I have an asp.net mvc web application, and i have a reference to SharpArch.Web (one of the Sharp Architecture assemblies)
When i rebuild the project, and run it, an exception is thrown telling me that the (Newtonsoft.Json.dll) is missing from the Bin folder which is used by (SharpArch.Web), so it's ok, i copied it, and every thing worked well.
When i try to rebuild the project again, the exception is thrown again, and the (Newtonsoft.Json.dll) assembly is deleted ??
Why did that happen? what does visual studio have to do with non-referenced assembly ?
and FYI, VS doesn't delete everything from Bin, just a specific assemblies !!!
and BTW i don't want to add a reference to (Newtonsoft.Json.dll), i don't like to reference an unused assembly.
I had the same situation on one solution I was working on. So I ended up putting those .dll's into a separate folder. In my case I named this folder "ServerAssemblies". Then I modifyed my project file (.csproj in my case) and added an "AfterRebuild" target. That way there is noe need to add references to unused assemblies to the project.
<Target Name="AfterRebuild">
<ItemGroup>
<ExtraAssemblies Include="$(SolutionDir)ServerAssemblies\**\*.*"/>
</ItemGroup>
<Copy SourceFiles="#(ExtraAssemblies)" DestinationFolder="$(ProjectDir)bin\"></Copy>
</Target>
I suppose that the Bin\ directory is reserved for mangling by Visual Studio. You'll have to put your assembly in a different location.
Related
I'm using the old VS 2015 Pro (C# project) and it seems like there is a bug or I don't understand something.
As I discovered by experimenting, adding copies of a dll file (that is already referenced by project) into Resources (bin\Debug\Resources) as Content (or None) makes Visual Studio overwrite (replace) the referenced dll (in bin\Debug folder), causing BadImageFormatException at startup. By including in Resources I mean adding instances of this:
<Content Include="Resources\NuGetPackageName\public\x64\DllName.dll">
<CopyToOutputDirectory>Always</CopyToOutputDirectory>
</Content>
Removing these fixes the problem. Changing Content to None or Always to Never (or both) does not fix the problem. It does not make any sense to me. Why is it copying the file to bin\Debug as well??
I'm referencing the DLL from the packages folder (it's coming from NuGet package). Technically, I'm pulling 2 NuGet packages, they both contain x64 and x86 version of the same dll as content and (for each package) one of them (based on selected x86/x64 in VS) is getting copied by prebuild script into a special location inside each package (in packages\PackageName\SpecialLocation folder) and one of the two is used as reference in the project - don't ask why! I know it's crazy!). It was working fine until these additional copies in resources appeared - actually after adding another project to solution, because it was still working fine before it was added. The new project does not copy or reference this dll so it does not affect this). I've checked that the copy in packages\PackageName\SpecialLocation is not getting overwritten incorrectly, so it's only the one in bin\Debug that is getting swapped.
Can you think of any reason for this happening?
I have a large solution in which the "root" project includes feature projects by glob:
<ProjectReference Include="..\Feature\*\*.csproj" />
This works, despite not looking great in the references list, but the issue that occasionally Visual Studio will rewrite the csproj with all of the project references resolved:
<ProjectReference Include="..\Feature\A\A.csproj" />
<ProjectReference Include="..\Feature\B\B.csproj" />
It's not clear what triggers this, but I'm guessing it might have something to do with NuGet.
Is there anyway to stop VS from doing this (akin to using DisableFastUpToDateCheck for custom MSBuild scenarios)?
It's not clear what triggers this, but I'm guessing it might have something to do with NuGet.
It should be related to the items in the ItemGroup. I have the similar issue before, but the difference is that I use wildcards to contain .cs files and your are .csproj files, looks like:
<ItemGroup>
<Compile Include="**\*.cs" />
</ItemGroup>
When I delete one of .cs file in the <ItemGroup>, the wildcard gets expanded in the csproj file. For you case, if I deleted the the C.csproj project from Visual Studio (Add it before, reload the root project), then I got the same result as you.
For this issue, many other community members submit a user voice to Visual Studio team: VS IDE should support file patterns in project files. Now this is well supported in the new project system used by .NET Core and .NET Standard in Visual Studio 2017, but they haven't done the work to support it for existing project types.
Is there anyway to stop VS from doing this (akin to using DisableFastUpToDateCheck for custom MSBuild scenarios)?
To resolve this issue, you can use option Exclude="..." to exclude the project that you do not want to refer to:
<ItemGroup>
<ProjectReference Include="..\Feature\*\*.csproj" Exclude="..\Feature\C\C.csproj" />
</ItemGroup>
Or, if you want to delete one of project and keep the wildcard pattern, you only need to unload the root project, then delete the reference project, reload the root project, the wildcard pattern would be preserved.
Hope this helps.
I've done further research on this.
For testing, you can consistency reproduce the expansion by renaming any project that's included in the wildcard pattern.
Also, the easiest way to prevent the expansion is to:
Move the project reference globs into Directory.Build.props or another external file
Set DisableFastUpToDateCheck to true in your csproj
Using properties doesn't work and isn't required, likewise with using an Exclude.
I am trying to create a VISX extension for Visual Studio 2010 that contains a few project templates. These templates aren't very complex, but I want to expose some additional configuration for them during creation via a wizard. I have successfully set up my VISX package to deploy the templates to the directory structure I want in VS2010, but as soon as I try to configure and run a wizard, I receive an error when I create the template along the lines of:
Error: this template attempted to load component assembly
'My.Assembly, Version 1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=...
My current configuration is as follows:
All the projects live in the same solution.
The VISX project includes project references to the project containing the wizards and to each template.
Each template is built from a project template template (...confusing terminology).
They are added through the .vsixmanifest designer as content, referencing the projects.
Each .vstemplate file has a WizardExtension element pointing to the IWizard implementation and containing assembly.
The wizard assembly is signed.
The .vstemplate files point to their wizards like this:
<WizardExtension>
<Assembly>My.Assembly, Version=1.0.0.1, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=a494da9e6e53f845, Custom=null
</Assembly>
<FullClassName>My.Assembly.Wizard</FullClassName>
</WizardExtension>
This, as far as I can tell, is how I'm supposed to do it. What exactly is going wrong? It looks like it can't find the assembly. Are there any other steps I need to take in order to get the assembly visible to the templates? The assembly is deployed to the extension folder when it is installed (I verified this), so it is at least making it out. Is there something special I need to do to the .vstemplate files to tell them to look in the extensions folder vs the GAC? Did I just miss something?
Note that I have found several pages on the internet stating that I have to GAC the assembly manually or with a script. However, few had my exact scenario (Project template templates being referenced by a VISX project, most examples are using a regular project exported via the project template wizard and having their packages dumped into the VISX folder structure). The only one I found that matched my scenario was an example from Microsoft. I tried to match that, but alas it still does not work. I tried relocating the project I downloaded to reference in this question but I cannot find it again, though.
Using scripts is how we've done this before, but I want to try and make things a little cleaner using VISX packages. I would like to avoid this, but if it's mandatory to script the VISX to install the template to GAC, I can do that.
When deploy the wizard based project template by VSIX Extension, it is better to use Short-Named assembly in .vstemplate. This can avoid the GAC deployment.
In your case, it should be:
<WizardExtension>
<Assembly>My.Assembly</Assembly>
<FullClassName>My.Assembly.Wizard</FullClassName>
</WizardExtension>
I am using VS2015 and faced this issue on and off. When I started building VSIX project with Wizard implementation, everything worked fine for sometime (4-6 weeks) and suddenly it stopped working. After a couple of weeks it would start working again and stop working without notice. Took me long time to find a workaround (still don't know why it suddenly stops).
This is how my VSIX project is built
I have VSIX project, project template and Wizard implementation in
the same solution.
VSIX and Wizard implementation are in the same project.
Added VSIX project dll and project template as Assets in VSIX project source.extension.vsixmanifest.
Project template *.vstemplate has Wizard section which refers to VSIX project with strong name:
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
<WizardExtension>
<Assembly>Test.Template.TemplateInstallerWizard, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=30ab381f68dc4f5e</Assembly>
<FullClassName>Test.Template.TemplateInstallerWizard.WizardImplementation</FullClassName>
</WizardExtension>
None of these worked for me
Uninstalled extension from VS regular instance via Tools->Extensions
and Updates..
Uninstalled extension from VS experimental instance by
launching VS exp instance from VS2015 command prompt as Administrator:
devenv.exe /rootsuffix exp
and then uninstalling the extension via Tools->Extensions and Updates..
Using short named assembly as explained by #Ethan Wu.
Installing templates via this command from VS2015 command prompt launched as administrator:
devenv /installvstemplates
Rebooting VS2015, my machine several times during this process.
This is what worked for me (thanks to #Ethan Wu)
Remove certificate from VSIX project.
Remove strong name from Project Template *.vstemplate
file
<WizardExtension>
<Assembly>Test.Template.TemplateInstallerWizard, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=null</Assembly>
<FullClassName>Test.Template.TemplateInstallerWizard.WizardImplementation
Clean and build the project.
Remove extension from VS regular instance and close VS2015 (not
absolutely required)
Install the extension.
Open new VS2015 instance and try to create the project with
wizard.
Couple of things to help debug
When VSIX project is build, in bin\debug folder a file is
created -extension.vsixmanifest which has the assets type.
Look for Asset Type="Microsoft.VisualStudio.Assembly":
AssemblyName value is what is expected in project template's
*.vstemplate WizardExtension section - they should match exactly.
After installing extension, go to VS2015 extension location on
local box:
%appdata%\..\Local\Microsoft\VisualStudio\14.0\Extensions\<some_temp_folder>
open extension.vsixmanifest to ensure that Asset
Type="Microsoft.VisualStudio.Assembly" AssemblyName value is
correctly populated. If required, you can change this value and
restart VS2015 to make this in effect.
Hope this will help someone and save tons of time as there is very little help on Wizard and custom project templates.
Thanks,
RDV
I run into the same problem, but mine came to light when I updated the AssemblyVersion of my wizard project. I checked and the versions in the manifest files matched as they should.
I simply went into C:\Users\Albert\AppData\Local\Microsoft\VisualStudio\16.0_c340331cExp\Extensions, found my extension and deleted it there. Now it works again.
(Note that I did find a few others since I've since changed the company name etc, in the AssemblyInfo file, so it could be the old ones laying around that also caused this)
In our Visual Studio 2010 project we reference - among the others - the SmartAssembly.Attributes.dll and it's properly copied to the Bin/Debug or Bin/Release folder of our local dev machines. On the build server this is true for all other references but not for 'SmartAssembly.Attributes.dll'. The build succeeds.
What should I check?
Thanks.
Open your .csproj file (or .vbproj file), and look for the assembly reference. Then make sure the hint path is still valid in your build server. Sometimes VS2010 will add an absolute hint path, instead of using one relative to the .csproj file itself, so the drive letter may be invalid in another machine.
For example, the reference may look similar to the one below (I made up all of the XML below to illustrate only and it's NOT valid), and the absolute hint path may be invalid in the build server (e.g. there's no drive letter d there):
<Reference
Include="SmartAssembly.Attributes, Version=8.0.0.0,
Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f1f7f1ad5da3a,
processorArchitecture=x86">
<SpecificVersion>False</SpecificVersion>
<Private>true<Private>
<!-- The HintPath below should exist and be valid in your build server -->
<HintPath>d:\temp\SmartAssembly.Attributes.dll<HintPath>
</Reference>
You can change the HintPath to make it relative to the .csproj file and therefore more general. For example:
<HintPath>..\libs\SmartAssembly.Attributes.dll<HintPath>
Another problem may be that <Private>true<Private> isn't there. This attribute mapped to the CopyLocal property in Visual Studio, so if it's missing from your .csproj, the DLL won't get copied to bin\Debug or bin\Release by MSBuild. See http://bronumski.blogspot.com/2009/06/project-reference-fun-and-games.html
We have several external DLL files being referenced in our Web Application Project. We have a deployment project for installing on the hosting servers. When we were using .NET 3.5 and Visual Studio 2008 the DLL files were being copied to the bin folder. Since we have upgraded to .NET 4 and Visual Studio 2010 this no longer happens, and we are getting server errors since the references cannot be found.
CopyLocal is set to true, and I cannot find anything inside the web.config which suggests this is being set elsewhere.
There is a bug in Visual Studio 2010. By default the XML in the solution file looks like this:
<Reference Include="DevExpress.SpellChecker.v11.1.Core,
Version=11.1.5.0,
Culture=neutral,
PublicKeyToken=b88d1754d700e49a,
processorArchitecture=MSIL">
<HintPath>..\References\DevExpress.SpellChecker.v11.1.Core.dll</HintPath>
</Reference>
Whereas MSBuild is expecting this below, so that the DLL file will be included in the deployment:
<Reference Include="DevExpress.SpellChecker.v11.1.Core,
Version=11.1.5.0,
Culture=neutral,
PublicKeyToken=b88d1754d700e49a,
processorArchitecture=MSIL">
<HintPath>..\References\DevExpress.SpellChecker.v11.1.Core.dll</HintPath>
<Private>True</Private>
</Reference>
The trick is to set Copy Local to False, save the project and then reset it to True - save again. This includes the Private node correctly, which MSBuild respects.
It appears that the default for no included private node (Copy Local) in Visual Studio 2010 is True, while MSBuild reads that missing node as False.
I was getting the same problem and rather than add a "BeforeBuild" step I created a test that simply did this
[TestMethod]
public void ReferenceAssemblyThatDoesNotCopyToBuildFolder()
{
Microsoft.Practices.EnterpriseLibrary.ExceptionHandling.Logging.LoggingExceptionHandler referenceThisButDoNotUseIt = null;
}
And that fixed the error The type 'Microsoft.Practices.EnterpriseLibrary.ExceptionHandling.Logging.LoggingExceptionHandler...' cannot be resolved
Something weird had happened to my deployment project. When I saw it had no detected dependencies, I removed the primary output and re-added it.
The dependencies are now showing up and being placed in the bin folder when installed.
I was getting exactly the same issue. We have a Visual Studio 2008 project which references the EnterpriseLibrary. When we run our integrated build using TFS and our Web deployment project, all the DLL files are copied over. When we upgraded to Visual Studio 2010, TFS 2010 and WDP 2010, some of the DLL file's were missing. Strangely, this only occurs to some DLL files and not others.
For example, we get the Microsoft.Practices.EnterpriseLibrary.ExceptionHandling.dll copied in both cases, but not the Microsoft.Practices.EnterpriseLibrary.ExceptionHandling.Logging.dll.
As a workaround I copied the files accross using a "BeforeBuild" step.
It now seems to build OK.
I just had the same issue and wanted to share what I found as it might help someone:
The reason in my case was that the assembly was installed in the GAC during an installation of some third-party application.
If the DLL file is in the GAC, the compiler won't bother to copy it to the destination folder, unless you specifically mark it for "copy local" using the "Private" node in the project file as mentioned by Junto.
The thing is that if you don't add that node, and you develop on one machine and build on a different one, and the DLL file is only in the GAC of the build machine, the default behavior without the private node will cause the file to be copied correctly on the development machine, but not on the build machine.
The bigger problem is if the DLL file is not referenced directly, but the project references a second project that in turn references the DLL file. In that case, you cannot mark the DLL file to be "copy local" in the project, as it is not referenced by it. So if the DLL file exists in the GAC - it won't get copied to your output folder.
Possible solutions to this case are:
Uninstall the DLL file from the GAC
Add a direct reference to the DLL file in the end project(s)
Re-sign the DLL file with a new strong name, which will differentiate it from the DLL file in the GAC.
I am not sure how it was set up in Visual Studio 2008, but I am almost positive that you might have been using the Post-Build event command line. In there you can tell to copy the DLL files you need for deployment. An example is given below:
mkdir $(SolutionDir)\Deployment
copy "$(SolutionDir)Your_Library_Name\Your_Dll_ForDeployement.dll"
$(SolutionDir)\Deployment\
I didn't meet the same problem but similar. I had WPF main project and referenced project where the referenced did not copy. I found that in my case the main project was set for NET 4.0 Client Profile and the referenced for NET 3.5. When I set the main project to 3.5 the compiled dll of the referenced project started to copy.
(I don't know why because I solved it by practice)
I too ran into a similar issue where referenced dlls were not copied into the bin in published folder. I was using a TFS checked out copy that didn't include the bin folder into the application.
-> So just included the bin folder.
-> Built the referenced applications
-> Published the website project
Now I see all the referenced dlls in bin in the published folder
I had a similar issue with VS 2012 Express. I used Tesseract libraries in my project. Everything worked well until I used this project in a solution where were more than one project. Problem was that some DLLs (liblept168.dll, libtesseract302.dll) that are normally placed in folders bin/debug/x86 or bin/debug/x64 were copied only when I rebuilt whole solution.
Changing a single line and building it again caused that the DLLs were deleted and not copied back.
I solved this issue by adding a reference of the project that creates missing DLLs to the startup project.
rzen and others, thanks - your comments led to a solution for us.
We have a project that targets version 10 of the Microsoft.ReportViewer.Common.dll and Microsoft.ReportViewer.WebForms.dll assemblies (separate "libs" folder we created at the 'src' level). But when we did a build, the output included version 12, which was recently installed on the build server.
Using comments here, we ensured that 'Copy Local' was set to True and that the flag was set in the project file. However, it was still deploying version 12. So what we found that did the trick was ensuring that the 'Specific Version' property was also set on the two references. Voila, version 10 of each file is now being deployed!
There was much rejoicing.
JH
If your project does not directly load the library, it won't always be deployed, even if it is referenced explicitly! I got confused because I could see it in a local Bin directory but not when deployed. The dll in the Bin directory was an old file that wasn't removed during Clean which is why I was confused.
A full clean and rebuild and it wasn't in my local Bin folder either which showed me the problem (I only use it in web.config). I then referenced the dll file itself in the project and set it to copy to output to make sure it gets deployed.
We can use the <Private>False</Private> to not to copy the referenced DLL files to the bin directory. This is useful when we are building applications in a separate TFS build server where we need to build the application and not to copy the DLL files to the bin directory.
Check the framework of the project in which the DLL file has been referenced. The framework should be .NET 4.0. Please correct it if the framework is Client Profile.
Adding the parameter
/deployonbuild=false
to the msbuild command line fixed the issue.
Got a similar issue when upgrading old WebSites into WebApplications.
The "Clean Solution" command would wipe out all external DLL files I purposely left in my bin folders.
Besides, it was not possible to bring those DLL back automatically simply by referencing them all, since many of them have the same file name (it happens when you work with many language specific resources)
Like stevie_c did, I took advantage of the Pre-Build command, but made it simpler:
I just used a xcopy command in the Pre-Build operation of the WebApplication project's properties. This way I could bring over the necessary external DLL files just before the build would start.