"
EndProject
Global
Don't forget to delete your old solution file!
if I cut the sln file and paste it in
the root folder,it doesn't load any of
my projects
Do this anyway, and try to open the solution. It will tell you that some projects couldn't be loaded: ignore the warning.
Then, go ahead and delete all the projects from the solution. After this right click the solution and select Add => Existing project and browse to your project file. Repeat for all projects in your solution.
Sometimes, the solution file may contain more than 5 projects attached to it.
In that case, Creating the new solution and adding projects to that is cumbersome and takes more time.
You can just edit the solution file to load the projects correctly.
Steps to do
sdas
1. Open the solution file in notepad or any text editor.
2. update the path which is underlined and made bold.
Project("{FAE04EC0-301F-11D3-BF4B-00C04F79EFBC}") = "BloombergPaydownService", "BloombergPaydownService\BloombergPaydownService.csproj", "{17DDDD3E-CD39-48B4-BE3F-71E550FCBBFC}"
Save the file and open in Visual studio.
Editing the solution file is a hazardous way to do things and I found a better way. Just create a new solution and add copies of the folders containing the various projects (in their respective folders) to the project.
You need
to select solution in solution explorer
then to find button File -> SaveAs solution.sln as
Press it
There are two ways you can do it:
Simply delete the entire project and create the entire project again in the other folder ( which is not recommended).
Here are the steps to follow without missing any files.
a. Goto Source control explorer Create a new folder or Just move the solution to which you want to move the folder to.
b. Load the solution in your local and it will prompt a message saying that do you want to reload it from source control click yes.
c. Once we load the solution you will see that the project you have moved won’t be loaded (Since we moved to the other folder)
d. So now, Remove the project which was not loaded and then add it as an existing project
e. I am sure that if you have added nugetPackages they won’t get loaded.
f. Goto file explorer of the particular project open the .csproj file and try to check the packages location, Error condition, Project reference and Import and apart from them if there are any
Which are pointing to a directory.
g. The simplest way is just adding some nuget package and see what is the path generated by visual studio.
h. Once we change the locations they will be loaded in references
i. After adding references try to build the solution and it will throw some build errors because we moved the project from one folder to other.
j. Add the project reference wherever needed after moving the files
k. Now the build will be succeeded.
More specifically my problem is if I include a pdf in my project and set its build action to content so it gets copied to the server when I publish, is there a way to exclude it from visual studios search and replace feature. Would a post build action be a solution to this? I just don't want anybody to do a global search and replace in my project and mess up the pdfs...
I know I just said a mouth full so let me know if you need clarification. Thanks!!!
If you look in the section headed "Find options" in the find dialog, there is an option titled "Look at these file types". If you qualify the type as *.cs, it will only look in files with that extension. You can also enter multiple file extensions. As long as you don't include pdf files in that filter, it will not apply to them. An alternative is to define a folder set to search in by clicking the ... next to the folder combo. Put your PDF files into a sub-directory of your project and exclude that folder from the folder set.
Additionally, as you have said, not including them in the project and using a post-build event to copy them to the output would also work.
I would qualify though that you are trying to solve a problem that shouldn't really be a problem. The onus is on the developer doing a find and replace to take care in doing so, and to not replace the contents of files they don't intend to change in the first place. Find an replace can be a dangerous tool.