I'm trying to create a managed library and package it with Nuget. The managed library consumes another DLL written in C and makes the calls through [DllImport] P/Invoke calls. In the root of the project I have a folder structure like:
root/runtimes/win-x86/native/file.dll
root/runtimes/win-x64/native/file.dll
I am not using a .nuspec file but instead generating the Nuget package from the .csproj file from a .NET STandard 2.0 project. I'm including those files with this in the .csproj file.
<ItemGroup>
<Content Include="runtimes\**" PackagePath="runtimes" Visible="true" />
</ItemGroup>
The nuget package has the managed DLL in the lib/netstandard2.0 directory and even has the unmanaged DLL in root/runtimes/RID/native directory. The project that is consuming this nuget package installs perfectly and builds without error.
The managed DLL the consumer will interface with is trying to use that native DLL like this
[DllImport("file_name.dll")]
private static extern IntPtr CscanHOpen(string connectionString);
//...
public void Open(string connectionString, int port) {
_handle = CscanHOpen(connectionString, port);
}
I'm getting the "file cannot be found" error from the project installing the nuget package and when I look in the build directory I don't see that unmanaged DLL there. I've tried using a targets file to copy the unmanaged DLL to the output directory of the consuming project but it never shows up.
I keep looking back at this question because there are no answers, so I'm going to repeat what we discussed in the comments.
The runtimes feature of NuGet only works for projects using your package with PackageReference, not packages.config. In fact, despite being on the NuGet client team, I'm not actually sure if runtimes is an SDK-style project feature, or if it also works with traditional projects. Honestly, I expect it only works with SDK style projects, because it requires the rest of the build system to know how to use these assets.
Therefore the answer to your question is to test your package with a SDK-style project. All .NET Core apps are SDK style, but you can also edit the project and change <TargetFramework>netcoreapp2.2</TargetFramework> to `net48, or make the xml tag plural and the value a semi-colon delimited list of TFMs.
Also note that class libraries don't have a host, hence don't have a RID. Therefore you may not see the runtime dlls. You need to make sure your test project that uses the package is something that has a host & entry point, like a console app.
To support packages.config projects (and probably traditional projects using PackageReference) you will need to bundle your own props and targets file in the package. You said you tried it, but it didn't work, which unfortunately just means you were doing it wrong. NuGet has a convention on how you must name your props and targets file. If you got that right, then the way you implemented copying the files didn't work. You can use MSBuild's increased verbosity, or msbuild -bl coupled with the MSBuild structured log viewer to debug your targets file.
Using the runtimes feature is so uncommon I don't really have any experience with it and don't know how to support both traditional projects, while using the integrated runtimes support in SDK style projects. I suggest you'll need to make sure your targets have a condition to run only when it's not an SDK style project, but I don't know how you'd detect that.
Related
I have a solution with an application project (ASP.NET Core) and multiple library projects. I want to separate some of the library projects into a separate solution and turn them into NuGet packages.
With the libraries in the same solution I could of course simply edit something in a library, run the application and see how it works (and debug, if necessary).
However, when I turn the libraries into a NuGet package, the application references the packages from our private NuGet feed instead of the project file.
My question is: is it possible to locally "override" the package reference and use the local source code instead? That way I could still edit the libraries and see the effects in the application. This is a lot easier than having to publish a new package for every small change (especially when trying to fix an issue or implementing a new feature).
DNT (Dot Net Tools) does this. You can specify which packages to switch and where they are.
See the 'switch-to-packages' and 'switch-to-projects' command line switches.
Its a bit fiddley as (when I last tried) you had to create a config file that holds the mapping, and it seems to be easy to break the switching. But its something.
https://github.com/RicoSuter/DNT
I've not tried it, but maybe you can use it to switch to packages on a commit for the build server to work correctly? (Or to ensure the references are correct in source control?)
If you want to use nuget in your project and debug, even modify the source files of the nuget packages, this is not a good choice because you should build the nuget project(generate the new changed dll) and repack it as a nuget package, then reinstall, to enable the changes. It is too complex.
Once you install the nuget, no matter how many changes you make, it’s useless. The nuget installed at this time is the version you made before any changes. No matter how you change it, it is the previous version. The version stays at that timestamp, unless you repackage the project. Generate nupkg and update the nuget version.
So nuget is not a good choice for your situation, you should use ProjectReference.
Directly use the ProjectReference to reference two source projects, build at the same time, and get the changed parts at the same time.
ProjectReference could cross two different solutions.
Add this on the main project:
<ItemGroup>
<!--add any nuget project'csproj file like this to debug its source code-->
<ProjectReference Include="..\xxx\xxx.csproj">
</ProjectReference>
</ItemGroup>
If the proejct is out of the solution, you could directly use the full path of the nuget project's csproj to connect it.
I'm not sure what you mean by "override" but you can always add the library project to your ASP.NET Core solution and reference it like normal project references. A project referenced within a solution doesn't have to be physically placed in the same folder as the solution itself.
This, however, does require that any developer on the project has both GIT repositories cloned locally (given your two solutions are located in separate GIT repos) in order to be able to build the ASP.NET Core solution. But I don't really see that as a downside.
Context
I have a Managed C++/CLR library which is built using CMake 3.17, and packaged into a NuGet package using CPack. The resulting nupkg file cannot be imported into a C# project, as the Package Manager issues the following error: "[snip] the package does not contain any assembly references or content files that are compatible with [.NETFramework,Version=v4.5.2]". However, adding a reference to either the project when added to the solution, or the corresponding library file generated by the build, works as intended.
C++/CLR Details
The code itself is very basic and produces a valid library which can be referenced from another project, when manually adding a reference via Visual Studio 2017 -> Add Reference (either the project or the corresponding library can be added this way and it works all the same).
The code consists of the class itself, and AssemblyInfo.cpp provides attributes which describe the metadata and version information only. The dependencies include only System, System::Runtime::InteropServices, and a raft of pre-built native libraries.
I have not added a .nuspec file, nor a nuget.config file, the latter which I believe is generated by the CPack NuGet generator when the package is built.
CMake / CPack Details
CPack NuGet support is relatively new, and I have been unsuccessful in finding a working example, but I have managed to successfully generate a nupkg file. Firstly CMake is instructed to build a Managed C++ library with the included source files, and the following properties set on the corresponding target ManagedLibrary:
set_target_properties (ManagedLibrary PROPERTIES DOTNET_TARGET_FRAMEWORK_VERSION "v4.5.2")
set_target_properties (ManagedLibrary PROPERTIES COMMON_LANGUAGE_RUNTIME "")
The documentation states that this will generate CLR/Mixed code and works as advertised, so I am able to successfully build against the target framework. The next step was to install the library in what I believe is the correct location:
install (TARGET ManagedLibrary DESTINATION . COMPONENT MixedCLR)
And supporting (native C++) libraries are installed similarly:
install (FILES [various..] DESTINATION . COMPONENT MixedCLR)
I also set CPACK_GENERATOR to 'NuGet', and then run the PACKAGE step from the CLI using cmake --build . --target PACKAGE which successfully produces the nupkg file.
Question
How does NuGet know what libraries to add a reference to?
Is a nuspec file required? If so, what must minimally be included in it, and how do I include it in the target CMakeLists.txt?
Is it acceptable to put the managed library, along with supporting native libraries, in the root of the package? If not, where should they go?
Are any other files generally included in a nupkg file?
Finally, if anyone knows anything about packaging and multi-targeting in C++/CLR to support different framework versions / architectures / build configurations, any notes on that would be highly appreciated.
How does NuGet know what libraries to add a reference to?
Primarily NuGet infers the libraries to reference from the package structure. Managed assemblies must be put in a directory which is libs/<TFWM> where TFWM is the Target Framework Moniker (eg: .NET Framework 4.5.2 => net452).
Is a nuspec file required? If so, what must minimally be included in it, and how do I include it in the target CMakeLists.txt?
The nuspec file is automatically generated by CPack at package generation time. The generated file is saved to the output directory, and will preserve the directory structure specified by the install command.
Is it acceptable to put the managed library, along with supporting native libraries, in the root of the package? If not, where should
they go?
As already discussed, the managed libraries go in libs/blah. Native libraries, on the other hand, go in runtimes/<RID>/native where RID is the Runtime ID. In my case I wanted to target Windows 64-bit, so the Runtime ID is win-x64.
Are any other files generally included in a nupkg file?
I bundle the PDB for convenience, but I didn't need to specify any other files or properties.
Finally, if anyone knows anything about packaging and multi-targeting
in C++/CLR to support different framework versions / architectures /
build configurations, any notes on that would be highly appreciated.
If targeting multiple framework versions it's simply a case of creating and installing multiple targets into the respective folders, there's nothing more complex to deal with.
Finally, my finished package structure looks like the following:
libs/
net452/
ManagedLib.dll
ManagedLib.pdb
runtimes/
win-x64/
native/
NativeLib1.dll
NativeLib2.dll
...
I hope this helps someone in the future.
I am working on creating a sample Nuget package to test out the process of creating an internal Nuget package for use in another project of mine. My end goal is to create a simple Nuget package, which can be installed onto another simple C# project, and tested out.
I have been following the Microsoft tutorial to create & publish a package using VS:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/nuget/quickstart/create-and-publish-a-package-using-visual-studio-net-framework
I successfully created & published my package on nuget.org, called MyNugetPackage, and attempted to install it onto my other C# project called TestingMyNugetPackage. I received an error in the NuGet package console stating:
Package does not support any target framework
This error makes sense, because I had read about supporting multiple .NET versions and specifying the version under the lib folder, and I definitely did not do that when creating my package:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/nuget/create-packages/supporting-multiple-target-frameworks
This idea of lib folder makes sense to me and I think I understand how to add my target .NET version to it. However, I cannot find this folder anywhere! It's not anywhere in the C# project directory. I assume I may need to create it on my own, but I'm not sure where to put it.
Many tutorials and SO questions I have read about this topic talk about how to use the lib folder, but no one ever says where it is. I'm a complete beginner to this and I know I am missing something obvious here, but I'm not sure what it is.
Edit: I did try to change my .nupkg file to a .zip file and extracting the contents in attempt to view the lib folder. This did work in extracting the contents, but I did not see any lib folder after expanding entire project tree and searching for lib.
Here is a quick layout of my C# solution tree:
Solution titled MyNugetPackage with a MyNugetPackage.sln file, a MyNugetPackage.csproj file, and a simple class Logger.cs that just has a public void Print(string text) { Console.WriteLine(text); } method:
MyNugetPackage
MyNugetPackage.csproj.1.0.0.nupkg
MyNugetPackage.nuspec
MyNugetPackage.sln
MyNugetPackage (folder)
bin (folder)
Debug (folder) -> .dll, .pdb
Release (folder) -> .dll, .pdb
obj (folder)
Debug (folder)
Release (folder)
Properties (folder)
AssemblyInfo.cs
Logger.cs
MyNugetPackage.csproj
Could someone direct me where I need to place my lib folder, so that I can add my supported .NET 4.7 framework reference, and successfully install my package?
A NuGet package (.nupkg) is just a zip file. If you are trying to view the contents of this file, open it like a zip file (using 7zip or something). Alternatively change the extension to zip. In the package you will find the "lib" folder as well as the .nuspec, and package folder (among other contents). But this is the resulting package that is built when you Pack your project, changes here would have no affect on your code.
If you're just trying to target one or more frameworks. In VS, edit your project file (.csproj). This file is an XML with a PropertyGroup that contains either a "TargetFramework" OR a "TargetFrameworks" element. To target a single framework add a TargetFramework element, to target multiple use the TragetFrameworks instead.
To target a single .Net framework:
<PropertyGroup>
<TargetFramework>net472</TargetFramework>
</PropertyGroup>
Alternatively, you can target multiple frameworks.
<PropertyGroup>
<TargetFrameworks>net472; netcoreapp3.0; netcoreapp2.1</TargetFrameworks>
</PropertyGroup>
This would target .Net 4.7.2, .Net Core 3.0, and .Net Core 2.1
I'm looking forward to setup an environment/configuration that allows me to build and deploy a custom library for multiple platforms / targets, such as build configurations and/or .NET framework versions. For this, I've laid out the following structure:
MyProject.sln
src\
File1.cs
File2.Net30.cs
MyProject.Net40.csproj
MyProject.Net30.csproj
MyProject.Net45.csproj
All project files are included in the solutions and built at once. Each project contains the source files for the framework it targets and/or all files where as different .NET versions are compiled conditionally (using compiler directives, e.g. NET35, NET34_OR_GREATER). Additionally, each project file contains the following msbuild directives:
<OutputPath>bin\$(Configuration)\$(Platform)\$(TargetFrameworkVersion)\$(TargetFrameworkIdentifier)\</OutputPath>
<BaseIntermediateOutputPath>obj\$(Configuration)\$(Platform)\$(TargetFrameworkVersion)\$(TargetFrameworkIdentifier)\</BaseIntermediateOutputPath>
<DocumentationFile>bin\$(Configuration)\$(Platform)\$(TargetFrameworkVersion)\$(TargetFrameworkIdentifier)\$(AssemblyName).xml</DocumentationFile>
This allows me to build them all at once by routing the output into different directories.
Now, that's all for building. However, I'm really stuck with deployment, especially related to NuGet. I've created a .nuspec where I include every dependency manually:
<file src="bin\Release\AnyCPU\v4.0\MyProject.dll" target="lib\net40-client\EIT.Foundation.dll" />
<file src="bin\Release\AnyCPU\v4.0\MyProject.xml" target="lib\net40-client\EIT.Foundation.xml" />
<file src="bin\Release\AnyCPU\v4.5\MyProject.dll" target="lib\net45\MyProject.dll" />
This works fine, but is really tedious. So first question: Is there any way to hook up the files automagically?
And my second problem: Sometimes my libraries have NuGet dependencies themselves. For project dependencies, a packages.config is automatically created in the same folder as the project when downloading NuGet dependencies. The packages.config not only contains the dependency or its version used in the project, but also which framework version of the dependency is required. This is a bit of a problem since every project file (for each framework target) resides in the same folder, so they would need to share the same packages.config file somehow. I'd tried relocating the project files to a different structure like this:
MyProject.sln
target\
net40\MyProject.Net40.csproj
src\
File1.cs
... however then I'm unable to preserve the folder structure in my source folder (if there's any) because the project files only allow me to include files, not folders (they are being automatically included.) Is there any way around this or is NuGet simply not suited for multi-target builds?
Whilst NuGet supports creating a NuGet package for a particular project it is targeted for single projects. The command is NuGet pack YourProject.csproj so I suspect it will not help you. Using a .nuspec file is probably the only way to get this working.
NuGet supports multiple projects in the same directory if you rename the packages.config file. Each packages.config file should be named after the project. So in your example the following should work:
packages.MyProject.Net40.config
packages.MyProject.Net30.config
packages.MyProject.Net45.config
I am attempting to publish and consume versioned NuGet packages of class libraries while avoiding headaches for local development. Here is a sample Visual Studio solution layout:
| Libraries
| LibraryA
| LibraryB
| LibraryC
| Applications
| ApplicationD
| ApplicationE
This is a single solution containing both shared class libraries and multiple applications. Currently references to the class libraries by the applications are local in-solution references.
What I would like to do is to publish the libraries (A,B,C) as versioned NuGet packages which are then referenced by the applications as needed (D,E). This allows a change to a shared library to be independent from an update to an application which is deployed. Without this, changing one library could cause the binaries to change in a dozen or more applications, all of which would technically need to be tested. This is undesirable, and versioning with NuGet fixes this.
However, let us say that I want to update the content of LibraryA and ApplicationD at the same time. In order to do this after we have switched to NuGet, I will have to make changes to LibraryA, commit them, wait for the package to be created, tell ApplicationD to update its reference to LibraryA, and then test or develop in ApplicationD. This is far more complicated than simply working with both at the same time using local in-solution references.
What is a better way to get both the robustness of versioned NuGet packages for my shared class libraries while also keeping development simple even if it spans over multiple projects and applications? The only other solutions I have found all involve too much overhead or headache, such as having to constantly change the references for ApplicationD between the NuGet package and the local project.
EDIT: To clarify the premise, this question assumes the following:
The architecture (solution and project organization) cannot be significantly reorganized
Shared libraries are going to change at a non-trivial frequency
Changing a shared library cannot force any application to be updated
Applications can reference different versions of shared libraries
Although it takes some work, it is possible to hand-edit .csproj files in order to set up conditional referencing by adding a Condition attribute to the appropriate references.
EDIT I've moved these conditions into ItemGroups, as it seems this is how my mentioned production code is working, and there has been mention of this being a possible issue in VS 2013.
<ItemGroup Condition="'$(Configuration)' == 'Debug Local'">
<!-- Library A reference as generated by VS for an in-solution reference, children unmodified -->
<ProjectReference>...
</ItemGroup>
<ItemGroup Condition="'$(Configuration)' == 'Debug NuGet'">
<!-- Library A reference as generated by NuGet, child nodes unmodified -->
<Reference Include="LibraryA">...
</ItemGroup>
This would allow you to have, on the Projects D & E, configurations of "Debug NuGet" vs. "Debug Local" which reference the libraries differently. If you then have multiple solution files which have their configurations mapped to the appropriate configurations on the projects within, the end user would never see more than "Debug" and "Release" for most operation, since those are the solution configs, and would only need to open the full solution for editing the A, B, & C projects.
Now, as for getting the A, B, & C projects out of the way, you could set them up under a folder marked as a subrepo (assuming you're using an SCM that supports this, such as Git). Most users would never need to pull the subrepo since they're not accessing the ABC projects, and are instead grabbing from NuGet.
Maintenance wise, I can guarantee that VS will not edit the conditional references, and will respect them during compilation -I have gone through both VS 2010 and 2013 (EDIT: Professional version, though I have delved into doing the same with express) with the same conditional reference projects at work. Keep in mind than in VS, references can be made version-agnostic, making NuGet the only place from which version need be maintained, and that can be done like any other NuGet package. While I'm hopeful, I have NOT tested whether NuGet will fight with the conditional references.
EDIT It may also be prudent to note that conditional references can cause warnings about missing DLLs, but does not actually hinder compilation or run.
EDIT For those still reading this, I'm now (7/2019) hearing that the IDE isn't as friendly to these changes anymore, and either it or the Package Manager may override them. Proceed with caution, and always read your commits!
Update for .NET Core (2.x ++)
.NET Core 2.x actually has this functionality built in!
If you have a project reference to project A in project B, and project A is a .NET Standard or Core project with proper package information (Properties -> Package with Package id set to your NuGet package ID), then you can have a regular project reference in project B's .csproj file:
<ItemGroup>
<ProjectReference Include="..\..\A\ProjectA.csproj" />
</ItemGroup>
When you pack (dotnet pack) project B, because of the Package id in project A, the generated .nuspec file will be set up with a NuGet dependency to that Package ID, together with other NuGet references you might have, instead of just including the built DLL file.
<dependencies>
<group targetFramework=".NETStandard2.0">
<dependency id="Project.A" version="1.2.3" exclude="Build,Analyzers" />
<dependency id="Newtonsoft.Json" version="12.0.2" exclude="Build,Analyzers" />
</group>
</dependencies>
I know this is a 2-years old post, but just found it while facing the same situation. Also found this for VS2015, I'm in the process of testing it. I'll come back and adjust my answer accordingly.
https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=RicoSuter.NuGetReferenceSwitcherforVisualStudio2015
I also faced a similar problem. One approach that worked was using local repository (which is basically just a folder in local) and adding post-build script in the libraries. For example: let's say you need to update your implementation for LibraryA, then include following 3 steps in your post-build event for LibraryA:
Check if local repository has that version of package; if yes then delete it
rd /s /q %userprofile%\.nuget\packages\LibraryA\#(VersionNumber) -Recurse -ErrorAction Ignore
Create a nuget package
nuget pack LibraryA.csproj
Push it to local repository
nuget push LibraryA#(VersionNumber) -Source %userprofile%\.nuget\packages
These steps will make sure that the package is always updated for that version after each build (we had to do this since nuget packages are immutable)
Now in ApplicationD, you can point to local repository (%userprofile%.nuget\packages) to get LibraryA; such that after each build of LibraryA, you will receive an updated version of it in ApplicationD
PS: Inorder to get version number of you library you can use this : Determine assembly version during a post-build event
Unfortunately, there really isn't a way to have the best of both worlds. Internally in my company, we've mitigated it somewhat with a fast build/deploy process, which counteracts most of the burdens with always referencing a NuGet package. Basically, all of our applications use a different version of the same library hosted in a local NuGet repository. Since we use our own software to build, deploy, and host the packages, it makes it pretty quick to update the library, then update its NuGet package in another solution. Essentially, the fastest workflow we've found is this:
Make changes to library
Automatically build and deploy version of library incremented by 1 to internal NuGet feed
Update NuGet package in consumer application
The whole process from check-in to updating the consuming project takes around 3 minutes. The NuGet repository also has a symbol/source server which helps tremendously with debugging.
In the properties of ApplicationD, go to the "Reference Paths" tab and add the path of the output folder of LibraryA. Then, if you change and build LibraryA, the next build of ApplicationD will use the modified LibraryA.
When you are finished, don't forget to remove the "Reference Paths" and update the referenced NuGet package version.
My not-so-clean yet fastest solution so far is:
Assuming the following two separate solutions:
VS Solution 1: contains libraries published as nuget packages:
Solution1
|_ my.first.library
|_ my.second.library
VS Solution 2: contains applications, which consume one or more of the above libraries as PackageReferences:
Solution2
|_ my.first.application
| |_ depends on nuget my.first.library (let us say v1.0.1)
|
|_ my.second.application
In case, I'm making changes to my.first.library
I proceed as follows:
Make code changes to my.first.library and rebuild
Navigate to the build output directory of my.first.library (e.g. <Solution1 directory>/my.first.library/bin/debug/netstandard2.0) and copy the .dll and .pdb files
Navigate to the my.first.library's local directory of the currently being used nuget feed (for example at: C:\Users\user.name\.nuget\packages\my.first.library\1.0.1lib\netstandard2.0) and replace the .dll and .pdb files there with the ones generated in step 1 (possibly making backup).
Changes get reflected in my.first.application. Continue working and repeat steps 1-4, when needed
Advantages:
being completely local. No secondary nuget feeds needed.
zero changes to .csproj/.sln files
Caution:
While this solution offers you flexibility, make sure you clear your nuget cache before acting on them, for example by publishing to a nuget server. Thanks #Benrobot