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Manually Setting up a .NET Framework Project using VS Code

I am working on a project that requires me to build a .dll file in .NET framework 4.x
I know this would be super easy if I were to use Visial Studio. But I have set my mind on using VS Code as my IDE.
In theory Visual Studio "only" automates the creation of all sorts of metadata and references. So I figured it should be possible to do these things manually. Correct?
Can anybody direct me to where I can find how to do that?
I am working on Windows 10.

Because Code isn't adept at managing a project file (.csproj) - nor should anyone have to - you can actually use the dotnet.exe CLI to create the project and target .NET Framework instead. The only requirement is that .NET Core SDK needs to be installed, even if you use MSBuild because the new SDK-style project requires different targets.
Run: dotnet new classlib -o MyLibrary
Run: code MyLibrary
Open MyLibrary.csproj in Code
Change the line <TargetFramework>v4.5</TargetFramework>
Now you can run dotnet build or msbuild build, and even set up build and test tasks in Code. By default, Ctrl+Alt+B will run a build task, or prompt to create one from a template if none exist yet.
Now you can simply add files without modifying the .csproj file. I participate in many OSS projects that use technique and can easily switch between VS, Code, or even non-IDEs like vim.

It would require from you to type a lot of code and files that are otherwise automatically scaffold (generated) when you create a new project in Visual Studio. Even though VS Code is supportive for .NET framework coding (with the C# plugin), I would advice you to use Visual Studio (the community version would suffice). It has much better support for any .NET framework development.

VS2010 C# not including correct .net framework version in target

I am doing maintenance work on a VS2010 C# project built against .net v3.5.
I recently changed the project Target Framework properties to the latest version listed (v4) - due to an expectation of using a version of .net that is actually included in Win10 by default - and rebuilt without any apparent issues.
Unfortunately the embedded dependency in the generated .exe is still for .net v2.0.50727 (which is what is reported for v3.5 AFAIK) and the target machine (a clean install of Win10) is asking to install .net 3.5.
Using MS VS2010 v10.0.40219.1 SP1Rel.
Unfortunately upgrading the build tools isn't an option (building the program with VS2015 works just fine).
I have gone googling but don't seem to have found any similar reports.
Based on some of the comments already posted, I seem to have not made myself entirely clear - hopefully the following will help.
1) the intention/requirement is to be able to install this app on a clean install of Win10 without needing any further downloads. (installing .net 3.5 is easy to do, just not what is wanted)
2) the ultimate build environment for this is automated, visualized and not in my control and therefore upgrading the tool chain is a major pain that I'd like to avoid if possible.
3) AFAIK there are no third party libraries involved. All of the listed references (dll's) are v4.0.30319.
4) this is a XAML-based development, one part of three projects in the solution - the other entries are the installer and a C# custom installation library. As far as I can tell everything is set for .net v4.

Unfortunately the embedded dependency in the generated .exe is still for .net v2.0.50727 (which is what is reported for v3.5 AFAIK) and the target machine (a clean install of Win10) is asking to install .net 3.5
So there is some dependency in your project that targets that version of .NET. It could just be that you need to Build > Clean Solution and with a Build > Rebuild Solution the problem is solved.
Otherwise, assuming some library does require some .NET 3.x library, the installation request is entirely correct. Windows 10 does not have an option for installing .NET 2.0 and another for installing .NET 3.5. If you search for Turn Windows features on or off you will see this:
Any dependency on a .NET 2.x-3.x library will trigger the activation/installation of the first feature in the dialog.
As far as I can see, you have 2 options:
Move everything to a framework supported by Microsoft, most preferably .NET 4.7.2 given support and security.
Deal with the installation process and understand that Microsoft does not install these versions of .NET in purpose. You can, however, add these installers as a prerequisite and even bundle them with your installation, but that won't help much.

Thanks to all who have tried to help me!
The issue has been resolved.
There appear to have been two causes for this issue and my confusion:
it turns out that the blank install of Win10 that the testing was being performed on was not entirely clean - the pre-installed network drivers/utilities from intel also had a .Net v3.5 dependency...
one of the embedded resources in the project was effectively a uncompressed tar-ball containing a number of files; including an executable that had the dependency on .net v3.5 - this was a binary blob stored in svn so the content was had not been updated for several years (ie well before my involvement) ...
With both of these issues addressed it would appear that my problem is solved, so once again thank you for your feedback, suggestions and patience,
PeterT :->

How to know what are the prerequisites for my windows form application

I have made an application using C# in windows forms. I am using Install shield 2010 to create a setup file for the application. It asks me what it should check for as prerequisites which it would check for before starting to install on any other device.
However, I do not know what I should include as prerequisites for my windows application. I do not know if it requires .net 4.5 or 4 or 3.5... I also had downloaded and included some references in the project and do not know if they are being included in the setup or not...
Please help

You need to look at the project properties of your winform app and see what version of the .NET framework you are building against. In some cases you can do things like compile against .NET 2.0 but then have an App.Config file that says 2.0 and 4.0 are supported runtimes. This gives you flexibility in choosing which if any .NET to redistribute.
From there you have to look at your dependencies (references) and there dependencies. It's possible that they require additional things such as C++ runtimes, database engines. For each of these you have to figure out if it's already part of windows, if a third party redistributable exists, can it be statically linked or privately deployed and so on.
There is no one simple answer. You just have to be familiar with your code base, what it requires and what the best practices are for each of those items.

Packaging a .NET Application So It Will Run On A Computer Without .NET

I have been recently trying to deploy a C# application on a computer that does not have .NET installed.
I know that there have been many questions around the same topic here on StackOverflow. Here are a few of them, of which I read the responses to all:
Packaging up the .net framework with a .net application deployment
Run a .net application without installing .net client profile?
Run C# windows application in windows XP without installing .NET Framework
So all of the responses to the above questions state that it is impossible without specific software, etc. One software mentioned was the Salamander .NET Linker. The only problem with that is that I cannot seem to be able to run the application after it has been processed by Salamender. I understand that this in itself is impossible, as it requires the .NET virtual machine to run. However, in the past, I have made Java applications and along with them, I shipped the entire JVM. Surprisingly, they still worked. So the reason why this is not a duplicate of the above questions is because my true question is:
What items of the .NET framework would I need to package? If I do manage to package all, would placing them in the same directory as the application I'm running allow the application to run?
I found one solution to this, the Microsoft .NET Redist Package. The only problem with this is that it has a GUI of its own. Aside from that, it would be a perfect fit. So, could anyone tell me one of two things:
Is there a command-line .NET package, and if so, where do I download it?
If there isn't, or it would be impractical to do so, approximately what directories would I need to copy from the .NET installations?
I understand that these files and directories are system specific, and that my .NET installation may not work on your computer, but if C# is like Java, then this should be achievable. Is it? Size is not a limitation, it does not matter to me whether or not the application and all its files is 1GB, or if it is only 1MB.
If in case there is no other solution, I used Dependency Walker to check all the dependencies of my program. If I were to package most of them, would my application, in theory, work?

For .NET, you really must just install the appropriate .NET framework. The .NET framework installation does include command line options to allow for silent installs, such as:
dotnetfx35.exe /q /norestart
For details on the command line options, see the options for 3.5 and for .NET 4.0.
That being said, most installation packages will handle these details for you as part of the installation. Using a decent installer will take care of this dependency automatically.

Depending on the pieces of the .NET Framework you need, you can use Mono. It supports shipping the runtime without installing just like you would a JVM, or you can statically link against the binaries to create a native executable .

If you are planning to deploy your application (and presuming the setup process doesn't need to be too complex), you can simply create a Setup project in Visual Studio and then bootstrap the prerequisites (.NET framework, and other stuff you think you might need).
You can follow the steps described in these MSDN articles:
How to create a Setup project in Visual Studio
How to add prerequisites to a Setup project
A walkthrough is given in this CodeProject article.
For more complex deployment scenarios (such as installing device drivers along your app, or better localization support), I would recommend looking into WiX (Windows Installer XML) toolset. It's a toolset that builds Windows installation packages, which you configure using XML files inside Visual Studio. WiX also supports various bootstrapping scenarios.
This page covers the differences between VS Setup projects, WiX, and InstallShield.

How can I deploy a C# application if users don't have .NET installed?

I have a C# program which I want to make available to my users, but the problem is that it requires .NET framework version 4.0. This is a problem because it was released pretty recently (April 2010) and a lot of people probably don't have it. To make matters worse it takes a while to download and install the framework (~10 minutes).
Is there any way I can install just a part of the framework I need? If that isn't possible can I compile my code down to a native binary for specific systems
eg. x86 32-bit, x86 64-bit, etc.
I've looked at a company called 'spoon' http://spoon.net/ but that looks like it just emulates apps on a server (sort of like citrix). What can I do to resolve this dilemma?

Anyone who wants to run your program needs the appropriate version of the .NET Framework installed. There's no way to work around this. It honestly amazes me how often this question gets asked. You can't compile .NET code down to any kind of a "native binary", and you can't distribute only the portions of the framework that you need. If all of this was important to you, you should have chosen a different development platform in the beginning.
Your only option is to bundle the .NET Framework along with your application's installer. The way to make this easiest on your customers is to use Visual Studio to create a setup project that will automatically install the .NET FW if they don't have it already, and then install your application, all in a single step process.
Visual Studio has built-in support for creating such a setup project, and most of the dirty work is handled for you. File -> New Project -> Other Project Types -> Setup & Deployment -> Visual Studio Installer. Then, pick either the "Setup Project" or "Setup Wizard" option, and follow the instructions.
The only thing to keep in mind since you've developed for .NET 4.0 is that there are two versions of this framework: the full version and the "Client Profile". The Client Profile is an attempt to do exactly as you mention and install only the portions of the framework that are used by the typical application. You have to first figure out of this is a deployment option for you. If your program uses classes that are not available in the Client Profile, you need to install the full version. Otherwise, you can consider installing the Client Profile, which is the default for all new projects targeting .NET 4.0 in VS 2010. Check the "Target Framework" settings for your application, under the project Properties. If it's not set to Client Profile already, try changing it and see if it will compile. That's the quickest way to tell if this deployment option is available to you. But there's only about a 15% difference in size between the two frameworks, so it isn't really that big of a deal if you must deploy the full version.
Either way, the setup project will automatically determine and bundle the correct version for your app. Definitely don't make the user download and run the .NET installer separately. Use the setup project and do this for them automatically. If you don't have VS or don't want to use the one it provides, investigate alternatives, like Inno Setup, which also support deploying and installing the .NET runtime with an app.

In many cases you do not need the entire .NET Framework 4.0 and can use the much smaller .NET Framework Client Profile. You can then use an installer to bundle the client profile installer with your app into a single deployment.
You cannot run a .NET app without the framework. If this is a deployment issue for your customers, you should consider either a Click-Once installer (web-based automated installation and updating) or porting the app to Silverlight.

For the sake of completeness, there is also the possibility for .NET Core release deploy Self-Contained Deployments (SCD) nowadays. When you create a self-contained deployment, .NET Core tools automatically include the latest serviced runtime of the .NET Core version that your application targets.
Deploying a Self-contained deployment has two major advantages:
You have sole control of the version of .NET Core that is deployed with your app. .NET Core can be serviced only by you.
You can be assured that the target system can run your .NET Core app, since you're providing the version of .NET Core that it will run on.
Here is a small guide from Scott Hanselman.